Matthias Wahls (born January 25, 1968) is a German

chess grandmaster Grandmaster (GM) is a title awarded to chess players by the world chess organization FIDE. Apart from World Champion, Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain. Once achieved, the title is held for life, though exceptionally it h ...

and chess instructor.

Career

Wahls began his career through SK Union Eimsbuettel, a

chess club A chess club is a club formed for the purpose of playing the board game of chess. Chess clubs often provide for both informal and tournament games and sometimes offer league play. Traditionally clubs host over the board, face to face chess more t ...

in Hamburg. Beginning in 1985, he played for Hamburger SK in the first division, and became the German Youth Chess Champion. Wahls was recognized by

FIDE The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE ( Fédération Internationale des Échecs), is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national c ...

as an

International Master FIDE titles are awarded by the international chess governing body FIDE (''Fédération Internationale des Échecs'') for outstanding performance. The highest such title is Grandmaster (GM). Titles generally require a combination of Elo rating and ...

in 1988 and achieved the title of Grandmaster in 1989. Wahls represented Germany in the

1990 File:1990 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1990 FIFA World Cup is played in Italy; The Human Genome Project is launched; Voyager I takes the famous Pale Blue Dot image- speaking on the fragility of Humankind, humanity on Earth, Astroph ...

and

1992 Chess Olympiad The 30th Chess Olympiad ( tl, Ika-30 Olimpiyadang pang-ahedres), organized by FIDE and comprising an openAlthough commonly referred to as the ''men's division'', this section is open to both male and female players. and a women's tournament, as wel ...

s and went on to win the 1996 and 1997 German Chess Championships. In 1998, Wahls qualified for the FIDE World Chess Championship held a year later in Las Vegas. He defeated Altin Cela of Albania by 1½ – ½ but was defeated in the second round by

Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...

Vassily Ivanchuk Vasyl Mykhaylovych Ivanchuk ( uk, Василь Михайлович Іванчук; born March 18, 1969), also transliterated as Vassily Ivanchuk, is a Ukrainian chess player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE in 1988. A leading ...

scoring 0 – 2. In the latter 1990s, Wahls began conducting seminars, focusing primarily on openings. He also published a book titled "The Modern Scandinavian: Themes, Structures & Plans in an Increasingly Popular Chess Opening" in 1997 and created a course on the

Scandinavian Defense The Scandinavian Defense (or Center Counter Defense, or Center Counter Game) is a chess opening characterized by the moves: :1. e4 d5 This opening is classified under code B01 in the ''Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings'' (). The Scandinavian ...

opening. Wahls' score In the Elo system of rating relative skill remained unchanged from July of 2006 through October, 2022, as he played no Elo-eligible matches. He has since dropped to 2533.

References

External links

* Chess Grandmasters Living people 1968 births German chess players Sportspeople from Hamburg German poker players {{Germany-chess-bio-stub