Jan Smejkal was one of the strongest players in the world in the 1970s. He became a grandmaster in 1972, won the Czechoslovak championship three times, and at the Leningrad Interzonal of 1973 he finished fourth, one place behind the three qualifiers for the Candidates: Viktor Korchnoi, Anatoly Karpov and Robert Byrne. He won international tournaments from Polanica-Zdrój and Palma de Mallorca to Vršac, Leipzig and Baden-Baden, beat the former World Champions Vasily Smyslov and Tigran Petrosian, and played in ten Olympiads, including the Lucerne Olympiad of 1982, where Czechoslovakia won the silver medal.
Lanškroun to grandmaster
Smejkal was born in Lanškroun on 22 March 1946. FIDE made him an International Master in 1970 and a grandmaster in 1972. In those years he won the Rubinstein Memorial at Polanica-Zdrój twice, in 1970 and 1972, as well as Smederevska Palanka in 1971 and Palma de Mallorca in 1972. He won the Czechoslovak championship in 1973, 1979 and 1986.
Leningrad, 1973
Smejkal played in three Interzonals. The first, at Leningrad in 1973, was his best result: he scored 11 points and finished fourth behind Korchnoi, Karpov and Byrne. Only the top three qualified for the Candidates, so he missed by one place. He also played in the Interzonals at Biel in 1976 and Rio de Janeiro in 1979.
He won seven consecutive games, in rounds five to eleven, to recover from a slow start. With two rounds left he was still only half a point behind Robert Byrne, but lost to Karpov in round sixteen. Kasparov's Garry Kasparov on My Great Predecessors, Part V describes Smejkal gaining a dangerous initiative, then losing his advantage in severe time trouble and dropping a pawn on move thirty-nine. Karpov won the adjourned ending with queens and opposite-coloured bishops (pp. 225–226).
His highest rating was 2615, in January 1976, when he was level with Mikhail Tal on the FIDE list.
The tournament circuit
In the second half of the 1970s Smejkal won Novi Sad in 1976, Vršac and Leipzig in 1977, and Warsaw and Trenčianske Teplice in 1979. He also won the grandmaster tournament at Dortmund in 1977, and in 1985 he won at Baden-Baden and at the Bad Wörishofen festival. He was known for his battles in time trouble and for his fighting spirit.
Olympiads and club chess
Smejkal played in ten Olympiads, first for Czechoslovakia and finally for the Czech Republic. At Lucerne in 1982 he was a member of the team, with Vlastimil Hort, Vlastimil Jansa, Ľubomír Ftáčnik, Jan Ambrož and Ján Plachetka, that took the silver medal.
In the German Bundesliga he played for SG Enger-Spenge from 1983, for the Münchener SC 1836 from 1985 to 1993 and for SK Passau from 1995 to 2000. In the Czech league he won the team championship with Bohemians Prague in 1994 and with ŠK DP Mladí Prague in 2001. He has not played a rated game since the 2001/02 Czech Extraliga season.
Legacy
Smejkal came within one place of the Candidates in 1973, won the Czechoslovak championship three times and won tournaments across Europe for fifteen years. He was part of the Czechoslovak team that won Olympiad silver at Lucerne in 1982, and he kept playing league chess in Germany and the Czech Republic into the 2000s.
Books
Books Jan Smejkal wrote, co-wrote, edited, or contributed to. Translations and reprints are grouped under the same work.
-
Mistr časové tísně: 40 vybraných partií
Coauthor — Eliška Richtrová and contributing annotators