It's a self-deprecating statement like "aw shucks, I ain't no genius". But actually they DO have talent, they're just being modest. And indeed, OCFs mule can practice all it wants. I won't win the Derby.

<Fusilli: Interesting... I think this has two possible interpretations:>

It was neither of those. I think people who are massively talented have a strong tendency to not realize (or possibly admit) how innately gifted they are. Sure, they work hard, as any chess player has to, but it's not the work that makes them so good. It's their raw talent. No talent plus hard work makes a decent chess player, but not elite. I daresay there are tons of chess players who work as hard as the elite GM's and never come close to that level.

Well,that is the appproach that always has appealed to Joe the Plummer.

Even Mozart worked very very hard.

I like Kasparov who emphazied that hard work is also a talent. He worked immensely hard himself.

There is the additional point that hard work has to be well organized and structured. I think I had some baseline talent, but I was rather lazy to study chess AND my study was chaotic (as in, often, pick up magazine and study random article, or grab book and look at random chapter). My coach provided some structure, but I got little coaching.

I saw a research article, long ago, where the authors had used fMRI to see which parts of the brain lit up when GMs and club players looked at given positions. Turns out they used different parts of the brain. That may have not been the only thing that the researchers did, but I remember the conclusion that, in order to reach GM level, people did in fact need to be born with certain kind of brain setup, and if you lacked that, no amount of work would take you there. So, apparently chess talent has a direct brain anatomy translation. (A little discouraging, I suppose... No wonder that study did not get much traction in the world of chess as it may have in the world of neurology.)

He neutralized my attempts almost without thinking. Like it was trivial. Like he played from the book. Is it possible that he knew the variation?

Sadly, the game score is almost certainly lost. There is one city, not so extremely far from here, where I might find it - as soon as the COVID enables, I will go there trying my luck.>

Congratulations to Lajos Portisch on his 85th anniversary, a beautiful day, good health and happiness for you!

Portisch has beaten six World Champions in classical chess: Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, Karpov, and Anand, virtually all top stars of his prime time: Korchnoi, Keres, Geller, Stein, Polugaevsky, Beliavsky, Andersson, Larsen, Miles, Nunn, Short, Timman, Hübner, Unzicker, Uhlmann, Mecking, Najdorf, Torre, Reshevsky, Browne, Seirawan, Ljubojevic, Gligoric, Ivkov, Pachman, Hort, Szabo, etc.

Highest ranking of GM Lajos Portisch: =2nd of the world, together with Korchnoi, behind Karpov in 1981 (January-June list) at Elo 2650. Best nominal rating: Elo 2655 in 1980 (January-December list), then as 4th of the world.

Super solid Portisch played in twelve consecutive (!) Interzonal cycles between 1962 and 1993, qualifying eight times (!) for the World Championship Candidate’s, namely at IZT 1964, 1967, 1973, 1976, 1979, 1982, 1985, 1987; missing the qualification for the Candidate’s only in the Interzonals 1962, 1970, 1990 (swiss system), 1993 (swiss system). He co-won two Interzonals.

Impressive Palmares of international invitation tournament triumphs: 4 wins at Wijk aan Zee and former Beverwijk (Hoogovens), 3 wins at IBM Amsterdam, 3 wins at Bosna Sarajevo, 2 wins at Hastings Congress, winning at Tilburg, Las Palmas, Skopje/Ohrid, San Antonio, Monte Carlo, Vidmar Memorial twice, Reggio Emilia twice, and several more, plus nine times National Hungarian Champion.

A member of twenty Hungarian Olympiad teams between 1956 and 2000 (board one 1962-88) where he won all in all eleven Olympiad medals (team and individual points or performance). In total, he played 260 Olympic Games. Of course, Lajos Portisch also played on board one for his team (together with Ribli, Sax, Adorjan, Csom, and Vadasz) to win the Gold medal for Hungary at the Chess Olympiad in Buenos Aires 1978.

<Albertan> Great article, with nice photos too. But I like the photo of this page best.

Victory!

-- CG Liberation Front -->

I'm a complete idiot, this entry is from 2022. Whatever.

Victory!