Simen Agdestein
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Simen Agdestein (born 15 May 1967) is a Norwegian chess grandmaster and ex-football star. He has won seven Norwegian chess championships, including the 2005 title.
The young Agdestein developed a prodigious chess talent, culminating in his becoming Norway's national champion at the age of 15, an International Master at 16 and a Grandmaster at 18.
On a local level, his regular dominance of the Nordic and Norwegian Championships during the 1980s amply demonstrated that there were few players who could resist his enterprising and inventive style. In international competition, his early achievements were noteworthy; he finished second at the 1986 World Junior Championship behind Walter Arencibia but ahead of Evgeny Bareev, Viswanathan Anand and Jeroen Piket. A little later, his Elo rating rose to a level in excess of 2600, but he never quite managed to break into the world elite circuit.
In the late 1980s, Agdestein became the envy of young men the world over, when he managed to juggle top-flight chess with a full time football career, representing his country at both.
In the early 1990s, a knee injury cut short his football activities and the difficult times that followed also reflected in his chess, with his rating going into steady decline. In 1999 however, Agdestein resurrected his game and returned to winning ways, topping the popular Cappelle La Grande tournament that year and a very strong Isle of Man tournament in 2003.
He has represented his country seven times at the Olympiad, mostly playing first board and winning an individual (board 4) gold medal at his first appearance in 1982.
As a player of the white pieces, he shows a preference for the queen pawn openings, while with black, favours the Ruy Lopez, Dutch Defence and other semi-open games. On the January 2007 FIDE list, he had an Elo rating of 2583, just short of his 5-year top score of 2595 achieved in January 2004.
Simen Agdestein works at a sports academy, where he teaches chess and football. He has also helped training the child chess prodigy Magnus Carlsen.
