In a welcome return after two years of shutdowns and two weeks of depressing headlines, the St. Louis Chess Club revived its much-missed invitational Classic Chess series this month, with American GM Sam Sevian and Ukrainian GM Illya Nyzhnyk sharing top honors in the 10-player St. Louis Spring Classic A Tournament.
On 14 February the Yugoslav-Serbian grandmaster Borislav Ivkov died in Belgrade at the age of 88. In 1951 Ivkov was World Junior Champion and in the 1960s and 1970s he was one of the world's best players. He made it to the Candidates in 1965, and who played in the Interzonal Tournaments in 1967, 1970, 1973, and 1979. | Photo: Durch National Archive
At the end of 2013, a match facing chess legends from the 20th century against young female talented players was organized in Podebrady, the Czech Republic. A 20-year-old Alina Kashlinskaya was the top scorer in the winning team of the Snowdrops, while Boris Gulko and Iossif Dorfman were the strongest for the Oldhands.
Lubomir Kavalek, 1943-2021
The Czech-American grandmaster, former number-10 in the world, coach, organizer, trainer, commentator, author, columnist, and member of the U.S. Chess Hall of Fame Lubomir (Lubosh) Kavalek died at the age of 77 after a brief but severe illness. The news was confirmed by his wife Irina.
Kavalek was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic), on August 9, 1943, exactly five months after GM Bobby Fischer. He won his first national championship in 1962 at the age of 19. In the same year, he played one of his most famous games, as Black against Eduard Gufeld, at the World Student Team Championships: