Karpov improved so quickly under Botvinnik's tutelage that he became the youngest Soviet National Master in history at fifteen in 1966 ; this tied the record established by Boris Spassky in 1952.

In his first attempt at the Soviet Championship final, the 22nd in the series, held in Moscow 1955, Spassky tied for third place with 11½ / 19, after Smyslov and Efim Geller, which was sufficient to qualify him for the Gothenburg Interzonal later that year.

Spassky then tied for first in a semifinal for the 24th Soviet championship, thereby qualifying.

At Leningrad 1963, the site of the 31st Soviet final, Spassky tied for first with Stein and Ratmir Kholmov, with Stein winning the playoff, which was held in 1964.

In February – March 1973, Spassky finished equal third at Tallinn with 9 / 15, three points behind Tal ; he tied for first at Dortmund on 9½ / 15 (+ 5 − 1 = 9 ) with Hans-Joachim Hecht and Ulf Andersson.

Finally, at Barcelona WC 1989, Spassky scored 7½ / 16 for a tied 8th – 12th place, as Kasparov shared first with Ljubomir Ljubojević.

He won his first Soviet title at Leningrad 1963 ; he tied with Boris Spassky and Ratmir Kholmov in the tournament itself, then won the playoffs.

His tournament victories include the first place tie (+ 6 − 0 = 9 ) with Boris Spassky at the Chigorin Memorial in Sochi 1965, first at Maribor 1967 ahead of Samuel Reshevsky, first at Krems, and first at Amsterdam 1980 tied with Hans Ree.

At age 69, he tied for second place in a very strong field at Buenos Aires 1979, with 8 / 13, behind winner Bent Larsen ( 11 / 13 ), though ahead of former world champions Tigran Petrosian and Boris Spassky.

Portisch qualified from the Amsterdam Interzonal 1964, with 14. 5 / 23, in a tied eighth / ninth place ( the winners were Mikhail Tal, Spassky, Vasily Smyslov, and Bent Larsen ).

Portisch got his revenge against Spassky in 1980, when he tied their quarterfinal match 7-7 in Mexico, and advanced to the semifinals since he had more victories with the Black pieces.

He won the Lone Pine tournament in 1973, tied for second place behind reigning World Champion Boris Spassky in the international tournament in San Juan, Puerto Rico in 1969, and took first place in the first-ever Grand Prix in 1980.

Shamkovich became a Grandmaster in 1965 and won several tournaments, with his best victory coming at Sochi in 1967, where he tied for first place with Nikolai Krogius, Vladimir Simagin, Boris Spassky and Alexander Zaitsev.

Garry Kasparov argued that Karpov would have had good chances, because he had beaten Spassky convincingly and was a new breed of tough professional, and indeed had higher quality games, while Fischer had been inactive for three years.

He had been living in seclusion in Yugoslavia due to an arrest warrant issued by the United States for violating the U. N. blockade of Yugoslavia with his 1992 match against Spassky, and for tax evasion.

Spassky won the Soviet Chess Championship twice outright ( 1961, 1973 ), and twice lost in playoffs ( 1956, 1963 ), after tying for first place during the event proper.

During his youth, from the age of ten, Spassky often worked on chess for several hours a day with master-level coaches.

Spassky competed for the Lokomotiv Voluntary Sports Society.

By sharing seventh place with 11 / 20 at Gothenburg, Spassky qualified for the 1956 Candidates ' Tournament, held in Amsterdam, automatically gaining the grandmaster title, and was then the youngest to hold the title.

Spassky then went into a slump in world championship qualifying events, failing to advance to the next two Interzonals ( 1958 and 1962 ), a prerequisite to earn the right to play for the world championship.

Spassky had the advantage for much of the game, but missed a difficult win after adjournment, then declined a draw.

A win would have qualified Spassky for the Interzonal, and a draw would have ensured a share of fourth place with Yuri Averbakh, with qualification possible via a playoff.

Spassky finished in a tie for ninth at the 27th Soviet final in Leningrad, with 10 / 19, as fellow Leningrader Viktor Korchnoi scored his first of four Soviet titles.

Another disappointment for Spassky came at the qualifier for the next Interzonal, the Soviet final, played in Moscow 1961, where he again lost a crucial last-round game, this to Leonid Stein, who thus qualified, as Spassky finished equal fifth with 11 / 19, while Petrosian won.

Then, in his Candidates ' Final match against Mikhail Tal at Tbilisi 1965, Spassky often managed to steer play into quieter positions, either avoiding former champion Tal's tactical strength, or extracting too high a price for complications.

Spassky lost a keenly fought match to Petrosian in Moscow, with three wins against Petrosian's four, with seventeen draws, though the last of his three victories came only in the twenty-third game, after Petrosian had ensured his retention of the title, the first outright match victory for a reigning champion since the latter of Alekhine's successful defences against Bogoljubov in 1934.

While Spassky was undefeated and handed tournament victor Larsen one of his three losses, his fourteen draws kept him from seriously contending for first prize, as he came two points behind Larsen.

In March – April 1970, Spassky played first board for the Soviet side in the celebrated USSR vs. World event at Belgrade, where he scored + 1 − 1 = 1 in the first three rounds against Larsen before Stein replaced him for the final match, as the Soviets won by the odd point, 20½ – 19½.

In 1969, Karpov became the first Soviet player since Spassky ( 1955 ) to win the World Junior Chess Championship, scoring an undefeated 10 / 11 in the finals at Stockholm.

Karpov defeated Lev Polugaevsky by the score of + 3 = 5 in the first Candidates ' match, earning the right to face former champion Boris Spassky in the semifinal round.

Spassky won the first game as Black in good style, but tenacious, aggressive play from Karpov secured him overall victory by + 4 − 1 = 6.

* 1972 – The first game of the World Chess Championship 1972 between challenger Bobby Fischer and defending champion Boris Spassky starts.

At the 23rd Soviet final, held in Leningrad in January – February 1956, Spassky shared first place on 11½ / 19, with Mark Taimanov and Yuri Averbakh, but Taimanov won the subsequent playoff to become champion, defeating Spassky in both their games.

In the 24th Soviet final, played at Moscow in January – February 1957, Spassky shared fourth place with Tolush, as both scored 13 / 21, while Mikhail Tal won the first of his six Soviet titles, which began his ascent to the world title in 1960.

Spassky travelled to Argentina, where he shared first place with Bobby Fischer, two points ahead of Bronstein, at Mar del Plata 1960 on 13½ / 15, defeating Fischer in their first career meeting.

Spassky then finished ahead of Petrosian and a super-class field at Santa Monica 1966 ( the Piatigorsky Cup ), with 11½ / 18, half a point ahead of Bobby Fischer, as he overcame the American grandmaster's challenge after Fischer had scored 3½ / 9 in the first cycle of the event.

Spassky also won at Beverwijk 1967 with 11 / 15, one-half point ahead of Anatoly Lutikov, and shared first place at Sochi 1967 on 10 / 15 with Krogius, Alexander Zaitsev, Leonid Shamkovich, and Vladimir Simagin.

Spassky shared first at the annual IBM event held in Amsterdam 1970 with Polugaevsky on 11½ / 15.

In November and December, Spassky finished the year by tying for sixth with Tal, scoring + 4 − 2 = 11, at the Alekhine Memorial in Moscow, which was won by Stein and Anatoly Karpov, the latter's first top-class success.

In the 1974 Candidates ' matches, Spassky first defeated American Robert Byrne in San Juan, Puerto Rico by 4½ – 1½ (+ 3 − 0 = 3 ); he then lost the semifinal match to Anatoly Karpov in Leningrad, despite winning the first game, (+ 1 − 4

Spassky won at Belgrade 1964 with an undefeated 13 / 17, as Korchnoi and Borislav Ivkov shared second place with 11½.

Spassky finished in fourth place at the annual IBM tournament held in Amsterdam, one point behind winners Petrosian and Albin Planinc.

In 1976, Spassky was obliged to return to the Interzonal stage, and finished in a tie for tenth place in Manila, well short of qualifying for the Candidates matches, but was nominated to play after Fischer declined his place.

Spassky missed qualification from the 1982 Toluca Interzonal with 8 / 13, finishing half a point short, in third place behind Portisch and Eugenio Torre ,< ref >< http :// www. 365chess. com / tournaments / Toluca_Interzonal_1982 / 22359 </ ref > both of whom thus qualified.

During this period, there were several triumphs in his city of birth, when he shared first place with Bronstein and Spassky in 1959, was a joint winner in both 1961 ( with Kholmov ) and 1962 ( with Vasiukov ), and won outright in 1963.

In the USSR Championship, Baku 1961 ( URS-ch29 ), Keres scored 11 / 20 for a shared 8 – 11th place, as Boris Spassky won.

at Moscow for URS-ch41, scoring 8 / 17 for a shared 9th – 12th place, as Boris Spassky won.

At San Juan 1969, he scored 9 / 15 for a shared 6th – 7th place ( Spassky won ).

His second place was shared with Milko Bobotsov and two World Champions, Vasily Smyslov and Mikhail Tal, ahead of two others, Boris Spassky and Tigran Petrosian, among a host of other strong players.

His first top-class round-robin event was Moscow 1959, where he was the youngest contestant, and scored 6 / 11 for a shared fourth / sixth place ; the winners were Spassky, Smyslov, and David Bronstein.