Viswanathan Anand had a remarkable 2004.
The Indian Super Grandmaster won all the classical events he participated in and was also awarded the chess Oscar for a record third time (1997, 1998 and 2003) for his excellent play last year. And considering his awesome record this year, Anand is a top contender for the 2004 Oscars too.
"2004 was an unbelievable year for me. Not only were my results good, but also my scores. If you look at Sao Paulo (8.5 out of 10) or Tallinn, Estonia (5 out 5) or Wijk Aan Zee (8.5 points out of 13) or Monaco (13.5 - combined points including Blindfold and Rapid), I had extremely good results and I played good chess. In that sense it was a magical year for me," the world number two told rediff.com
"But the challenge now will be to continue that as long as possible. I hope it lasts through 2005."
To keep that winning streak going, a lot of practice and hard work is needed in the future.
"Basically, you have to keep abreast of all the developments. You can't just continue with the analysis that you did last year. I try to allocate some time for training sessions to find a lots of new ideas. I also continue my physical training. I go to the gym every day and try to cycle or walk as well and then try to get back to the game with a fresh mind."
Anand, who turned 35 this month, is also a regular traveller and spends most of his time moving around the world to participate in chess tournaments. He visited three new countries this year to take his tally to a whopping 42 countries.
"In the last year, I managed to add three more countries -- Bulgaria, Brazil and Estonia. I like the regular circuit but once in a while it's nice to go to some place which is exotic. Normally, my tournaments tend to be in Holland, Spain, Germany and so on and I enjoy that too. But every year you get some new destination. A couple of years ago we went to Iceland, we also went to Israel. If you add some new countries to the list its a break from the monotony."
The Indian ace said there was not much he had to ponder about this year-end.
"I generally had good results throughout the year. The only tournament where I did not win the overall category was Monaco. It was not a low point, it was still a good result. But compared to the rest of the year maybe you can call it a disappointment."
Anand created history by winning the Estonia event with a perfect score of 5/5. Among his victims was former world champion Alexander Khalifman. "The high point of the year was the perfect score I got in Estonia -- 5 out of 5 -- it is a very good thing to remember."
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"On one hand the Chess Olympiad was a success, because we improved our performance, we managed to produce our best-ever standings at the tournament. But I feel with a little bit of luck maybe we could have managed a medal."
Anand, who lives in the little town of Collado Mediano near Madrid, is on a brief visit to India to meet up with his family in Chennai. Unfortunately, it also happened to be one of the places, which was affected by the tsunami, which hit South East Asia.
"I am extremely close to the place where the tsunamis hit. It didn't affect us because we were far enough, away from the beach," he said.
"It is sad to watch what happened to so many people. It took some time to even understand what was happening. For the first few hours, the numbers (of casualties)were still very modest as compared to what has happened now. Now, the casualties are in the thousands and that is sad."
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