USSR First League — Volgodonsk 1981

Four years after sharing the Soviet Championship at Leningrad in 1977, Boris Gulko topped the First League at Volgodonsk with 10½/17 — proof that even deep into his years as a refusenik, still waiting on a refused application to emigrate, he could out-play eighteen of the country's leading masters. The final he qualified for, at Frunze that winter, belonged to someone else: an eighteen-year-old named Garry Kasparov, sharing his first Soviet title.

◇Gulko back on top

Gulko's 10½ led a tight chase: Adrian Mikhalchishin, Gennadij Timoscenko and Josif Dorfman tied for second on 10, and Evgeny Sveshnikov took the last of the five qualifying places on 9½ — half a point ahead of a five-way tie on 9 that included Yuri Anikaev, Nukhim Rashkovsky, Evgeni Vasiukov, Bukhuti Gurgenidze and Zurab Azmaiparashvili.

Gulko had already shared the Soviet title once, in 1977, before he and his wife, the Woman Grandmaster Anna Akhsharumova, became prominent refuseniks after their request to leave the country was refused. He continued to compete inside the Soviet system through the early 1980s, and would not be allowed to emigrate to the United States until 1986.

◇The reversal at Frunze

None of the five Volgodonsk qualifiers came close to the top at Frunze, where Kasparov and the reigning champion Lev Psakhis tied for first on 12½/17. Gulko himself slid to fifteenth on 6½; Dorfman finished ninth on 8½ and Sveshnikov tenth on 8; Timoscenko fell to seventeenth on 6, and Mikhalchishin, who had tied for second at Volgodonsk, finished last of all eighteen players on 5½.

It was as complete a reversal as the Soviet qualifying system produced in this era: the man who dominated the First League found himself outclassed a few weeks later by a field that included the future World Champion.