Maxime Vachier-Lagrave

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave
At 2016 Dortmund Sparkassen Chess Meeting in Dortmund
Country	France
Born	(1990-10-21) 21 October 1990 Nogent-sur-Marne, France
Title	Grandmaster
FIDE rating	2811 (September 2016)
Peak rating	2819 (August 2016)
Ranking	No. 4 (October 2016)
Peak ranking	No. 2 (August 2016)

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (French pronunciation: [maksˈim vaˈʃje laɡʁˈav]; born 21 October 1990), sometimes referred to as MVL, is a French chess Grandmaster and the 2009 World Junior Chess Champion. He is currently the No. 1 ranked player in France^[1] and the third highest rated player in the world.^[2]

Vachier-Lagrave is a three-time French champion (2007, 2011, shared 2012) and four-time winner of the Biel Grandmaster Tournament (2009, 2013, 2014, 2015). He also holds a university degree in mathematics, which he earned in 2010.^[3]

Early life

From the age of six, Vachier-Lagrave competed in numerous sections of youth tournaments, winning the French Under-8 championship in 1997, U-10s in 1999, U-12s in 2000, U-16s in 2002, runner up in the U-18s in 2003 and won the U-20s in 2004 scoring 8/9.

He also took part in the World Youth Chess Championship, coming third in the U-10 division in 2000 (8½/11), third in the U-12 championship in 2001 (8/11), second in the U-14 event in 2003 (9/11) and third in U-16 section in 2005 (8½/11).

From 2001 to 2008, his FIDE rating increased steadily from 2198 in January 2001 to 2637 in January 2008. Vachier-Lagrave passed 2600 in October 2007 and 2700 one year later.

He became an International Master in 2004 and achieved the Grandmaster title in 2005 at the age of 14 years and 4 months^[4] after sharing first in the 2004 Paris Championship with 6½/9, winning the NAO GM tournament in 2004 with 6/9 and coming second in the Évry GM tournament in February 2005 with 7½/9.^[5]

His strong results culminated in winning the World Junior Chess Championship held in Puerto Madryn, Argentina in 2009, scoring 10½/13.^[6]

Chess career

Vachier-Lagrave playing against Viswanathan Anand during the Alekhine Memorial in Paris, 2013

2004 : Winner of the French Junior Championship (U20)
In 2005, Vachier-Lagrave finished in third place at the French Chess Championship with 7/11 and fifth place.
Besançon 2006: finished 5th at the French Championship with 6 points out of 11 and a TPR of 2608
Aeroflot Open, Moscow 2006: played the A1 tournament, reserved for players having a rating superior to 2550. He gained 6 points out of 9 and finished 6th with a TPR of 2775
Young Masters, Lausanne 2006: being the youngest player invited, won the tournament with a TPR of 2630
Corus tournament B, Wijk aan Zee 2007: finished 5th with 8 points out of 13
Winner of the 2007 and 2008 Paris City Chess Championships with 7 points out of 9
Winner of 2007 French Championship after beating GM Vladislav Tkachiev in tiebreak match. In the main tournament he collected 7.5 out of 11
Winner of the 2008 Gregory Marx Memorial in Paks, with 7 points out of 10
Winner of the 2009 Biel Grandmaster Tournament with 6 points out of 10 ahead of Morozevich and Ivanchuk.
Winner of the 2009 World Junior Chess Championship
2010: Part of a "world team" of experts in a game against Magnus Carlsen
Winner of the 2010 Hoogeveen tournament
Winner of the 2010 European Blitz Championship^[7]
Winner of the 2011 and 2012 French Championships
Winner of the 2012 SPICE Cup Festival^[8] at Webster University with 6 points out of 10 ahead of Le Quang Liem, Ding Liren, Wesley So, Georg Meier, and Csaba Balogh.
Winner of the 2012 European Blitz Championship^[9]
In the 2013 Alekhine Memorial tournament, held from 20 April to 1 May in Paris, Vachier-Lagrave finished eighth, with +2−2=5.^[10]
Winner of the 2013 Biel Grandmaster Tournament (+3 -2 =5) after a tie-break against three players (Moiseenko, Bacrot and Ding Liren)
2013: Semifinalist at the Chess World Cup 2013.
Winner of the 2014 Biel Grandmaster Tournament with 6 points out of 10 ahead of Radoslaw Wojtaszek.
2014: Scored 4/10 in the Sinquefield Cup 2014 in Saint Louis, USA, the strongest chess tournament ever held in the history of chess.
2014–2015: Finished 15th (out of 16 participants) in the FIDE Grand Prix 2014–15, one of the qualifying methods of the 2016 World Chess Championship cycle.
2015: Tata Steel Chess Tournament - 2nd place
2015: Grand Chess Tour Participant (Norway Chess (4th–5th), Sinquefield Cup, London Chess Classic). Came 2nd on tiebreak in the Grand Chess Tour behind Magnus Carlsen.
Winner of the 2015 Biel Grandmaster Tournament with 6.5 points out of 10 ahead of Radoslaw Wojtaszek. 4th victory in Biel and 3rd consecutive victory.
2015: Second Place at the World Blitz Championship in Berlin with 15 points out of 21, only 0.5 point behind Alexander Grischuk.
2016: Winner of the 2016 Dortmund Sparkassen Chess Meeting with 5.5 points out of 7. Ahead of multiple-time previous winners Vladimir Kramnik and Fabiano Caruana.

Teams

Vachier-Lagrave played in the U16 French team championship since 1997. Team results include:

U16 French championship 2004–2005: first board for NAO Chess Club, 7 points from 7 games. NAO-CC earned the title
U16 French championship 2005–2006: first board for NAO Chess Club, 7 points from 7 games. NAO-CC again earned the title
Top 16 2005–2006: NAO team, 6½ points from 8 games. NAO-CC won the championship for the fourth time in a row.

References

↑ Federations Ranking: France. FIDE.
↑ Men: Global ratings August 2016. FIDE.
↑ "Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile". chess24.com. Retrieved 2016-07-15.
↑ "Chess prodigies and mini-grandmasters". ChessBase. 2006-01-10. Retrieved 11 October 2015.
↑ GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave Chessdom.com
↑ "Federación Argentina De Ajedrez". Ajedrez.com.ar. Retrieved 2013-12-09.
↑ "European Blitz Championship 2010". FIDE. 2010-12-18. Retrieved 11 October 2015.
↑ "Susan Polgar Chess Daily News and Information: Vachier-Lagrave tops SPICE Cup". Susanpolgar.blogspot.com. 2012-10-22. Retrieved 2013-12-09.
↑ "European Blitz Chess Championship 2012: Maxime Vachier-Lagrave takes gold medal". Chessdom. 2012-12-14. Retrieved 11 October 2015.
↑ "Aronian and Gelfand win Alekhine Memorial 2013". ChessBase News. 1 May 2013. Retrieved 2 May 2013.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile and games at 365Chess.com
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile and games at Chessgames.com
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile and games at Chess-DB.com
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile at the Internet Chess Club
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave player profile at Chess.com
Chessgraphs.com rating history for Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, graphed in comparison to other top chess players

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