Player Profile: Boris Gelfand

Full Name: Boris Abramovich Gelfand

Peak FIDE Rating: 2777 achieved in 2013

Federation: Israel

Active Since: 1973, and is an active player.

Player Description: 

A long-time legend of the game, Boris Gelfand was born in the Soviet Union and later became a citizen of Israel. His longevity in Chess is legendary, as he has stayed in the top 20 for most of his life. In addition to being a chess player, Gelfand is also an author in the chess world, having published three books. 

Talking about his early career, Gelfand was just five years of age when his father bought him a Chess book so that he would have something to do. In the beginning, Gelfand was reluctant to read but finished it later. The name of the book was Journey to the Chess Kingdom by GM Yuri Averbakh and Mikhail Beilin. 

The family quickly learned that Boris was interested in the sport and he was given a coach as early as the age of 5. Gelfand studied under a couple of additional coaches until 1980, when he was attending the Tigran Petrosian School. 

After a sparkling career, where he once was the World Championship challenger, Gelfand now is semi-active player, a Chess author and has also coached Daniil Dubov and the Norwegian Chess Team. He has authored four books.

Career Scorecard:

Games Played: 1720

Games Played as White: 861, Won: 297, Draw: 428, Loss: 136

Games Played as Black: 859, Won: 194, Draw: 485, Loss: 180

World Championship Cycles Appearances:

Gelfand appeared in two World Championship cycles - 2007 and 2012.

Olympiad Medals:

Novi Sad 1990 (Team Gold)

Dresden 2008 (Individual Silver and Team Silver)

Khanty-Mansiysk 2010 (Team Bronze)

National Championships:

Belarus National Championships (1984 and 1985)

Tournaments won:

• Sokovsky Memorial 1983

• Belarusian Championship 1984, 1985

• Soviet Union Junior Championship 1985

• European Junior Championship 1987

• World Junior Championship 1988 (Tied for first place)

• European Junior Championship 1988 (Tied for first place)

• Manila Interzonal 1990 (Tied for first place)

• Wijk Aan Zee tournament (Tied for first place)

• Chess World Cup 2009

• 2012 Candidates Tournament

• FIDE Grand Prix 2012 (Tied for first place)

• FIDE Grand Prix 2013 (Tied for first place)

Best Games: 

1: Boris Gelfand vs Vishwanathan Anand 2012: Boris Gelfand almost defeated the Indian Grandmaster Vishwanathan Anand in the 2012 World Championship, but lost in Rapid games. The match kicked off with six draws, and then Gelfand took the match lead in the seventh game by capitalizing on a mistake by Anan,d but the Indian made a comeback in the eighth game. The rest of the 12 games in the regular schedule ended in draws, so the match went into a tiebreaker. The first tie-breaker was a draw, and Gelfand faced time trouble. Anand took the lead and edged Gelfand to the title. 

2: Boris Gelfand vs Alexander Grischuk 2011: Gelfand and Grischuk met in the 2011 Candidates tournament. The first five games ended in a draw. Gelfand went on to win the sixth and the final game on the white side of  a Grunfeld defense to win the match and the tournament.