Composing a Life

In an online interview with International Master Sagar Shah for the ChessBase India YouTube channel at the end of July, Russian-Belgian Grandmaster Vladimir Nikolaevich Chuchelov was asked about four-time Women’s World Chess Champion 侯逸凡 (Hóu Yìfán) — one of his most illustrious students — and whether was sorry that she withdrew so early from the world stage in favour of her academic career. “For me it’s of course a pity that she has taken a break. She is clearly very talented, she was in this period of her life where she was not sure whether to interrupt her chess career and go on to academic studies. But also she is somebody who has a lot of interests apart from chess. It was great fun to work with 侯逸凡 (Hóu Yìfán). Definitely I was also helping her during the World Championship match against Mariya Muzychuk so a great experience overall. My opinion is she could definitely cross 2700. She was very close. She was 2680 at some point”, he said. Photo © Lennart Ootes.