Dubai: Le Quang Liem of Vietnam, the reigning World Blitz Chess champion, who will defend his crown starting on Thursday at the Dubai Chess and Culture Club, is a player with a strong will to win and a tremendous ability to analyse the game.
Soon after he became the world champion last year in Russia, international newspapers called him the ‘Spartan Warrior’ in recognition of his battling ability, which he attributes to tough training from a young age.
Speaking to Gulf News before the start of the two-day World Blitz Championship, Quang Liem revealed his approach to the game that has made him a world champion. “In Blitz, you need to play very fast. I guess it is a combination of precise speculation, intuition and luck. In fact, luck is very important,” said 23-year-old Quang Liem, who wants everyone to come and enjoy blitz chess, which takes 15 minutes or less per side.
“Blitz is probably chess for entertainment and I guess everyone will enjoy blitz very much. Though it is entertainment, one has to train hard to excel,” he added.
How did he train to become the world’s best? “A lot of training and continuous practice is a must to get used to the speed. An amateur has to play lot of blitz games just to prepare for this tournament. I usually prepare just like I do for any other tournament and then I relax and focus only during the game. This approach has yielded good results for me.”
Quang Liem says he owes his success to his brother. “I started playing chess from the age of seven. My brother taught me how to play chess and after that I got very interested in the game and I earned some early success, which motivated me to take chess seriously.”
Quang Liem enjoys the challenge of having to give his best due to increasing competition. “Nowadays competition is very tough because many strong and young players are coming up and there is a lot of challenges for us to preform well. Ultimately, it all comes back to your talent, work ethic and determination to win the game.”
In the Blitz Championship, each player will have three minutes and two seconds additional time per move, starting from move one, over 21 rounds starting from 3pm.
