Why is d4 so often chosen in the world championships?

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4 5.Nc3!? is a fun line to play for White, aiming to create an imbalance after 5...Nxc3 6.dc, White the idea of Be3/g5, Qd2, 0-0-0 and a Kingside attack. The alternatives for Black are 5...Nf6, which wastes a lot of time, and 5...Bf5?? and 5...d5?? which lose to 6.Qe2.

This is just patently untrue. The logic behind it would also suggest that 1.d4 isn't played more because of the QGA.

Both statements are utter malarkey. Any strong GM who plays 1.e4 is ready to face the Russian Defense. Carlsen plays to win as white and plays 1.e4 against just about anyone. And he plays to win!

We'll see how often Magnus Carlsen plays 1.e4 in a world championship match situation. Even Fischer didn't play 1.e4 every time once he got to the World Championship match.

Ruys and Scicilians are incredibly rich, and not even close to analysed to a conclusion.  I think they prefer 1.d4 because it's a more secure edge.  But I'm just guessing, I'd like to hear a world champion comment on it.

It's extremely fun to play against Anand, when he has his informant on Miles-Christiansan lol.

1.d4 is played that often because it's a good move.

Please don't tell anyone, this is a top secret.

haha I will keep your secret sir. :) 

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkmDPMSl2Gg :)

2. KK play 23rd and 24th game of 1987 WCH :)

I suppose to avoid the berlin and the sicilian.

Smyslov and Nimzo-Roy are absolutely correct in their assessments of how often 1. d4 was played in the Alekhine-Capablanca WC matches as well as the positional characteristics of 1. d4.

Kasparov went so far as to say that the test of Black in the QGD is how well he able to get his c8 Bishop into play. 2... e6 gives the Orthodox, Cambridge Springs and Tarrasch Defenses while even a 2... c6 move can still find Black playing x... e6 later, with still the same problems.

This is why some favor not only 1. d4 for the positional complexness and locking in the c8 Bishop for a lot of the game, but that Black will usually have an IQP position or if he manages to get an early Bf5 move in, will often be punished with Bg5 and losing the f6 Knight at times followed by a timely Qb3 in several lines to attack at the b7 pawn that was left undefended by the Bf5 move.

Not sure how much is mixed like leftover spaghetti here but the general ideas are that for positional 1. d4 tends to be better while those who are attackers will favor 1. e4 more.

http://www.chess.com/article/view/the-end-of-1e4-in-world-championship-matches

1.e4 is not as popular because of the Berlin, Petrov, and to a lesser extent the Marshall Attack. Gelfand shoed that the Sveshnikov is also hard to break.

People bring up the Berlin a lot, but I thought Kramnik did so well because he outprepared Kasparov.  How often since then has the Berlin been played?  Somehow I doubt it's such a deterrent against e4, I only ever hear non-pros mention it.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1165519

Waffle, Kramnik used the Berlin quite a few times after the match. I forget who, it might have been Svidler, who came up with an interesting antidote.

The Berlin is not an automatic draw. The player with the better long-range plan is most likely to win. Most world champion candidates don't play the Berlin or the Russian defense when faced with 1.e4. But it is extremely difficult to win against any world-class opening.

And the fashion against 1.e4 is partly just that, fashion. When Carlsen finally reaches the World Championship, we will probably see 1.e4 more often again. Kasparov and Karpov played 1.e4 in about 1/3 of their WC matches.

Anand played e4 in half his games vs Gelfand too, all Sicilians, not Berlin Wall or Petrov.

Ah hah!

(lol that context is on previous page)

Or could we reword this question as;

"Why do players who turn to d4 so often become Champions?"

Could d4 really be the Wheaties of the chess world?

Wheaties of the chess world?  That sounds about right... in that amateurs and children believe it, while the diet of pros is much more complex and rigorously selected.

BTW in the 1927 Capa match, the selection may be described as a fad, but it's more accurate to say that their understanding of chess strategy and opening theory at the time was very ridged.  Opening with anything other than 1.d4 d5 was considered inaccurate while today we see many openings as viable.

But seriously, lets looks at the statistics.

1.e4   54.5% to white.

1.d4   56.3% to white

1.Nf3  55.7% to white

1.c4    56.3% to white

1.g3    55.0% to white

When youve seized every other conceivable advantage under the sun to beat your opponent, and still need that little extra boost, I guess that 1.8% d4 offers over e4 looks mighty tempting.

But tbh, 1.e4 would probsbly be higher than any of those, if we took away 1....c5. The Sicilian just kills whites stats.

It's interesting to me that 1.c4 and 1.g3 are higher than 1.e4.  This is statistics of chess.com games maybe?