I believe Judit Polgar still holds the rank of strongest IM ever. At the age of 12, as an IM, she ranked 55th in the world. She wouldn't become GM until she was 15. Most people don't rank in the top 100 until they are a GM.
@@theanonymouslegion4811 It also depends on time period, Nowadays 12 year olds are getting GM norms, Many prodigies are coming up and reaching 2500-2600 in just 17-18 years so Earlier there were definitely not many strong players except 10 -20 whom we know,So its possible.
Hey, Gotham, I’m a female in my 60s who started playing chess just a few years ago. Thank you for highlighting women in chess snd for inspiring young girls to get an early start. You’re my favorite chess RU-vidr. Keep up the awesome work!
Best of luck Alene, I'm just getting back into chess having not played since 2004. Back then I played at a club for a while and my greatest achievement was a win against a female player who was about 60. I found an early endgame combination she overlooked, and to be honest, I'm not sure I could have even beat her with the extra piece but she graciously gave me the game as a reward. I was thrilled for that win because she always just crushed me positionally every time I played her! She was a B-class player iirc, and one of the top 100 women in the US at that time. She was a lovely, sweet woman, 100% grandma vibe, but would just tie you up on the board until you only had bad moves left!
Wow!! U have started following chess as hobby/passion at like 60s??? That's when people want to retire and have fun! Cool!! U r a legend!! Thanks alot mam cuz now i feel insanely motivated by figures like you
Judit is a great player - sometimes felt they should have put one of her games in the Queens Gambit - just to remind everybody that there was a live Elizabeth Harmon existing - without all the issues! Still the female player I most admire was Vera Menchik who was the only woman until Judit that played in super-tournaments - beat world champions (Euwe) and national champions. Sadly due to the second world war - she did not play to much at the end and died in a V1 - bomb attack in 1944. She deserves a miniseries of her own.
@@rastrisfrustreslosgomez544 the Queens gambit is based on a book with the same title, they simply followed the source material. (It's loosely based on the life of bobby fisher in case you didn't know)
@@hommelwijf so what? displaying Judith's games on screen is independant from following the source material since knowing which move got played is irrelevant to the narrative, instead it would be a great source of fan-service and a much appreciated tribute to the real life Queen
I would love your review of Sofia Polgar's tournament in Rome. I believe they nicknamed it the "Sacking of Rome" because she obliterated all of the GMs with an incredible tournament performance.
@UCyCmBIFgh7iWrDtUVR9LLWg It's difficult to count up all the things that are wrong with this horribly misinformed comment, but suffice it to say you aren't making a great case for that IQ claim.
@@cybrancommander5993 imagine shaming someone because they admire a professional chess player, she's way above average, also imagine using nerd or simp as pejorative terms to shame people
A lot of these top players didn't respect here because she was a female chess players, and they payed the price for it. Although she wasn't the greatest player she did a lot for womens chess and played some great games in her career. No other woman has ever reached a FIDE rating of 2700. Anyone who reaches a FIDE rating of 2700 is a badass chess player. And Judith certainly was a badass chess player.
@@frickseerose6146 She was close, but she's around 2650. She did take a short break (I think it was for her studies), but I bet that she will break 2700.
i didn't know judith never played in women's games!! that's so dope, i thought i was in the minority of chess-playing women for not liking that women had their own separate titles because it *does* set the bar lower. thanks for the video, judith is such a rockstar.
It does set the bar lower but there's a reason for that. Never in the history of humanity were women endorsed nor encouraged to play chess. Quite the opposite. So it makes sense how systematically they'd try to start less and by giving them a separate category the chess federation is trying to encourage more women to join and better themselves at this male dominated sport. Someday when the discrimination on the basis of gender will be ancient history then the segragations will be also long forgotten, for now they're trying to 'even the field'
Because women are quite far behind men in chess. Why? I don't really know. It could be because women in general don't like this game as much as men do (although I don't know if that really is the case). But Judit is the only woman to pass a 2700 rating in her career if I'm not mistaken. There are many male players that have surpassed not only 2700, but also 2800. It doesn't make much sense to put a woman who is around 2650 with male players who are 2750-2850.
The first fifteen moves against Anand looked soooo much like a guess the elo game,she sacking pieces and Anand avoiding to take them looked so much like Gothamsub blundering pieces and randomnoob not noticing it 😂😂😂😂😂
@@Zozakaoo7 yeah... but does the sentence have something to do with his chess carreer? Lone sentence. You would have to answer the question til his chess career be praised. So the sentence is technically asking about the man's life as a whole.
Have you noticed the difference between her and Anish Giri comentating on the WCC? Giri is always like "oh, this pawn here closes the diagonal, white goes here and equalizes and the game is 0+" while Judit just dont give a f***k for the engines and is always like "but what If you trade here and after king moves, now i can infiltrate with my f******g badass rook"
I live in Hungary and started playing chess a few months ago. I want to learn it, so I took one of her books out of the library to try to improve and inspire myself. Thank you for the video, it was also very inspiring!
@@JeeBand Well I gave up on learning a long time ago, but I've found things that fit me better. I hope you succeed though, good luck with learning chess!
Thank you Levy, this is truly appreciated. As one of your female viewers who recently got into chess, this means a lot. Good luck on your journey to GM!
I love that you featured her and that KING'S gambit game. Fitting since she's a tough ass female player and there are rarely king's gambit games at this level since it's so risky. Shows how great she is.
Thank you so much for being so blatently honest, direct and correct on such an important topic. Im very sure this video will be inspitational for a lot of people. Thank you
Female viewer here! I play in my university chess team and am reguarly patronised and put down by references to 'only ever being able to beat women' (when there's never any women in the tournamounts anyway) - plus I'm the only woman in the whole team ...some of my gal friends came along once and never came back because they said they felt too uncomfortable with some of the comments - Judit serves as such a huge inspiration to me, and this video is so so important and I really value it! (also if you're reading this, please don't pin of shame anyone as it diverts from the message). Much love :)
omg the victim mentality men and women are different wtf if top 20 male GM's of all time compete against female top 20 of all time who will win the most we know the answer stfu and stop hating on men grow up
This was one of the most entertaining Gothamchess videos I've seen. Judit's games were incredible, not to mention they were against the best in the world.
Content machine. Thats why so many people love u. It was unthinkable for me to be interested in chess, but u did it. Now here watching ur videos minutes after they come out. Keep it up
Fun fact: the 8th game was played indeed in San Luis, Argentina. I live there, and I saw that game, but I was 9 years old and didn't even know how to play chess (my grandma was fan of her). Yet im still trying to find out who the hell asked me but hey, I meet her back then. Saludos a todos los argentinos leyendo
"If playing like women meant anything in chess it means to play with relentless aggression." - Gary Kasparov thoughts on his defeat against Judith. Chess requires brains and hands to move pieces nothing else. Its a myth to think that chess is a game of men.
Yeahhh I mean.... not quite a myth is it, when you look at the standings and records. Don't tell me women are still being shut down in 2021 and are afraid lol. All doors are open now.
@@lucasng4712 what they said is absolutely true. Obsessively spending years and every waking moment pushing wooden pieces around a board, with absolutely no guarantee of financial compensation as a result of it, is objectively a complete waste of time. Men are really weird and get hugely obsessive about minutiae, be it in sport or anything else. *This is in no way saying women cannot do x or y*. They absolutely can and are frequently better at it. Though generally speaking, dudes are wired differently. There are biological differences that can't be ignored. This DOES NOT mean men are automatically better at things because they are men. This is simply a broad explanation for why you see more men in STEM fields (Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and also in sports like Snooker and Chess. We should be able to have a reasonable debate about this sort of thing without fear of being branded sexist, or getting your comments batted away with a dismissive "lmao no".
what a queen!!! thank you so much for this Levy, god i really wanna play competitive chess again now :) Honoured to be part of the 5% even as a semi-mediocre 1200 haha
I would have love if you would added the story of the Polgar´s family, how her parent had a theory from before they born, that anyone could become top in something just practicing from little (as all champions does), and he did this experiment with her daughters, which he totally success to prove his point without the advantage of numbers or innate talent. Even taking into account that it would be always a culture bias and pressure that plays against women, because their own friends and social circle push them to "boyfriends, kids, etc" from early age, when for men there is no hurry or distractions and they even get encourage to be 100% committed. So I guess that is the biggest gap that society should start to close.
@@lynxsss5403 one thing is to know that with practice you could improve (everyone knew that), another thing was to believe that that even without an innate talent (just from adn) someone can reach the top, proving that "genius are made, not born" (I Still think adn also help but he made his case). This is the story: medium.com/the-reflectionist/creating-a-genius-the-3-stage-journey-to-creative-excellence-7ac02dab9e9 And this was even a higher proof because he had daughters, which is harded from a social enviroment point, because these girls does not have any previous role model to follow or feel inspired (other women good at chess), which they may believe that is not possible, that they may be inferior, they also may have the influence of friends or society telling them that is not normal a girl playing chess, that they should do another thing).
@@angellestat2730 One doesn't need any women or men inspiration at all just like I like sabine hossenfender she is a physicist and she inspired me to do physics I don't see any reason why she should be men so that I can take any inspiration
This was possibly your best recap to date, and certainly the one I enjoyed the most. There was an evident Zeal for Polgar's games that you showed, and it's easy to see why. They're exciting. The way she opens out sacrificing material for sustainable initiative. Incredible. Sometimes I can trick myself into playing sharply by telling myself, "I have less to defend... I'm winning." In her case, when she makes that sacrifice, she seem to do so with the intention of committing to that light square, dark square, bishop pair... strategy. it's definitely fun to watch and I thank you greatly for sharing. On a side note. I'm nearly ready for that Caro course of yours. The nimzo/ragozin isn't working out for me. Too much fighting for equality, and not enough fighting for advantage. I really wanted to save it for the 1500-1800 climb, but If I'm going to approach the slav, I always felt it best to approach the two together. I catch a lot of flack for not blindly pitching your courses, but I haven't taken one. I am nervous about the video format, but I am also looking forward to it. I've never played a dishonest game. Which is something I don't think I can say about anything else in life. A disingenuous recommendation would seem to violate that in some fashion. I hope you don't take any actual offence. I've rambled for far too long. In any case, if I haven't said it before. May the best of your todays be the worst of your tomorrows.
I would have love if he would added the story of the Polgar´s family, how her parent had a theory from before they born, that anyone could become top in something just practicing from little (as all champions does), and he did this experiment with her daughters, which he totally success to prove his point without the advantage of numbers or innate talent. Even taking into account that it would be always a culture bias and pressure that plays against women, because their own friends and social circle push them to "boyfriends, kids, etc" from early age, when for men there is no hurry or distractions and they even get encourage to be 100% committed. So I guess that is the biggest gap that society should start to close.
@@angellestat2730 It's really not though. The biggest factor when it comes to the gender gap in chess is biology. Men and women have different characteristics. Which, to be fair, is an even greater endorsement of her father's theory. By the way, you forgot to mention the fact that her father actually put out an ad in an attempt to find a woman who would agree to participate in his experiment, which is how her parents got married in the first place.
@@angellestat2730 imo the biggest difference is men and women themselves and mental characteristics. Men innately want to he leaders the same isnt true for women. A woman is just as likely as a man to get bullied for playing chess at school the difference is how important this is to either one and in my experience women always bail out first men are simply more likely to take risks. Whether this is because men are stronger mentally or dont feel the same pain or rejection from being ridiculed I will never know though I tend to lean to the latter. Obviously in the past this simply doesnt apply women were second class citizen which while his did have advantages the disadvantages massively outweigh it and one of them was a lack of education but in modern society there is no reason women shouldnt be just as good at chess as men exept for interests. You see the same thing in Esports why arent women as good at games as men? Well the size of your hands makes a small difference but its just participation because either board games video games and such just arent as riveting to women in general or mabye as singular entities they are less likely to stray from a group mentality to play what is seen as "nerdy" or "geeky" to create new parts of modern culture such as gaming such as chess such as comics and movies like marvel such as anime. The majority of these "nerdy" things are dominated by male fans and imo Is the reason women suck at games and chess in comparison to men imo.
Thanks for highlighting Judit Polgar! She is a human wrecking ball over the board. I hope you'll consider another deep dive into some other sweet victories by her. Her fighting style is really great to watch for folks (like me) who's play ain't so great, but who really appreciate the art of chess! These are beautiful games wonderfully presented, so thanks for doing it! Good day.
I don’t usually comment, but I just wanted to say it’s so refreshing to hear you talk about and understand the gender gap! It’s so important to have men talking about current issues (whether chess related or not) and videos like these always make me smile. Thank you Levy. Here’s to more top female players in the future! 🥂
Judit and Susan are superfantastic women with an always positive attitude. Just watch Judit’s latest against Magnus. And their advocacy for chess is absolutely amazing.
Judit was ranked no 8 in her peak. She was very very strong. Its not surprising to see her defeat no. 1 players. Just like Dubov defeated magnus in airthings, Dubov is not even in top 10 but it wont surprise me if he defeats magnus or nepo in any upcoming games.
I was already a fan of Judit Polgar for her interesting background story, didn't realize she was such an incredibly aggressive player too (who beat 11 world champions), very crazy games
Bravo! A wonderful example of what is in store for the chess world if the trend can sustain its efforts over the patriarchs of chess. Intelligence is not determined by sex or gender, and any new ideas from anyone is what makes chess exciting! I love excitement in chess, and as a older straight male playing chess, I don’t care what or with who you do with your private time, I only care about the next move! Well done Levy, well done!
Why did you feel the need to tell everyone you are a straight white male? Did you want woke points? It doesn't add anything to your reasonable analysis.
@@TheLincolnrailsplitt why did you guess they were white? And mentioning it makes the point that he's saying that not to benefit himself, but for greater fairness and justice. Do you hate the idea of a level playing field?
Thanks for constantly speaking up about this Levy. It's super appreciated and I can only hope people listen up ❤️ You could argue there isn't barriers now, but there are social barriers. While I've played chess (online) and played with plenty of nice dudes, I've experienced also a lot of hostility, aggression, harassment, etc. I don't really let it get to me because I'm old enough to know those guys must be super unhappy with themselves, but it can definitely be off putting to younger women, and I worry for someone like my niece (but hopefully I can help her out 💪). Anyways, just a long rambly way to say thanks for speaking up about this!!
@Kate Drewcka - I agree but the situation is more complex than simply looking at how men treat women players on line, or what the opportunities are today. Imagine that there is a race and that half the players (Group A) start that race, go a few laps and then they allow the other half (Group B) to start. Now, as the competitors are driving round, they can hear the commentators saying how Group B are never going to be as good as Group A: never going to catch up because they are inherently less skilled at racing. Imagine also that the A's have better cars, a whole network of engineers and mechanics and financial supporters to back them, and the B's don't because no one thinks they are worth investing in. Lastly, imagine that the second group have grown up with myths about themselves that make them feel inferior. Now imagine that the first group are men and the second are women.
@@guyslifehacks5179 - I think that might be a generalisation/assumption that you can't back up. Also, it doesn't matter if men are mean to each other when playing games - this is a far more complicated situation than a few insulting comments. Read my comment to Kate Drwecka above.
@@honeychurchgipsy6 I wholeheartedly agree! It's just something I didn't get into because I've found youtube comments to often be pretty toxic. Thanks for bringing it up though!
@@thisiskatedee - I hear you!! You would not believe the ridiculous arguments I've engaged in on YT The worst are the men who think they are the ones fighting for women's rights, and that feminism is bad for women because, in the past, women could choose how they lived their lives whereas nowadays they are forced to have a career etc. It's bizarre and scary too.
Imagine beating a world champion. Man, she's badass, although she never was a world champion, no other woman can get even close to what she did. Huge respect to Judit Polgar.
Seeing Topalev, Ponomariov, Khalifman and Kasimdzhanov here makes me wish for more content about these guys. I hate how they are treated like total nobodies by chess media as they are/were all fantastic players, regardless of any debates people might have about the split.
Yes, and to classify Judit as the strongest female chess player of all time, while technically correct, would be to seriously mischaracterize her and miss the point: Judit simply is one of the strongest chess players ever! Her game against Anand was relayed in pseudo-live fashion over an Internet Relay and was stunning; and it still is! - j q t -
@@johnballard6725 kasparov defeated her 12 times and she only won once. Same to Magnus. Stop worshipping this overrated character just becoz shes a woman
@@digitalstories2179 - triggered much? Why are you and your kind so upset when a woman gets praised for her achievements? Polgar is not overrated at all - she is rated exactly as she should be - as one of the best chess players ever. She beat Fisher's record to become the youngest person ever to become a GM (at the time) at the age of 15, was rated 55 in the world according to FIDE - at the age of 12 - and achieved a ranking of 8th in the world: need I go on? And all this without the advantages of being coached by world champions and former world champions as Kasparov and others were.
You should also cover games from Hou Yifan, only her mid-20s, widely considered to be the second-strongest female chess player in history (behind Judit Polgar)
She is by far my favorite chess player of all time. Such aggressive, creative positional approaches...Her games are a rare occasion where I would say a chess game is "hype"!
Most important video you've done Gotham (all your videos are great). My daughter enjoys chess (I'm her dad) and I bring up Judit and Irina Krush and Jennifer Yu (etc.) as examples of great Chess players all the time. Judit is a giant...with a little bit more luck and support she would have been world champion. Thanks for making the video.
That’s an incredible sexist comment! I know he was well intended as any of us would be glad to be compared with Tal, but Judit has a unique style of aggressiveness, that’s why Top male players COULD NOT SEE HER KILLER MOVES come, even when ALL OF THEM knew all of Tal’s games. Judit Polgar is a beast and a machine in her own right.
Polgar sisters are an inspiration on every point. From the way their parents chose to educate them, the results and achievements each of them had in this sport, to their legacy. I admire Judith’s pure attacking style, power play and will; the hostile context (vs Kasparov, Korchnoi) in which she played some of these matches proves her incredible character strength. In this regard, a few months after Carlsen gave his chess champions tier list in an interview - he wasn’t so kind with Judith - she happened to meet him in a garden in Madrid and beat him to the punch in a blitz game hahaha
@@cassandrasinclair8722 it's not necessarily a false dichotomy. There are areas of mutual exclusivity see the gender- equality paradox. There have been attempt to equalize culture in regards to treatment of men and women and that has by and large lead to greater disparities between the sexes.
@@cassandrasinclair8722 I call it a paradox because the social constructionist types would say that men and women are basically the same, so equalizing culture would produce more equal results in varying endeavors. I didn't mean it to sound like I was endorsing that view. Sorry if that wasn't clear, I do agree with what youre saying.
Jesus Christ, why do you new gen kids need to see women in chess just to be inspired? So cringy. Back in my day, when I was a kid in chess (yeah I'm male), there were many females in chess...great females in chess...they just were quiet and got on with business...there were some formidable female opponents...some beat me, some didn't. I was chess captain at school too. But we didn't make such a big fuss about gender back then...oh he's a boy, oh she's a girl...all that claptrap. Nowadays on social media, everything is so cringy and people look for validation by being inspired by great women players and stuff...a bit cringy. I'm glad I didn't grow up with social media. My sister is a great chess player, and she doesn't need to be inspired by other females to do well on her own...she just does it.
Having lived and worked in Hungary for two happy years of my life and having a great affinity for the country, the people and the language, Polgar Judit is one of my favourite chess players. It is very nice to see this collection of her winning games and the opponents are like a who’s who of chess masters from the period. Thanks you for the video, the background inputs and the analysis. 👍👍👍
I would have love if he would added the story of the Polgar´s family, how her parent had a theory from before they born, that anyone could become top in something just practicing from little (as all champions does), and he did this experiment with her daughters, which he totally success to prove his point without the advantage of innate talent that you can from just form numbers (no every man who practice from little become a top player). Even taking into account that it would be always a culture bias and pressure that plays against women, because their own friends and social circle push them to "boyfriends, kids, etc" from early age, when for men there is no hurry or distractions and they even get encourage to be 100% committed. So I guess that is the biggest gap that society should start to close.
I really love the way that you describe and explain the games 😅 you make them really easy to understand and make me laugh. 🙋🏻♀️ I'm one of the girls that started watching your videos after the queen's gambit, I originally started watching to teach my boyfriend how to play after he got me a chess set for Christmas and he didn't have a clue what he was doing but your one of my favourite RU-vidrs now 😅 and my boyfriend now won't play chess with me because I play online all the time and watch your videos every day haha
Levy you are the only streamer that I like to watch the entire video... super clear and the most well prepared explaining every tactic and every game... Keep like this!! You are the best 💪
I feel the same towards women-specific titles and tournaments. Symbolically it represents the idea that women can't compete with men and that men are inherently stronger at chess, which is discouraging and helps perpetuate disparity in the ratio of female players.
Exactly! Unlike physical sports, chess really doesn't discriminate at all. So chess tournaments shouldn't either. Men have a physical advantage in sports, but chess is completely equal. It's just that chess isn't promoted towards young girls as often as towards boys. I remember as a young girl I liked chess but didn't like the fact that the chess class I went to had no girls and quit after a few months and didn't care to keep playing. Until extremely recently after chess was popularised and I remembered that I used to really like it because it made me think strategically.
Still men and women are different wtf we are so different in Physical aspect but we are not that different in mental but we are different i think it's memory if top 10 male Gm's compete against top 10 female Gm's out of 100 who will win the most we all know the answer stop with the men hate
@@Jkjoannaki Nope men and women are different in physical so much but we are not that mush difference in mental but we are different if top vs top male and female compete against each other ot of 100 who will win the most we all know the answer but keep be a victim and hate on men that's the only thing modern feminist women know about
