Mikhail Botvinnik was the ultimate boy scout of chess
- always prepared! Indeed, his advance preparation for
his key matches was feared by the greatest. It even
involved the radio blaring while he was playing training
games as well as having nicotine-puffing opponents blow
smoke in his eyes during practice games, in order to
acclimatise himself for the real thing. Of course, this
was before the days of modern political correctness
when smoking in public is regarded by the powersthat-
be as a heinous crime and is, unlike licking the
highway clean with your tongue, now generally banned by
law on health and safety grounds.
Botvinnik's training games were a well guarded secret
only shared by a few trusty colleagues, such as the
Grandmasters Ragozin, Averbakh and Furman. The Soviet
state was a monument to paranoia at the best of times,
but suspicion multiplied when world titles hinged on
secrecy, and these games have lain hidden for decades
after they were played.
Botvinnik was World Champion three times, from 1948-
1957, 1958 -1960 and 1961 -1963. His final championship
victory against Tal in the 1961 revenge match counts as
one of the highest scoring rating performances in the
history of chess. It was of course based on the most
meticulous preparation, not least in the psychological
sphere of seeking to find and play positions which were
not to Tal's taste.
Grandmaster Jan Timman is one of the most popular and
colourful players on the modern scene. A finalist in
the FIDE-World Chess Federation-World Chess Championship
in 1993, Timman has been the second dominating force
in Dutch chess after world champion Dr Max Euwe. Here
Timman presents every Botvinnik training game which
could be found and subjects the most important to
typically close analytical and explanatory scrutiny.
