Vladimir Naef

Wladimir Naef (born September 3, 1919 in Moscow - † June 16, 2006 ) was a Swiss chess player and composer .

chess

Wladimir Naef was one of the founding members of the “Swiss Association of Art Chess Friends”, at whose meetings he always attended when he was able to. From 1957, as the successor to Samuel Isenegger , he led the study section of the Swiss chess newspaper for 23 years . He was active as a composer mainly for auxiliary matt tasks , but also in other types of composition.

Naef also stood out as a strong party player, he won the Zurich Cup in 1952 , was in the final of the Coupe Suisse in 1953 , which he even won in 1959, played in the Swiss national team from 1953 to 1963, was 13-time team champion with the chess company Zurich and celebrated many club-internal victories.

Here is one of his early studies.

Wladimir Naef
Swiss Chess Newspaper, 1951

	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 to move wins

Solution:

1. Rg2 – g4! Kc4-d3
second Tg4xf4 f3-f2
3. Tf4xf2 e4-e3
4. Tf2-f3-d2 Kd3
5. SD8 e6 e3-e2
6. Ne6-f4 e2 e1d
7. T f3-d3 matt

Private

Wladimir Naef was born in Moscow, but returned to Switzerland with his family as early as 1920, where he grew up bilingual. This later made him a sought-after translator. In his youth Naef was a successful tennis and table tennis player . He worked as a machine engineer specializing in hydraulics in various industries, but was called to active military service in 1939 . At the end of his career, Naef worked as a director. His first wife, who died early, gave Naef four children.

Web links

• Compositions by Wladimir Naef on the PDB server