Vasyl Mykhaylovych Ivanchuk (; born March 18, 1969), also transliterated as Vassily Ivanchuk, is a Ukrainian chess player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE in 1988. A leading player since 1988, Ivanchuk has been ranked at No. 2 on the FIDE world rankings three times (July 1991, July 1992, October 2007).
Ivanchuk has won Linares, Wijk aan Zee, Tal Memorial, Gibraltar Masters and M-Tel Masters titles. He has also won the World Blitz Championship in 2007 and the World Rapid Championship in 2016.
In 2011, by the decree of the President of Ukraine, Ivanchuk was awarded the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise.
Career
Early years
Ivanchuk was born in Kopychyntsi, Ukraine. He won the 1987 European Junior Chess Championship in Groningen and first achieved international notice by winning the 1988 New York Open scoring 7½/9 points, ahead of a field of grandmasters. He tied for first place in the 1988 World Junior Chess Championship at Adelaide, but lost the title on tiebreak to Joël Lautier. He was awarded the Grandmaster title in 1988, and entered the world top 10 the same year.
Reaches world elite
Ivanchuk attained chess world fame in 1991 at the age of 21 when he won the Linares tournament. Fourteen players participated, eight of them, including World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov, rated in the top ten in the world, and another two among the world's top 50 players. Ivanchuk edged Kasparov by a half point, defeating Kasparov in their head-to-head game.
It was widely believed that Ivanchuk might become world champion. He came close in 2002, when he reached the final of the FIDE World Chess Championship 2002. Ivanchuk consistently ranked among the top 10 from July 1988 to October 2002 and among the top 20 up to June 2009, but Mark Crowther's The Week in Chess said his erratic play was due to "poor temperament." His results saw him drop as low as 30th in July 2009, but he returned to the top ten in the next list. His inability to become world champion despite his immense talent and longevity has been attributed to his admittedly poor nerves, demonstrated by blunders such as at the 1994 London Grand Prix blitz, when he failed to complete a strong attack on Viswanathan Anand with a mate in one despite having 0:54 left on the clock. Ivanchuk's nerves were notably exposed during the high-tension atmosphere of World Championship match-format tournaments, such as in 2002 where he was heavily favored in the FIDE championship final after having defeated defending champion Anand in the semifinals, only to lose to countryman Ruslan Ponomariov in a major upset, denying him the championship. Subsequent match-play tournaments in World Championship cycles saw Ivanchuk consistently underperform; in the FIDE World Chess Championship 2004, Chess World Cup 2005, Chess World Cup 2007, and Chess World Cup 2009, he failed to advance past the third round despite being seeded No. 5, No. 1, No. 1 and No. 6 respectively in those events.
Ivanchuk's world championship aspirations were also dampened by the title split from 1993 to 2006. Due to obligations with FIDE, Ivanchuk and Anand did not participate in the 2002 Dortmund Candidates tournament for the Classical World Chess Championship 2004. He was then narrowly excluded, on the basis of rating, from the rival FIDE World Chess Championship 2005. While he won one of the events of the FIDE Grand Prix 2008–2010, his overall performance was not enough to qualify him for the World Chess Championship 2012 candidates tournament.
Since 2013
Ivanchuk played in the 2013 Candidates Tournament, which took place in London, from 15 March to 1 April. He finished seventh, with a score of +3−5=6. The tournament was notable for his unusually poor time management (he lost two games on time), as well as his major impact on the leaderboard despite being a tail ender: he managed to defeat both leaders Magnus Carlsen (round 12) and Vladimir Kramnik (round 14), resulting in Carlsen qualifying for the World Chess Championship by tiebreak.
In 2016, Ivanchuk won the World Rapid Chess Championship in Doha, Qatar, with a score of 11/15. He defeated Carlsen, among many others.
In recent years, Ivanchuk has started playing checkers and has achieved a certain level of success. In the World Draughts Federation's July 2019 ranking list he was ranked number 1111 in the world, with a rating of 1997.
Playing style
Ivanchuk is regarded by his peers and many observers as a chess genius. Kasparov explained in an interview that Ivanchuk had a level equivalent to that of a world champion although he had never been one.