I saw an old interview WITH bobby and he did not claim to HAVE understanding but in the interview on video he claimed to study and try anything and everything until he found something unexpected so when he went to tournament he would surprise them with something they weren't ready for! and when he ran out of unexpected replys or if everyone figured out responses to his game then he would run off and study some more. This is the same as any GM would do. Kasparov's ElO rating is in the 2900 range and Bobby's the 2600 range, Bobby said any female player was like playing a beginner and there isn't a female that could beat him even if he took both of his knights of the board, he was arrogant because he became a GM at age 18 but not to far latter Judit Polgar became GM at age 15 stealing Bobby's title of youngest GM ever!!! Judit's ELO rating is in the 2700-2800 range.

Fischer was no more born with natural tallent than any other GM Bobby went to chess classes and had a chess teacher that beat him all the time Bobby read books and studied and memorized and worked his freak'n little kid butt off because his parents paid for him to go to chess classes. He is good because he worked just like anyone reading this post could get better if they work harder and memorize and study like Bobby did, he BECAME a GM it wasn't born to him. He loved it which is why he TRIED to understand it. Same as every GM. 

sorry you are right! Judit Polgar beat bobby by a whole month! but the point is that people are so caught up on his name because he was advertised on tv and the government used him as a political media tool and so few others get recognized like K. Humpy age 15 Peter Leko age 14 Etienne Bacrot age 14 RPonomariov age 14 T. Radjabov age 14 Bu Xiangzhi age 13 M. Carlsen age 13 Sergey Karjakin age 12 

And don't forget our liitle champion Fabiano Caruana GM at the age of 14...

On www.chessmetrics.com some crazy people calculated the elo rating of all the players of the history of chess based on actual calculations so, let see that Fischer touched, altough for a little, before to disappear () the highest elo rating ever: 2893!! if I well remember... Kasparov stood around 2850-80, but for years...

Then... who have had won in an hypotetic match Fischer-Karpov in 1975? My opinion: Fischer in 1975, Karpov the rematch.

pastoryoshi: I don't think it matters how much I study chess, I'll never get as good as Fischer was. This might be due in part to having started later, and not having had lessons, but I'm sure there are lots of people in the world who do play obsessively and are trained as much as you like, who never get anywhere near Fischer's level. So, to say his success wasn't down to talent is a little...wrong, in my opinion.

Even Fischer admitted that out of all the old grandmaster games he studied, he was most impressed by Capablanca. Also in an analysis of old games by all of the greatest players, it was determined that Capablanca's moves were the most perfect/correct. I say that Capablanca was the greatest chess genius ever, in a time before lots of study material was available.

In the Fischer vs Kasparov debate, I would have to say that it is a draw, they are both insanely good.

fischer was self taught and he taught himself russian so he could read their chess books. he was at least 100 elo points higher than anybody else at the time and in  2  candidate matches for the chance to play  for the world championship he won 6-0 in both matches which put his elo rating over well over the 3100 mark and someone said to win 2 matches 6-0 was like beating muhammed ali with one hand tied behind your back and the russians even said if he played karpov,karpov would be lucky to to win one game  

People are born with the great talent or not. If they don't, no matter what your chess coach tells you and how much you work, you will not become Fisher, Kasparov, Tal, Capablanca, Morphy, etc. Don't tell me that modern crap, that anybody can be super-GM. Take Magnus Carlsen - don't you think he has a great natural talent?  In his 17 he plays endgames like Capablanca. So, he will be the world champion, not somebody just working his ass off. Of course, talent should be multiplied  by work, but work without talent? By the way, Fisher worked much more than anybody else, chess was everything for him. I am not even his fan, never was, but I listened to super-GM Mark Taimanov many years ago and he knew Fisher (he lost to him 0:6) and that's what he said about him.

Fischer studied around 10 hours a day. Even without "natural talent" Im sure he would still have been one of the top GM's. Im still not even sure if he had natural talent. I wonder how you would go about proving such a thing..

 Well one certaintly cant be a dunce, but still with that much work put into it I could see most anybody becoming one of the top if not the top GM.

It would be quite a challenge to even equal someone who is a genius at the game and also works hard, like Anand or Kasparov, if you don't also have a motherlode of talent yourself.

Phelan - you too think that studying 10 hours a day will make you super-GM, it will not. Every top GM has a natural talent, otherwise he will not be there. Can you imagine musician without talent ( playing hundreds of hours) being top world piano performer?

Regarding Fisher - After the World Speed Chess championship at Hercegnovi, Yugoslavia, in 1970, "Fischer rattled off the scores of all his twenty-two games, involving more than 1,000 moves, from memory!". Do you remember any of your blitz games at all? Do you think studying 10 hours per day will make you to be able calculate like Kasparov or see combinations like Tal or feel the position like Petrosian or Botvinnik, or play the endgame like Capablanca or Smyslov ?

Nice points. I just felt like quoting it. It gives a bigger picture and doesn't nit-pick on their records against specific players.

 YES!!

 Yes I think if I studied intensely for 10 hours a day for a number of years I could become one of the greatest GM's in the world today. I think a lot of people could, but not many have the time or the perseverance to do such a thing.

and yes I can remember most of the moves I played in an OTB tournament last month from memory, but it wasnt blitz. I can remember the opening and some of the key positions in blitz games I have played here on chess.com but I think i would remember them better if I played them OTB.

I think that, in a way, Kasparov proved his greatness in ways Fischer didn't. He competed for a large number of years and, for a long time, beat everything that was thrown at him. He was consistently the greatest around for a very long time. He hated losing probably as much as anyone, and had a mind like a computer. Fischer never proved that he had that kind of consistency.

...But, at the same time, Fischer's competitive instincts were so inhumanly powerful that I think in a match against Kasparov, he would have found a way to shred him to pieces.

Phelan - you would have a little chance to become one of the  “greatest GM's in the world” if you were ~2200 (not here, of course, ELO J ) now, and you were <15 years old. Since you have long rating of 1633 here,  I would love to know how much time it will take you to get to 2000 ELO, then to 2100, then to 2200, then (even by some miracle you would get there) you will stop. Don’t bet your life on chess, there are many other things paying off much better on the time investment.