Тимур Гареев

Alexander Alekhine, 4th world champion, is regarded as one of the strongest blindfold players ever The number of 45 boards was such a high standard that for decades none came close and the few claims to have broken it, such as Janos Flesch, were soon cast in doubt due to dubious conditions uncovered later. Thus Najdorf’s great record stood for 64 years, until a German master, Mark Lang, finally one-upped the feat after months of preparation, raising the bar to 46 boards in 2011. However, another player also had his eye on Najdorf’s record: the ebullient free spirit Timur Gareyev. Hailing from Uzbekistan, the US-based chess grandmaster had made a name for himself with off-beat articles sharing his passion for life doing skydiving, globetrotting, and eventually blindfold simuls. Realizing he had an obvious talent for it, and their popularity, his displays were soon in regular demand, with newspapers gobbling it up, describing the ‘flip-flop wearing, exercise bicycle pumping, blindfold player’ as a vision of admiration and astonishment never to be forgotten.