The ladies rush into the game, royal forts fly apart and in the end a mistake decides whether victory or loss. Flash chess doesn't leave you time to think. The grandmasters play on the basis of their memory and intuition. That is exactly what Daniil Dubow loves.
Blitz chess is Dubow's favorite game, but he became world champion a year ago in the somewhat slower version of rapid chess. Here each player has 15 minutes for his moves. When the next rapid and blitz chess world championship starts on December 26th in Moscow, the 23-year-old Russian in his hometown is one of the favorites for the titles in both disciplines.
But he did not set the goal of defending his title, Dubow told SPIEGEL. He's not a guy who sets goals. "It's like going to the casino: you can set yourself the goal of winning a few thousand dollars, maybe you win, but you are likely to lose." Dubow, a hobby poker player, is a free spirit, a creative player, not a theoretical timpanist. That was the case before.
The influence of the grandfather
In his youth, Dubow was one of the many child prodigies that always appear in chess. At 14, he became a grand master. His grandfather, Eduard Dubow, a chess referee famous in Russia, also played a part in this. The grandfather knew players like the eternal World Cup opponents Garri Kasparow and Anatolij Karpow personally. With such contacts, it was not difficult to find good coaches for his grandson. "Thanks to my grandfather, I had opportunities that the other boys didn't have," says Dubow. The other boys, he means especially young players who, unlike him, came from small towns in Russia and could not move to Moscow for the chess school. Many lost touch.
Karim Jaafar / AFP
In 2016 Dubow won bronze at the Blitz World Championship, behind Magnus Carlsen and winner Sergei Karjakin
In contrast, teenagers Daniil always got better. "It all turned out quite easily," says Dubow today: "I didn't really work on myself and became a grand master." When he had to decide what he wanted to do after he finished school, the decision was made to become a chess professional. "I'm not sure if that was smart. But it was smart to be happy," says Dubow. "I didn't want to work in a company, have a boss and all that."
Dubow made it into the top 50 in the world rankings. But his performance stagnated. From then on, he had to train harder. He once talked to Magnus Carlsen, world champion in classic and blitz chess, Dubow says. He said to Carlsen: "You are the best player in the world, but you don't spend a lot of time on your chess." Carlsen had agreed with him, but also said that when he was a teenager he worked on himself like crazy.
Carlsen's second
Carlsen and Dubow have a special relationship. At the classic World Chess Championship 2018, the Russian worked as a second for the world champion, as a helper in the analysis of the games. The two met at a tournament in Georgia, played a few games against each other and Carlsen soon asked if Dubow would not work for him during the World Cup. He had recognized his talent for creative openings.
Dubow developed new opening paths for Carlsen for the World Cup, bold variants with early figure victims. That summer, the world champion said that Dubow had inspired him. Second colleague Jan Gustafsson told SPIEGEL: "Dubow is a very, very creative, very young, very aggressive, very self-confident player who sometimes does not take well-trodden paths and is willing to take more risks." This suits him with flash chess, so he likes to upset his opponents.
Anton Vaganov / REUTERS
Dubow stayed away from the 2017 World Cup - in protest, as he says today
A few months after Carlsen defended his title, Dubow became world champion in rapid chess. Dubow does not know whether training with Carlsen was the deciding factor for the title: "It was useful, of course, but it didn't feel that I was pointing the way."
Protest against Saudi Arabia
Even without training with Carlsen, Dubow had already won bronze at the Blitz World Cup in Qatar in 2016, his favorite tournament. However, he was unable to refill in 2017 because he did not participate. Dubow said today that he had waived to protest the World Cup being awarded to Saudi Arabia. No Israeli players were allowed to compete in Riyadh, and they were not given visas. "Simply ridiculous," says Dubow. The World Cup is still funded by Saudi Arabia, but the tournament has been held in Russia since 2018.
It was very painful for him to be able to watch his favorite tournament from home, says Dubow. Since he became world champion a year later, he doesn't regret the decision today. His grandfather Eduard died a few days before the World Cup and dedicated the victory to him.
Dubow believes that around 20 players could become world champions this year - above all, of course, Magnus Carlsen. "It depends on your mood and how you slept," says Dubow. He doesn't have a clever preparation plan. "I'm preparing a couple of openings that are too risky for the classic game." Then it is played according to intuition. That's how he likes it best.
