He has achieved history’s highest Elo rating, the system used to evaluate a player’s skill. He has been the top player in the world since 2011, and the reigning world champion ever since that victory over Anand. Carlsen is now widely regarded as the best chess player of all time. 1 player in the world, won his first world championship, beating Viswanathan Anand in such swift and decisive fashion that they did not even play the final two games. It was classic Carlsen: arrogant and wryly self-deprecating at once, and very charming.Īnd who could disagree with him? Just before his twenty-third birthday, in 2013, Carlsen, who was already the No. The media members in attendance laughed and applauded. Carlsen at twenty-three, the moderator pressed? “Yeah, twenty-three,” Carlsen said, with a nod and a smile. Carlsen gave a different answer: “Probably myself, like, three or four years ago,” he said. Caruana answered with Bobby Fischer, the brilliant American whose dynamic play unsettled Soviet dominance of the game, at the height of the Cold War. Two weeks ago, at a press conference in London, after Round Five of the twelve-round world chess championship, the two competitors, Fabiano Caruana and Magnus Carlsen, were asked to name their favorite chess players from the past.