Tribute to Bobby Fischer...!

The enigmatic, reclusive & American Chess Superstar Bobby Fischer passed away on Jan 17th this year. An American Chess champion at 14 and a grand master at 15, Bobby was indeed one of the most remarkable world chess prodigies America has ever churned. The much talked about Cold War icon who dethroned the Soviet Union's Boris Spassky as world champion in 1972, was certainly a maestro whose contributions in the world of chess was phenomenal indeed. His march towards towards World Championship was surrounded by many controversies & tensed moments. But what impressed me most about ace grandmaster was his contributions to this world. I decided to list few of them down on this blog as a tribute to this chess legend:

• Fischer Clock: Fischer filed for Patent for this clock. Using this clock each player got a fixed period of time at the start of the game and then additional small amount after each move. In this way, the players were never short of time in practice.
• Chess Theory: He established "Poisoned Pawn Variation" and practiced the same in his match with Boris Spassy in Revyjavik.
• Fischer's Chess960: He invented a new kind of chess which gave more importance to an individual's creativity & chess playing talent rather than memorization of opening chess moves. The way this worked was during opening, chess pieces & pawns were placed randomly on the chess board in 960 combinations following these rules. Once the game began, normal chess rules & fundamentals applied.

Over & above everything, he focussed on what mattered most to him in life - "Playing Chess". His uninhibited love for chess motivated him to master the game of chess & eventually become a memorable world champion.

Check this amazing Photo Essay about Bobby in TIME.