Jan Timman, Tata GM group B: “I don’t have illusions”
We continue our series of three interviews, with players from the Tata Steel A, B and C groups, who all make some sort of comeback. In the second interview we have Dutch chess legend Jan Timman, one of the world’s leading players for two decades. At the peak of his career he was considered to be the best non-Soviet player and was known as “The Best of the West”. Timman has won the Dutch Championship nine times and has been a Candidate for the World Championship several times. He recently turned 60.
At the Tata Steel chess tournament, which starts next Saturday in Wijk aan Zee, Timman will be playing in the B group. You can find more info here.
In the latest issue of New in Chess Magazine, on one of the first spreads there is a big photo taken at the Immopar tournament in Paris, 1991. You’re being interviewed, after winning the final, while your opponent Garry Kasparov looks disappointed. In a recent radio program you didn’t mention this as one of your biggest successes. Was this because it was a rapid tournament?
Yes. Of course, without a doubt this was my biggest achievement but it wasn’t, let’s say, a long-running achievement. It’s not the same as when you’re playing a tournament that lasts for weeks and where you manage to stay in good shape. On top of that, it wasn’t calculated for the rating list. But on the other hand, if you just take the result by itsef, it should be considered my best result. I beat the strongest players in the world convincingly in short matches and besides, I could have beaten both Karpov and Kasparov with 2-0. I would certainly have won that second game against Kasparov if I hadn’t offered a draw. I had a winning position and I had more time on the clock. But at that moment I thought: you never know what can happen, and a draw is enough.
Related to this: how do you see the development of rapid chess and blitz becoming more and more important. Since January 1st, tournaments can be calculated for separate rapid and blitz ratings and it’s a known fact that FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has tried to cut down the rate of play considerably. Do you see this as a negative trend, or do you also see positive sides, perhaps for popularizing the game?
Let me start by saying that I think it’s a good idea to introduce separate ratings, especially for rapid tournaments. Rapid tournaments have clearly become more important. When we were active with the GMA [Grandmaster’s Association – CV], we didn’t like it but in the mean time rapid has become more important, for example for tie-breaks. That’s why in my opinion separate ratings are certainly justified. I’m not so sure if it’s a good idea to set up a separate rating system for blitz tournaments. But the importance of these tournaments should not be overrated. For example, the tournament in Reggio Emilia has made clear that also at top level enough games are decided. It just depends on who is playing the tournament. In Reggio only thirty percent of the games ended in a draw, a very low number, if you compare this with the past. So this is not a reason to hold less classical chess tournaments. And that’s what it’s all about, to make chess more popular, I can imagine you’d want to make rapid tournaments more important, but even then you have to be careful. You cannot just say, look, we have this idea for a TV show, 25 minutes for each player, and then you can produce an hour of TV. That’s a very old idea which we already discussed in the GMA, but first you need to know if a show can really be successful like this. Or rather, you first need to know if rapid chess can really make chess significantly more popular. There are not enough signals that point in this direction.
More here.
I thought Timman retired.