Kasimdzhanov Rustam (05.12.1979)
Uzbek Grandmaster (1997). The 16th World Champion (2004), Asian Champion 1998, second in World U20 championship in 1999 and second in the Commonwealth championship in 2003.
Best results: winner at Essen 2001, Pamplona 2002/2003, Vlissingen Open 2003, Neckar Open 2004 and shared first in Fajr Open in 2011. He also shared first place with Anatoly Karpov and Vassily Ivanchuk in the 2006 Keres Memorial and succeeded at the Open in Mainz and Corsica Master in 2006. Kasimdzhanov was runner-up in the FIDE Chess World Cup in 2002 (losing to Viswanathan Anand in the final).
He has played in eight Olympiads since 1996, in 2000 he was awarded a bronze medal for the third best result at board one. He won also the gold at the 16th Asian Games 2010 Individual Rapid.
He was a second for World Champion Vishwanathan Anand, having worked with Anand in preparation for the World Chess Championship in 2008 and 2010 and 2012. He worked also with Sergey Karjakin 2014 and to Fabiano Caruana in 2016.
Rustam has recorded few videos produced by Chessbase: The path to tactical strength (2006), A World Champion’s Guide to the Petroff (2007), Beating the French Vol. 1 (2007), Beating the French Vol. 2 (2007), Beating the French Vol. 3 (2007), Albin’s Countergambit for Experts (2008), Endgame for Experts (2008), Anti-Moscow Gambit for Experts (2008), Strategy Step by Step (2008), Attacking the King – for experts (2009), King’s Indian – A World Champion Guide (2010), The Power of Tactics (2010), The New McCutcheon (2015), The Classical French – Main Line (2015).
Peak rating: 2715 in 2015.