Magnus Carlsen might walk away from classical chess

Post by dnel » Thu, Jun 05, 2025, 10:38 AM UTC

mcv wrote: post #42

ale wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe that to people like Magnus it goes beyond "the job becoming boring" and his stance alludes directly to Fischer's disillusionment with the game – lacking in genuine and human creativity.

That's exactly why Magnus is now championing Free Style Chess, originally promoted by Fischer: you randomize the starting position of the pieces, which makes traditional opening theory useless. That cuts away a lot of the memorization and introduces a lot of new creativity. It's not entirely surprising that both of these world champions saw that as a way to keep the game interesting. Something else that Magnus someti…

Post by cdmoyer » Thu, Jun 05, 2025, 1:27 PM UTC

thom wrote: post #59

neom wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we CAN agree on that!!! 1000% I was just annoyed at that guy when I read about him because it just seemed like he didn't want to spend the time up front, and I actually get it, but that's what it takes to play at the world class level I think? Business is mine. Love it to death, not for everyone and not everyone likes to play it the way I do, especially not those I play against, but I love to play business as…

It's hard to defend Fischer because he was a massive weirdo. Magnus has had far more skin in the game long term though, so I'm generally willing to hear him out.

Post by davidguetta » Thu, Jun 05, 2025, 1:46 PM UTC

eterm wrote: post #17

Etheryte wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not forget that Magnus didn't lose his world champion title, he gave it up willingly after holding the title from 2013 to 2021. All those years where everyone else is focusing specifically on how to defeat him and still coming short. He's talked about this at length in interviews, mostly it just became incredibly boring.

Only Magnus really knows if it was "incredibly boring" or he feared losing over the board, and even he might not really know himself. I think it's a shame for the sport that he wasn't willing to risk losing his WC title over the board, but make no mistake, he has lost his WC title regardless.

Post by dyauspitr » Thu, Jun 05, 2025, 2:42 PM UTC

thom wrote: post #16

I think everyone here can probably sympathise when a job stops being about the bits you actually enjoy or are good at. I have no doubt Magnus is the best ever, but the vast majority of the effort in classical chess is spent away from the board. Slogging through an opponent and their team’s computer driven opening prep just isn’t super fun and probably isn’t why most people fall in love with chess. Anyone who has gone…