Hort participated in a number of Zonal and Interzonal qualifying tournaments to select a challenger for the world title, generally with good results but without reaching the final stages of the Candidates process.

While accounts of subsequent events differ,[3] it is clear that he was persuaded to resume play, but then did not appear for his game with Hort, who was awarded a victory by forfeit.

Negotiations with the organizers went downhill from this point, and Fischer withdrew from the tournament to begin his penultimate estrangement from grandmaster chess.

During Candidates matches, each player was allotted a fixed number of rest days to accommodate such situations, but Spassky exhausted his entire allocation of time-outs yet was still unable to compete.

[2] Hort has appeared numerous times as chess commentator alongside grandmaster Helmut Pfleger on German TV.

[5] The following is a game from the 1967 Zonal tournament (qualifying event for the Sousse Interzonal) held at Halle, East Germany that well illustrates Hort's capacity for converting a positional initiative into a winning attack.