Ehsan Ghaem Maghami


Ehsan Ghaem-Maghami is an Iranian chess grandmaster. He is the record holder of Iranian Chess Championship with 13 titles.
On the September 2011 FIDE list, he had an Elo rating of 2583. He holds a Bachelor of Laws and is currently studying sports management at the University of Tehran.
In 2004, he finished first in the Kish GM Tournament. In 2009, he won a 20-game combined match against Anatoly Karpov, played with the proviso that each game be played to mate or dead draw. The overall score was eight wins to Ghaem-Maghami, seven wins to Karpov, and five draws. In 2011, he finished first in the 10th Avicenna International Open Tournament in Hamadan, Iran.

Early life

Ehsan was born on January 11, 1982 in Tehran and learned to play chess at the age of 8 from his father. His early rise in the chess community was swift as he won the Iranian men's championship title by age 14. While also a talented football player and the captain of the Tehran juniors football team at the age of 10, his interest in chess exceeded his interest in football, causing his choice of the former over the latter.

List of Career Achievements

First International Grandmaster in Iranian chess history.
Captain and player of the 1st board in Iran chess national team for the previous 14 years.
Defeated grandmaster Anatoly Karpov in a match totaling 20 games, held in Tehran in 2009.
Guinness record holder for most simultaneous chess games which was held in Tehran on 8-9th FEB 2011
13-time Iran national chess champion
6-time Iran blitz chess champion with 6-time attendance
2-time Iran Rapid chess champion with 2-time attendance
Record holder for the most active and the most successful chess player in 2004 in regard to increasing the most rating points and playing the most games and tournaments, which is registered by the World Chess Federation
Winner of 45 international reputed chess tournaments in different countries
Owner of 4 medals in the world university chess championships
Owner of two bronze medals in the 1st world mind sports games in 2008
Owner of 19 Asian medals in different categories such as individual, team and club tournaments including silver medal of Asian championship in 2003 and bronze medal of Asian games in Doha in 2006
Record holder of the Iran championship title at different ages

Guinness World Record

An Iranian grandmaster, he ousted the Israeli title holder on 9 February 2011 to regain the Guinness record for simultaneous chess games after facing more than 600 players in over 25 hours.
Ehsan Ghaem-Maghami, then 28 years old, won 97.35 percent of his games which began on 2011/02/08 in Tehran's Shahid Beheshti University, a feat reportedly making him the new Guinness title holder of the game.
Of the total 604 games, Ghaem-Maghami won 580, lost 8 and drew 16 in a feat that took more than 25 hours and treading around as he moved from opponent to opponent. "I am so happy to break the record" a victorious yet exhausted Ehsan remarked, adding "...,but now I have to break my sleep record". Reportedly, a physician, a masseur and a dietician were monitoring him throughout the match. He said he would have put in the same zeal even if the previous title holder was a non-Israeli.
"Iran is great and deserves the best. Let's not talk politics... even if this record was held by another person, I would have gone all out to break it," he said after the matches when asked about ousting Israeli Alik Gershon.

Chess career

In October 2011, Ehsan Ghaem-Maghami was expelled from the Corsica Masters in Bastia, France for refusing to play in his scheduled match against Israeli player Ehud Shachar. Ghaem-Maghami told organizers he would not play the Israeli for political reasons. The Islamic Republic of Iran, which refuses to recognize the existence of the Jewish state, has long refused to engage in sports competition against Israel.
In 2013 he played against British Grandmaster Nigel Short in his native homeland.