WELCOME MESSAGE FROM THE FIDE PRESIDENT KIRSAN ILYUMZHINOV

Today is a remarkable date for the chess world – the 100th anniversary of a chess legend Mikhail Botvinnik.

Mikhail Botvinnik is known as one of the greatest chess players of the twentieth century, the founder of the Soviet chess school and three-times World Chess Champion. Mikhail Botvinnik played a major role in the chess life of his generation which led chess to a new, state level of its development. Due to his outstanding chess career and achievements people of his country learned more about chess and it gradually entered every Soviet family. He is not only the "Patriarch" of the Soviet chess school but also a wise mentor of such noble chess players as Anatoly Karpov, Garry Kasparov and Vladimir Kramnik among the others.

Anyone who loves chess will always remember his style of play and his brilliant games against Capablanca, Tal, Smyslov. These games helped many people learn and fall in love with chess. Playing top class chess for decades, being an eminent chess author, one of the pioneers of computer chess and one of the openings theory researchers, Botvinnik is widely regarded as the most influential chess contributor in the world.

We are paying tribute to the first world class player who will be in our hearts forever.

Smyslov-Botvinnik, 1954