Jón Loftur Árnason (born 13 November 1960) is an Icelandic

chess Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...

grandmaster. He is a three-time Icelandic Chess Champion and was World U17 Chess Champion in 1977.

Chess career

Like fellow Scandinavians

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and

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, Jón in his youth was hailed as a potential world champion after a string of promising results. In 1976, aged 15, he finished equal first in an event for players under 21. The same year, he won an Icelandic open tournament with the score of 9.5/11. Just a year later, playing in a telex match for Iceland against England, he drew as

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against Jonathan Mestel, an established master. Also in 1977, at

Cagnes-sur-Mer Cagnes-sur-Mer (, literally ''Cagnes on Sea''; ) is a French Riviera town near Nice that is in the Alpes-Maritimes department, in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, in southeastern France. Geography Cagnes-sur-Mer is a town in southeaste ...

, he won the World Under-17 Championship (ahead of other distinguished young talents, including

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), before becoming Icelandic champion on the first of three occasions (1977, 1982 and 1988). Shortly thereafter, he accepted an invitation to join the Botvinnik chess school in the Soviet Union. In 1979,

FIDE The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE ( , ), is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national chess federations and acts as the Spor ...

awarded him the title of

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 international competition, he competed first at Husavik 1985, Plovdiv 1986 and Helsinki 1986 (shared). In 1986, FIDE awarded him the

International Grandmaster Grandmaster (GM) is a Chess title, title awarded to chess players by the world chess organization FIDE. Apart from World Chess Championship, World Champion, Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain. Once achieved, the title is hel ...

title. In individual encounters with some of the world's best players, he showed that he was a strong player. He defeated world championship contenders and super-grandmasters of the calibre of Short, Korchnoi, Shirov, Adams, Dreev, Vaganian and Larsen. He has also drawn former

world champions A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

Petrosian, Smyslov, Tal, Karpov, and Khalifman. Representing his nation's

Chess Olympiad The Chess Olympiad is a biennial chess tournament in which teams representing nations of the world compete. FIDE organises the tournament and selects the host nation. Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, FIDE held an Online Chess Olympiad in FIDE Onli ...

team between 1978 and 1994, he helped Iceland to 5th and 6th-place finishes in 1986 and 1992, respectively.

Personal life

Jón Loftur Árnason has been less active since 1995, in order to concentrate on his other passion, business and finance. He obtained a degree in Finance and Accounting from the

University of Iceland The University of Iceland ( ) is a public research university in Reykjavík, Iceland, and the country's oldest and largest institution of higher education. Founded in 1911, it has grown steadily from a small civil servants' school to a modern co ...

and embarked on a career that took him to Icelandic firm Oz Communications Inc., where he was appointed Secretary and Treasurer. Perhaps due to his elevated position, the company showed an affinity with chess and in 2000, sponsored the prestigious rapid ''chess@iceland'' tournament, won by Kasparov ahead of Anand. Jón took part, but was by then short of top class practice and finished in last place. Since then, he has played chess only in a minor capacity, mainly in local team tournaments.

Notable games

Viktor Korchnoi vs Jon Loftur Arnason, Reykjavik, CBM 02 1987, English Opening: King's English Variation, General (A20), 0-1Jon Loftur Arnason vs John Nunn, Novi Sad (ol) 1990, Spanish Game: Closed Variations (C84), 1-0Jon Loftur Arnason vs Alexey Dreev, Reykjavik op 1990, French Defense: Tarrasch Variation. Modern System (C03), 1-0

References

* ''Chess'' Magazine (August 1978) - page 346, A new Icelandic star.
Olimpbase - Olympiads and other Team event information

Reference to Arnason's business career up to 2002

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Arnason, Jon Loftur 1960 births Living people Chess Grandmasters Jon Loftur Arnason World Youth Chess Champions Jon Loftur Arnason Jon Loftur Arnason