He won thrice Leningrad City Chess Championship in 1933/34 (joint), 1939 and 1947 (joint). He participated many times in USSR Chess Championship. His best result was in 1933 when he shared 3rd (Mikhail Botvinnik won). He also played in international tournaments, finishing 15th at Moscow 1935 (Botvinnik and Salo Flohr won), and took 2nd at Helsinki 1946 (Viacheslav Ragozin won).