Nikolai Dmitrievich Grigoryev

Nikolai Grigoryev, 1925

Nikolai Dmitrijewitsch Grigorjew ( Russian: Николай Дмитриевич Григорьев ; born August 14, 1895 in Moscow ; † November 10, 1938 ibid) was a Russian-Soviet chess player , organizer and composer of endgame studies .

Life

Grigoryev's father was a violinist and played in the orchestra of the Bolshoi Theater for several decades . In his childhood Grigoryev was excellent at playing the violin and drawing. But besides music and painting he was also interested in the exact sciences of mathematics and astronomy. Grigoryev's grandfather was an Armenian priest.

In 1914 Grigoryev finished his education in a Moscow high school and enrolled in the physics and mathematics faculty of Moscow University. In 1917 he was drafted into the front and had to break off his studies. After a serious illness and his recovery, he worked in various state institutions and from 1920 as a math teacher in schools.

Grigoryev died in Moscow in 1938 as a result of an infection that he got during appendicitis-related appendectic surgery. Alexander Herbstman attributed the death to the fact that in 1938 medical care was less sophisticated and no penicillin was known.

Tournament chess

At the age of 14 Grigoryev began to study chess and soon became a strong player. A game against Alekhine , played in Moscow in 1915, appeared in Alekhin's family journal Schachmatny Westnik . In a variant of the game given later, there were five queens on the board after 23 moves and three pawn conversions (see also the article MacCutcheon Variation ). In the All-Russian Chess Olympiad in 1920, the first major tournament after the revolution, Grigoryev finished 5-7. Place, although at the same time he secured the implementation of the event under the most difficult conditions. In 1921 he played a match against the future world chess champion Alekhine (+0 = 5 −2).

Grigoryev won the Moscow championship four times (1921, 1922, 1924 and 1930), constantly playing in the USSR championships. In the fifth in 1927 he fulfilled the national championship standard, in 1929 he shared the 1st – 2nd in Leningrad. Place with Romanowski in the international workers' tournament.

Grigoryev achieved his best historical rating of 2610 in January 1922, making him one of the top 14 players worldwide.

Editor and organizer

In 1922 Grigoryev founded a chess corner in Izvestia , one of the central daily newspapers with the highest circulation. It was the first weekly chess publication in the country.

study

Grigoryev composed more than 300 studies and was particularly considered a specialist in pawn endings .

Nikolai Grigoryev
64, 1930

	a	b	c	d	e	f	G	H
8th									8th
7th									7th
6th									6th
5									5
4th									4th
3									3
2									2
1									1
	a	b	c	d	e	f	G	H

White moves and wins

Grigoryev's study shown in the diagram was first published in 1930 in the Soviet chess magazine 64 . In this pawn ending, the correct advance of the passed pawns decides the outcome of the game. White's pawn advance 1. h2 – h4 would be flawed, although Black cannot stop the pawn from being converted with the king, but in turn leads his free d-pawn to the queen after 1.… d7 – d5, after which the game would be even. With the correct move

1. f2-f4

White uses the position of the opposing king on a3, as he threatens to move in with a check bid on f8, after which the black d-pawn would not get beyond the d2 square. The black king must therefore approach the f-pawn or its conversion square f8:

1.… Ka3 – b4 , with the planned route c5 – d6 – e7, the king also clears the way for the a-pawn, on around 2. Kh1 – g2 follows a7 – a5. But now the second white passed pawn on the h-file decides, who in the interplay with the f-pawn overwhelms the black king and d-pawn:

2. h2 – h4 d7 – d5 , since the black king is in the square of the f-pawn, he can advance his passed pawn.

3. f4-f5 Kb4-c5

4. h4 – h5 d5 – d4

If the f-pawn moves, the king must move up to prevent the conversion. If the white h-pawn moves, the black passed pawn does the same, this is repeated until the final:

5. f5-f6 Kc5-d6

6. h5-h6 d4-d3

7. f6-f7 Kd6-e7

8. h6-h7 d3-d2

The following two conversions with a check command ensure victory, Black finds no time to use his passed pawn:

9. f7-f8D + Ke7xf8

10. h7 – h8D + and after another Qh8 – d4 the queen wins the d2 pawn.

literature

Kan, IA; Bondarewski, IS: Shachmatnoye tvochestvo ND Grigoryeva . Fiskultura i sport, Moscow 1952. (Russian)

Web links

• Replayable chess games by Nikolai Dmitrijewitsch Grigorjew on chessgames.com (English)
• Tkachenko, Sergei N .: Koroli schachmatnoj pechoty (Russian)
• 42 studies by Grigoryev

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Alexander Herbstman: Memories of famous composers . eg 65.
2. ^ Statistics on Grigoryev's historical Elo rating