Joël Lautier

Lautier
Full name	Joël Lautier
Country	France
Born	April 12, 1973 Scarborough, Canada
Title	Grandmaster
Peak rating	2687 (January 2002)

Joël Lautier (French pronunciation: ​; born 12 April 1973) is a French chess grandmaster and FIDE Senior Trainer (2006).

Born in Canada, of a French father and a Japanese mother, Lautier is one of the strongest grandmasters in France. He won the 1988 World Junior Chess Championship on tiebreak at Adelaide, and the French Chess Championships in 2004 and 2005. He was the No. 2 French GM in 2005 after Étienne Bacrot.

Lautier first received world attention in 1986 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where at the age of 13 he won the Under-14 World Championship ahead of Sofia Polgar and Judit Polgár, who both tied for second.

Results against world champions

Until recently, Lautier was one of only two players (the other being Vassily Ivanchuk) to have beaten every World Champion dating back to 1975 (Anatoly Karpov, Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik, Alexander Khalifman, Viswanathan Anand, Ruslan Ponomariov, Rustam Kasimdzhanov, and Veselin Topalov). However, he has never defeated Magnus Carlsen.

He twice defeated Garry Kasparov with the black pieces, for example, in Linares 1994:

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. c3 Nf6 5. d3 d6 6. Bb3 h6 7. h3 a6 8. Nbd2 Be6 9. Bc2 Ba7 10. Qe2 Qe7 11. b4 d5 12. a4 b5 13. 0-0 0-0 14. axb5 axb5 15. d4 exd4 16. e5 dxc3 17. exf6 Qxf6 18. Nb3 Nxb4 19. Bb1 d4 20. Rxa7 c2 21. Rxa8 cxb1=Q 22. Rxf8+ Kxf8 23. Qxb5 Qxb3 24. Qb8+ Ke7 25. Qxc7+ Ke8 26. Bd2 Qd8 0-1

Other activities

Lautier is one of the founders of the Association of Chess Professionals. He served as its president from 2004 to 2005.

As of 2009, Lautier no longer classifies himself as a chess professional, but as a businessman working in Russia. He speaks fluent Russian.

Now divorced, he was previously married to Woman Grandmaster Almira Skripchenko.

Results Timeline for Chess World Cup

Year	2005	2007	2009	2011	2013	2015
Chess World Cup	4R	A	A	A	A	A