Magnus Carlsen

Sven Magnus Øen Carlsen (born 30 November 1990) is a Norwegian chess grandmaster.

He is a five-time World Chess Champion, the reigning five-time World Rapid Chess Champion, the reigning seven-time World Blitz Chess Champion, and the reigning Chess World Cup Champion.

Carlsen was born in Tønsberg, Norway, on 30 November 1990 to Sigrun Øen, a chemical engineer, and Henrik Albert Carlsen, an IT consultant.

The family spent one year in Espoo, Finland, and then in Brussels, Belgium, before returning to Norway in 1998, where they lived in Lommedalen, Bærum.

They later moved to Haslum.

Carlsen showed an aptitude for intellectual challenges at a young age.

At two years, he could solve 500-piece Jigsaw puzzles; at four, he enjoyed assembling Lego sets with instructions intended for children aged 10–14.

His father, a keen amateur chess player, taught him to play at age five, although he initially showed little interest in it.

He participated in his first tournament—the youngest division of the 1999 Norwegian Chess Championship—at 8 years and 7 months, and scored 6/11.

Carlsen was coached at the Norwegian College of Elite Sport by the country's top player, Grandmaster (GM) Simen Agdestein, who in turn cites Norwegian football manager Egil "Drillo" Olsen as a key inspiration for his coaching strategy.

In 2000, Agdestein introduced Carlsen to Torbjørn Ringdal Hansen, a former Norwegian junior champion and later International Master (IM) and Grandmaster (GM), as Ringdal served a one-year siviltjeneste (an alternative civilian service programme) at the college.

Over the course of that year, Carlsen's rating rose from 904 in June 2000 to 1907.

His breakthrough occurred in the Norwegian junior teams championship in September 2000, where he scored 3½/5 against the country's top junior players and gained a (TPR) of around 2000.

Apart from chess, which he studied about three to four hours a day, his favourite pastimes included playing football and reading Donald Duck comics.

He also practised skiing until age ten.

From autumn 2000 to the end of 2002, Carlsen played almost 300 rated tournament games, as well as in several blitz tournaments, and participated in other minor events.

In October 2002, he placed sixth in the European Under-12 Championship in Peñiscola.

The following month, he tied for first place in the 2002 World Under-12 Championship in Heraklion, placing second to Ian Nepomniachtchi on tiebreak.

He then obtained three IM norms in relatively quick succession: the first at the January 2003 Gausdal Troll Masters (score 7/10, 2453 PR); the second at the June 2003 Salongernas IM-tournament in Stockholm (6/9, 2470 PR); and the third at the July 2003 Politiken Cup in Copenhagen (8/11, 2503 PR).

He was officially awarded the IM title on 20 August 2003.

After finishing primary school, Carlsen took a year off to participate in international chess tournaments in Europe during the autumn of 2003, then returned to complete secondary education at a sports school.

At 15, he won the Norwegian Chess Championship, also becoming the youngest ever player to qualify for the Candidates Tournament in 2005.

At 17, he finished joint first in the top group of Corus.

He surpassed a rating of 2800 at 18, the youngest at the time to do so.

In 2010, at 19, he reached in the FIDE world rankings, the youngest person ever to do so.

He has three sisters, and in 2010 stated that one thing that first motivated him to take up chess seriously was the desire to beat his elder sister at the game.

The first chess book Carlsen read was a booklet named Find the Plan by Bent Larsen, and his first book on openings was Eduard Gufeld's The Complete Dragon.

Carlsen developed his early chess skills playing by himself for hours on end—moving the pieces around, searching for combinations, and replaying games and positions his father showed him.

Simen Agdestein emphasises Carlsen's exceptional memory, stating that he was able to recall the locations, populations, flags and capitals of all the countries in the world by age five.

Later, he memorised the locations, populations, coats-of-arms and administrative centres of "virtually all" 356 Norwegian municipalities.

He has held the position in the FIDE world chess rankings since 1 July 2011 and trails only Garry Kasparov in time spent as the highest-rated player in the world, while holding the record for longest consecutive reign.

His peak rating of 2882 is the highest in history.

He also holds the record for the longest unbeaten streak at an elite level in classical chess at 125 games.

A chess prodigy, Carlsen finished first in the C group of the Corus chess tournament shortly after he turned 13 and earned the title of grandmaster a few months later.

Carlsen became World Chess Champion in 2013 by defeating Viswanathan Anand.

He retained his title against Anand the following year and won both the 2014 World Rapid Championship and World Blitz Championship, becoming the first player to hold all three titles simultaneously, a feat which he repeated in 2019 and 2022.

He defended his classical world title against Sergey Karjakin in 2016, Fabiano Caruana in 2018, and Ian Nepomniachtchi in 2021.

He declined to defend his title against Nepomniachtchi in 2023, citing a lack of motivation.

Known for his attacking style as a teenager, Carlsen has since developed into a universal player.

He uses a variety of openings to make it harder for opponents to prepare against him and reduce the utility of pre-game computer analysis.