I'm a 50+ year-old professional network builder with businesses in more than a dozen countries.

As a child I was fascinated by the medieval look of chess pieces as I watched my Dad play. I took up chess when I was 14 and was considered a prodigy (of sorts) when I won first place in an inter-village tournament at the age of 16 participated by mostly adults.

I further honed my chess skills in steamy chess clubs in Manila where you often find people gather around high-stake (and rowdy) 3-minute blitz games. (It was in one of those clubs, sometime in the late 70's that I saw an Indian child played blitz games with much older opponents and beat them all. I'm now sure that who I saw then was the future world champion, Viswanathan Anand! I wish I should have challenged him and get the distinction of having played a world champion!)

I was greatly influenced by the Fischer-Spassky championship match in 1972. I often get in time trouble so having at least a day to make a move in turn-based chess makes me a much stronger player (perhaps at least 500 over my estimated rating).

inactive_czechmate