Happy Birthday Zhou Jianchao
"Today in Chess History," June 11th, celebrates the births of three Grandmasters:
- Konstantin Chernyshov of Russia, whom we featured last year on "Today's Grandmaster." He was born in 1967 and became a Grandmaster in 2000.
- Dimitris Anagnostopoulos of Greece, born 1970, GM 1996.
- Zhou Jianchao of China, born 1988, GM 2006.
Zhou Jianchao learned to play chess at the age of 6. He achieved the norms required for the Grandmaster title at the 2005 Aeroflot Open (A2 Group), the 2005 Dubai Open and the 2006 Aeroflot Open (A2 Group); becoming China's 21st Grandmaster at the age of 17. He is a co-champion of Asian Team Championship and won a Board Gold in 2008. In March 2009, Zhou became a top 100 player in the world for the first time in his career. In 2011 he won the 1st Chinese Rapid Championship in Hefei.
In team events, Zhou played for China in the Chess Olympiad in 2010, the World Team Chess Championship in 2005 (winning the team silver), the Asian Team Chess Championship in 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2018, the 2nd Russia-China Match in 2004 and the World Youth U16 Chess Olympiad in 2004 (winning gold). Zhou Jianchao plays for Shanghai chess club in the China Chess League (CCL).
