¡Feliz 77 cumpleaños, Vlastimil Hort!

Cumple confinado

La pandemía también está afectando a Vlastimil Hort, en cuanto a las posibilidades de moverse tal y como estaba acostumbrada. El gran maestro alemán, nacido en la República Checa, antes de la crisis del coronavirus, solía acudir a muchos torneos y acontecimientos ajedrecísticos, para dar exhibiciones simultáneas o para contribuir con sus amplios conocimientos como comentarista y experto, pero últimamente también debido al éxito de su libro "My Chess Stories". 

Vlastimilr también solía a asomarse a la oficina de ChessBase en Hamburgo con frecuencia y es autor de varios DVDs de entrenamiento del surtido de ChessBase. ¡Ojalá vuelvan pronto esos tiempos! 

"Ahora mismo estoy siguiendo los torneos que se disputan a través de internet, pero yo mismo no suelo jugar online. Simplemente no es lo mismo", comentó Hort. 

Vlastimil Hort y su esposa Brigitte viven cerca de Bonn, en Alemania. Normalmente puede viajar muy bien desde ahí a todos los sitios. Le gusta desplazarse en tren. La verdad es que Hort tenía pensado acercarse a Wijk aan Zee, para seguir en directo el torneo Tata Steel Chess que dará comienzo el próximo fin de semana. Pero las cifras crecientes de contagios del coronavirus son tan preocupantes que prefiere quearse en casa. 

"Corona virus de m... mucho cuidado. Pero esto me permitirá continuar trabajando en una segunda toma de mis historias de ajedrez". 

Hoy es el 77 cumpleaños de Vlastimil Hort. 

¡Felicidades y que cumpla muchos años sanos y felices más!

Extracto de su libro

A corpse on the road

Chess Olympiad 1964 in Tel Aviv. I shared a room in the Hilton Hotel with Ludek Pachmann. In the afternoon before the day off, I had lain down to take a nap. But suddenly, there was a disturbance from above, from the ceiling. It was dripping! I was immediately wide awake and took a look at the damage. The water stain on the ceiling was getting bigger and bigger. Obviously, something was wrong in the room above. I ran up the stairs. The door to the room was half open and I entered quickly.

I saw Gideon Ståhlberg lying on the bed. "Hello, Mister Ståhlberg!" No answer. An empty whisky bottle lay next to him. Water all around him. Obviously totally drunk, he was calmly trying to take off his socks. The water was coming from the bathroom. I hurriedly stomped through the masses of water and turned off the running tap of the bathtub.

One year later, in Marienbad 1965, I played my first game against him.

Gideon Ståhlberg

Stahlberg was born in Sweden in 1908, but after the Chess Olympiad 1939 in Buenos Aires he stayed in Argentina. In chess, he was a damned good tactician and for a long time his heavy drinking did not affect his playing strength.

In Leningrad (today and again St. Petersburg) 1967 I was to play another tournament with him. The venue of the tournament was a theatre. The drawing of lots attracted a large audience and all seats were occupied. All players were introduced personally and the first round was scheduled for the next day.

But shortly before the first round, sad news reached us. Ståhlberg had died the night before. The official cause of death was a heart attack. Two empty vodka bottles in the room.

But chess goddess Caissa allowed him to play on.

Zarupin, a Soviet official, was supposed to accompany the coffin with the body on the train to Moscow. Perhaps Zarupin loved alcohol as much as Gideon. The fact is, when Zarupin arrived in Moscow, the coffin with the corpse had disappeared. The KGB was alerted, a search was launched. Finally, after two days, the coffin was found and Gideon was flown to his old home in Sweden.

Because of Stahlberg's unintentional early exit from the tournament, I got Black three times in a row. That had never happened to me in my entire career.

My Chess Stories

Vlastimil Hort
"My Chess Stories"
176 páginas, primera edición 2020,ca. 24 euros

Traducción y edición: Nadja Wittmann (ChessBase)

Enlaces

• "My Chess Stories" en la librería Schachversand Niggemann