Henrique Costa Mecking, also known as Mequinho, is a Brazilian chess grandmaster who reached his zenith in the 1970s and is still one of the strongest players in Brazil. He was a chess prodigy, drawing comparisons to Bobby Fischer, although he did not achieve the International Grandmaster title until 1972. He won the Interzonals of Petropolis 1973 and Manila 1976. His highest FIDE rating is 2635, achieved in 1977, when he was ranked number four in the world. He became the 3rd best in the world in 1977, behind only World Champion Anatoly Karpov and Viktor Korchnoi. He is the first Brazilian to become a grandmaster. Despite winning his first national championship at the age of 13, he played in very few tournaments. He won at Vršac in 1971 and finished third with Robert Byrne at Hastings in 1971–72. In 1975, he twice shared second place behind Ljubomir Ljubojević, firstly at Las Palmas with Ulf Andersson and Mikhail Tal and then at Manila with Lev Polugaevsky, Bent Larsen and Helmut Pfleger.
Joel Lawrence Benjamin is an American chess player who holds the FIDE title of Grandmaster (GM). In 1998, he was voted "Grandmaster of the Year" by the U.S. Chess Federation.
Anders Gideon Tom Ståhlberg was a Swedish chess player. He was among the inaugural recipients of the title International Grandmaster from FIDE in 1950.
Harry Golombek OBE was a British chess player, chess author, and wartime codebreaker. He was three times British chess champion, in 1947, 1949, and 1955 and finished second in 1948.
Duncan Suttles is a chess grandmaster. Canada's second grandmaster after Abe Yanofsky, Suttles was recognized internationally for the originality of his strategic play in the mid-1960s and 70s. He retired from competitive chess in 1985.
John Peter Fedorowicz is an American chess player and chess writer from The Bronx, New York.
Alexander Ivanov is a Soviet-born American chess grandmaster. Born in Omsk, present-day Russia, he moved to the United States in 1988. FIDE awarded him his Grandmaster title in 1991. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife, fellow chess player and Woman International Master Esther Epstein.
Walter Korn was an Austro-Hungarian writer of books and magazine articles about chess. Despite his status as a writer, there is no known record of him playing tournament chess, and few chess players ever met him. One of his few known games is a draw against a 13-year-old Gordon Crown, published in the April 1943 issue of Chess. Korn was a FIDE International Judge for chess compositions and contributed the entire topic of chess for the Encyclopædia Britannica (1972).
John Herbert White was co-author with Richard Clewin Griffith of the first three editions of the famous chess opening treatise Modern Chess Openings. It was first published in 1911 and is still in print. Griffith and White explained in the preface to the first edition that "the many recent master tournaments have rendered necessary an up-to-date book on the Openings" and that "the book is intended to be a guide for match and tournament players". The fifteenth edition, by American grandmaster Nick de Firmian, was published in 2008. The book is commonly referred to as MCO today.
Rubén Felgaer is an Argentine chess player who received the FIDE title of Grandmaster (GM) in 2002. He is a five-time Argentine Chess Champion.
Mihai Șubă is a Romanian and Spanish chess player. FIDE awarded him the International Master title in 1975 and the Grandmaster title in 1978.
Initiative in a chess position belongs to the player who can make threats that cannot be ignored, thus putting the opponent in the position of having to spend turns responding to threats rather than creating new threats. A player with the initiative will often seek to maneuver their pieces into more and more advantageous positions as they launch successive attacks. The player who lacks the initiative may seek to regain it through counterattack.
Anton Vladimirovich Smirnov is an Australian chess player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster (GM) by FIDE in 2017.
Zoya Schleining, is a Ukraine-born German chess player who holds the title of International Master.
Silvino García Martínez is a Cuban chess player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster (GM) by FIDE in 1975. García Martínez is a four-time Cuban champion. He was also Pan American champion in 1968 and won an individual bronze medal at the Chess Olympiad in 1978.
Slavoljub Marjanović is a Serbian chess Grandmaster (GM) (1978), Yugoslav Chess Championship winner (1985), Chess Olympiad team bronze medal winner (1980), FIDE Senior Trainer (2004).
Slim Bouaziz is a Tunisian chess Grandmaster (1993).
Amador Rodríguez Céspedes is a Cuban chess Grandmaster (GM) (1977) who represented Spain since 2002.
Goran Čabrilo is a Serbian chess player who holds the titles of Grandmaster (GM) (1995).
Gad Rechlis is a Moldova born Israeli chess player who holds the title of Grandmaster (GM) (1992).
