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Alexey Sokolsky

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Name
  
Alexey Sokolsky


Role
  
Chess Player

Alexey Sokolsky httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediacommonsbb

Died
  
December 27, 1969, Minsk, Belarus

Books
  
Your First Move: Chess for Beginners

Killegar chess presents efim geller vs alexey sokolsky 1950


Alexey Pavlovich Sokolsky (5 November 1908 – 27 December 1969) was a Ukrainian-Belarusian chess player of International Master strength in over-the-board chess, a noted correspondence chess player, and an opening theoretician.

Contents

Sokolsky Opening: Sokolsky vs Strugatsch 1958


Chess career

In 1935, he took second in the Russian FSSR. He was twice Ukrainian Champion (1947 and 1948), and was Belarus Sub-Champion in 1958. He also played in the 13th Soviet Championship in 1944, finishing with 7½/16 (tie for 8th–10th place); the 17th Championship in 1949, finishing with 8½/19 (12th place); and the 21st Championship in 1954, finishing last with 5/19.

He was the first Soviet Correspondence Chess Champion (1948–51).

Legacy

The name of Sokolsky is known now mostly due to his opening research and development of the chess opening 1.b4 which became known as Sokolsky Opening. It is also known as the Polish Opening, or the Orangutan Opening, the name Savielly Tartakower gave it in 1924.

Sokolsky Memorial master-norm tournaments have been held regularly in Minsk since 1970.

Sokolsky wrote over a dozen books. The most famous of these are The Modern Openings in Theory and Practice (1962) and Debyut 1b2-b4 (1963), a book about his eponymous opening.

References

Alexey Sokolsky Wikipedia