Vladimir Okhotnik is not necessarily a name that many chess players today would recognize. Indeed, before reading this book the only reason I had heard of him was that we had previously played four online blitz games in 2020! Following this virtual meeting I more or less forgot about him until I saw a recent release from Thinkers Publishing that seemed worth a read: It’s Never Too Late to Become a Grandmaster, by Okhotnik.
The book begins with a fairly direct biographical description of his career in chess to this point. Growing up in Ukraine, Okhotnik had plenty of opportunities to play chess early on, which must have helped his development considerably. He became a master in 1976, and an IM in 1987. Facing a difficult decision, Okhotnik made a brave choice to embark on a career in chess at a time when such a prospect was only deemed feasible for a select group of the best players on the planet. Throughout his life, he has only supported his family through tournament winnings and salary from teaching.
As Okhotnik describes, this fact made it a necessity for him to play in countless tournaments, enough that it proved difficult to describe in one book. He has played in events in more than 20 countries and surely has interesting stories to share from just about all of them. This is well evinced by an entire chapter devoted to his “memorable meetings with great chess players.” Here’s one example that I think showcases his straightforward but engaging style of writing quite well (46):
“I remember an episode related to Vasily Ivanchuk, who even then (1985) stood out among other juniors. An excellent memory, tactical vision and extraordinary imagination favorably distinguished Vasya in those years. He played blitz well and could not find a partner in the training camp – no one wanted to play with him! As a result, I sat down to play him. We played 64 games and I lost 26-38.
Suddenly after the match, I heard ‘Yes… You are not so easy, Vladimir Ilyich.’ ‘You too, Vasya, are not so simple,’ I muttered in response. We both were unhappy with the result of the match! Someone probably thinks that right now I would not mind such a result? Not true! Even now, at 70, I would have remained unhappy …”
Throughout his career, Okhotnik has gained several GM norm level results and ought to have achieved the title much sooner than he did. Tragically, in the initial document sent to FIDE for review, one of the norms proved to fall short of a requirement by 0.3 rating points. Despite having a fourth norm “in reserve,” Okhotnik was understandably flummoxed and made no move to submit the proper paperwork. I take it as a sign of his character that he soldiered on and achieved the Grandmaster title anyway at the age of 61, by winning the 2011 World Senior Championship. He went on to take the title again in 2015.
After the initial discussion of his career, Okhotnik then takes a much deeper dive into his most memorable games, from all stages of his career. I quite like the use of the word “memorable” here, seeing as this allows for the inclusion of interesting but somewhat flawed battles, which don’t make their way into typical “best game” collections. It becomes clear from a study of the selected games that he is a fairly creative and unique player, in the opening stage and other parts of the game, and that he strives to play interesting chess. Here is one game (his decisive win from the 2011 World Senior Championship) that I found especially impressive. It is never easy to keep a cool head in defense in a high pressure situation, but here I think Okhotnik performed this task exceptionally well.
My only complaints would be some instances of lengthy and clearly computer driven annotations – which Okhotnik does give fair warning of – and some occasionally awkward phrasing, no doubt due to English not being Okhotnik’s native language. Overall, I would recommend this book to chess players of just about any level as an entertaining and inspirational read.
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