Veselin Topalov, (Bulgarian: born March 15, 1975) is a Bulgarian
chess player. He became the FIDE World Chess Champion by winning the
FIDE World Chess Championship
2005. However, his title is disputed; some regard
Vladimir Kramnik as the World Chess Champion because of his victory over
Garry Kasparov in 2000. Furthermore, an allegation of computer assisted
cheating during the FIDE World Chess Championship 2005 was made, although no
evidence has yet been produced to support the claim that Topalov cheated.
In the January 2006 FIDE rating list, he was number two in the world (after
the
retired Kasparov) with an Elo rating of 2801, becoming the third player
to have ever achieved an over 2800 ELO rating, behind historical ratings
leaders Garry Kasparov (2851) and Vladimir Kramnik (2811).
Veselin Topalov was born in Ruse, Bulgaria. He was taught to play chess when
he was eight years old by his father. In 1989 he won the World Under 14
Championship in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, and in 1990 won the silver medal at
the World Under-16 Championship in Singapore. He became a Grandmaster in
1992.
His current trainer and manager is International Master Silvio Danailov.
Topalov has been the leader of the Bulgarian national team since 1994. At
the Chess Olympiad in 1994 in Moscow he led the Bulgarians to a fourth-place
finish. He has won a number of tournaments, and at the FIDE World Chess
Championship in New Delhi in 2000 reached the quarter-finals.
Veselin Topalov won (+4 =5 -1) the M-Tel Masters 2005 tournament, held 11
May to 22 May in Sofia, Bulgaria. The victory was achieved by a last round
win over
Vladimir Kramnik in an unusual game featuring multiple blunders by
both sides.
Viswanathan Anand finished second, back by one point, in a field
of six including Ruslan Ponomariov, Michael Adams, and Judit Polgar. The
average rating of the participants was 2744, making this super-GM, double
Round-robin tournament the strongest in 2005.
