Garry Kimovich Kasparov (Russian: Garri Kimovich Kasparov, Russian pronunciation: ['garjI 'kjim@vjItc ka'spar@f]; born Garik Kimovich Weinstein, 13 April 1963) is a Russian, and formerly Soviet, chess grandmaster, former world chess champion, writer, and political activist, who many consider to be the greatest chess player of all time. From 1986 until his retirement in 2005, Kasparov was ranked world No. 1 for 225 out of 228 months. His peak rating of 2851, achieved in 1999, was the highest recorded until being surpassed by Magnus Carlsen in 2013. Kasparov also holds records for consecutive professional tournament victories (15) and Chess Oscars (11).

The World Chess Championship 1984 match between Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov had many ups and downs, and a very controversial finish. Karpov started in very good form, and after nine games Kasparov was down 4-0 in a "first to six wins" match. Fellow players predicted he would be whitewashed 6-0 within 18 games. In an unexpected turn of events, there followed a series of 17 successive draws, some relatively short, and others drawn in unsettled positions. Kasparov lost game 27 (5-0), then fought back with another series of draws until game 32 (5-1), earning his first-ever win against the World Champion. Another 14 successive draws followed, through game 46; the previous record length for a world title match had been 34 games, the match of Jose Raul Capablanca vs. Alexander Alekhine in 1927. Kasparov won games 47 and 48 to bring the scores to 5-3 in Karpov's favour. Then the match was ended without result by Florencio Campomanes, the President of Federation Internationale des Echecs (FIDE), and a new match was announced to start a few months later. The termination was controversial, as both players stated that they preferred the match to continue. Announcing his decision at a press conference, Campomanes cited the health of the players, which had been strained by the length of the match. The match became the first, and so far only, world championship match to be abandoned without result. Kasparov's relations with Campomanes and FIDE were greatly strained, and the feud between them finally came to a head in 1993 with Kasparov's complete break-away from FIDE.

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