Biel 1976 Interzonal

The Biel Interzonal was one of two qualifiers into the 1977 Candidates matches. Bent Larsen, always at his best when running his own race, won the twenty-player round-robin outright by half a point. Behind him three former world championship contenders — Petrosian, Portisch and Tal — tied and had to be separated by a play-off in Varese.

◇A road to the Candidates

For the 1976–78 cycle the Interzonal stage was again split in two, at Biel and at Manila, with the top finishers of each advancing to the Candidates matches that would eventually produce a challenger for World Champion Anatoly Karpov. Twenty players gathered in the Swiss watch-making town of Biel/Bienne for nineteen rounds.

The field was heavy with experience — Tigran Petrosian, Lajos Portisch, Mikhail Tal, Vasily Smyslov, Robert Byrne, Robert Hübner, Efim Geller and Ulf Andersson — alongside rising talents such as the young American Kenneth Rogoff.

◇Larsen's half-point

Bent Larsen, the great Danish individualist, made the running and held on to win outright with 12½/19, half a point ahead of the chasing group. It was a characteristic Larsen result: uncompromising, front-running, and clear of a very strong field.

Petrosian, Portisch and Tal all finished on 12, tied for second through fourth. With more Candidates places to fill than the standings alone could award, the three had to meet again to decide who advanced.

◇The Varese play-off

The tie was settled in a playoff at Varese, in northern Italy. Petrosian scored 4½, Portisch 4 and Tal 3½, so Petrosian and Portisch joined Larsen in the Candidates and Tal was out.

Those extra Varese games were played only among the three tied contestants, which is why a summed-points cross-table can appear to lift Petrosian, Portisch and Tal above Larsen: the archive folds the play-off in with the Interzonal itself. On the round-robin that decided the tournament, Larsen finished first.