Nosher

You've taken quite a few GM and IM scalps in your blitz series - if you have a good season in league do you ever think about playing in a few tourneys to try and upgrade your CM to an FM?

Thanks for doing this btw, very enjoyable.

Almost any person of average intelligence can get to be a very good chess player with practice and training. Great players have that extra spark of raw talent, intuition or dedication that make them stand out, but they aren't necessarily geniuses. There have been some very strong players and at least one world champion (imo) who, apart from chess, seemed a little on the dull side.

For example: "It will be cheering to know that many people are skillful chessplayers, though in many instances their brains, in a general way, compare unfavorably with the cognitive faculties of a rabbit." - Mortimer

"Chess is a foolish expedient for making idle people believe they are doing something very clever when they are only wasting their time." - George Bernard Shaw

However, it is almost universally acknowledged among we chessplayers that when a woman asks you "Do you have to be a genius to play chess?", the correct answer is "Oh, yes".

Not exactly the scandal it was represented to be. See this statement by the Israeli Chess Federation about the reporting of the issue.

Of course, it would be much better if these precautions were not necessary, but that's a different matter to how it was reported.

228 is very nice indeed, congrats!