After turning in a particularly good performance, it is natural for a chess player to suffer a letdown. But it would be hard to imagine a bigger one than Alexei Shirov’s recent crash and burn. In May, Shirov, of Spain, won the M-Tel Masters in Bulgaria, a chess tournament that featured one of the strongest competitive lineups of the year. Just over a week later, he was in Poikovsky, Russia, for the 10th Karpov Tournament, named for the former world chess champion Anatoly Karpov. Shirov, the chess tournament’s top seed, started with four losses. Two of the games were hard fought, but Shirov was wiped out in the other two. He steadied himself to draw games ...

More...