Bent Larsen

Bent Larsen
Bent Larsen (1961)
Full nameJørgen Bent Larsen
CountryDenmark
Born(1935-03-04)4 March 1935
Thisted, Denmark
Died9 September 2010(2010-09-09) (aged 75)
Buenos Aires, Argentina
TitleGrandmaster (1956)
Peak rating2660 (July 1971)
Peak rankingNo. 4 (July 1971)

Jørgen Bent Larsen (4 March 1935 – 9 September 2010) was a Danish chess grandmaster and author. Known for his imaginative and unorthodox style of play, he was the second-strongest non-Soviet player, behind only Bobby Fischer, for much of the 1960s and 1970s.[1] He is considered to be the strongest player born in Denmark and the strongest from Scandinavia until the emergence of Magnus Carlsen.

Larsen was a six-time Danish Champion and a Candidate for the World Chess Championship on four occasions, reaching the semifinal three times. He had multiple wins over all seven World Champions who held the title from 1948 to 1985: Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov, Mikhail Tal, Tigran Petrosian, Boris Spassky, Bobby Fischer, and Anatoly Karpov,[2] but lifetime negative scores against them.[3]

From the early 1970s onward, he divided his years between Las Palmas and Buenos Aires[1] with his Argentinian-born wife. He suffered from diabetes, and he died in 2010 from a cerebral haemorrhage.[4]

  1. ^ a b Speelman, Jon (20 September 2010). "Bent Larsen: Chess player who with Bobby Fischer was one of only two players the Soviets feared in the 1960s and '70s". The Independent. London.
  2. ^ http://www.chessgames.com, the Bent Larsen games file
  3. ^ On a percentage basis, his best score against a World Champion was with Max Euwe. Larsen and Euwe met over the board only once, at the Munich Olympiad in 1958; the game ended in a draw; Larsen versus Euwe, Chessgames.com
  4. ^ Barden, Leonard (17 September 2010). "Bent Larsen obituary". The Guardian. London.

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