Maia Chiburdanidze

Biography (1961)

Born in Kutaisi (USSR, now Georgia) in 1961, Maia Chiburdanidze started playing chess around the age of eight. Her exceptional chess talent became evident very early. Still in her teens, Maia took the chess world by storm. She consecutively won her debut tournament in Brasov (aged just 13), USSR Girls Championship (1976) and then finished second in the Women's Interzonal (Tbilisi, 1976), thereby qualifying for the 1977 Candidates Matches. She made it all the way to the Candidates Final, where she prevailed over Alla Kushnir by a narrow margin to challenge the reigning champion Nona Gaprindashvili. The title match took place in Pitsunda (1978) and saw Chiburdanidze defeating Gaprindashvili (+4-2=9) and becoming the youngest Women's Chess Champions at the time.Chiburdanidze successfully defended her title four times. In 1981, she drew a very close match with Nana Alexandria (8-8) to retain the chess crown. Three years later, she beat Irina Levitina in Volgograd (+5-2=7). The next title defence came against Elena Akhmilovskaya in Sofia in 1986 (+4-1=9). In 1988 she bested Nana Ioseliani in Telavi, Georgia (+3-2=11).Her third-longest reign ended in 1991 when Chiburdanidze lost the title match to Xie Jun of China (+2-4=9).After losing her title, Maia had several shorts for the crown but did not quite make it. In 1995 Chiburdanidze lost the playoff match to Susan Polgar (the opponents tied for first place in the Candidates in Tilburg in 1994), while in the knockout era, she stumbled in the semifinals twice (2001 and 2004).