Vladimir Alatortsev

Vladimir Alexeyevich Alatortsev (Russian: Влади́мир Алексе́евич Ала́торцев, pronounced "a LAH tart sev"; 14 May 1909 – 13 January 1987) was a Soviet chess player, author, and administrator.

During his career, he became champion of both Leningrad and Moscow, and played in the Soviet Chess Championship finals nine times, with his best competitive results in the 1930s.

However, Botvinnik, who was two years younger, established complete dominance over Alatortsev right from the start, and wound up with a 9–0 lifetime won-loss score with two games drawn.

Alatortsev's first important high-level result was a shared 3rd–6th place in the Soviet Championship, Moscow 1931, with a score of 10 points out of 17; Botvinnik won.

Alatortsev made his best Soviet Championship result in 1933 at Leningrad (URS-ch08), when he placed clear second with 13/19, as Botvinnik won his second title.

He earned a place in the 1935 Moscow International tournament, the strongest Soviet event since 1925, and finished with an even score of 9½ /19, as Botvinnik and Salo Flohr won.

Alatortsev posted his second best pre-war result when he tied for 1st–2nd places with Leonid Shamaev in a strong tournament at Leningrad 1938, with 14/21, ahead of Lilienthal and Viacheslav Ragozin.

With the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, organized chess was put to a stop for the next several years; but Alatortsev's solid pre-war results earned him an invitation to a strong event at Kuibyshev 1942.

He had to return to qualifying for the next Soviet final, and made it through at Moscow in the semi-final with 10½/15 to tie for 2nd–4th places, as David Bronstein won.

Players such as Alexander Kotov, Isaac Boleslavsky, David Bronstein, Efim Geller, Yuri Averbakh, Tigran Petrosian, and Mark Taimanov were all younger and had the benefits of organized Soviet training, so they surpassed the older generation in their achievements.