Vasily Mikhailovich Byvshev
	Dedicated to eightieth birthday of Great Trainer
	On 18th February, 2002, Vasily Mikhailovich Byvshev, the USSR master of sports, the Honored Trainer of Russian Federation, could have been 80 years old.

A grand party, taking place in the former Leningrad Palace of Pineers and Schoolchildren, was dedicated to this memorable date. Here, in the very center of the city on the Neva-river, within the long period of 45 years, Vasily Mikhailovich had been helping hundreds and thousands young chess-players to grasp wisdom and secrets of the ancient game. Besides the trainer's body itself, in which Mr. Byvshev had been working for so many years, his pupils, acquaintances, colleagues in training art, his widow Evgeniya Grigoryevna called on this party. Although, in my viev, number of visitors was substantially less than it should have been in such a day, the memorial day. The speakers among them there were his pupil, grand master Eugeny Solozhenkin, masters Igor Blekhtsin and Alexandre Shashin, for many years knowing V.Byvshev, shared their reminiscences with other present in the party. They said many warm words addressed to the trainer, the Trainer with the capital letter "T". This grand arrangement was conducted by the Palace senior trainers Alexey Yuneev and Boris Goberman. It may be said that the meeting of several generations of his pupils, colleagues and simply worshippers of his teaching and chess-players talent took place.

Strangely enough, Vasily Mikhailovich was not known to the wide circle of chess-players; although those who had occasion to meet him and associate with him and more over, those who were taught by him, keep the lightest reminiscences of him. The following information about him can be found in the Encyclopedic Dictionary edited by Anatoly Karpov, as well as in the book .

He was born 18th February, 1922 in the village of Starovo, Kalinin (now Tver) region. Master of sports from 1949, Honored Trainer of Russian Federation from 1972. Lawyer. The participant of many championships of Leningrad, the best result being shown in 1954ã. - the fourth place. The participant of the USSR championships in 1952, 1954, 1956; the best result 10th -11th places divided with grandmaster Å.Geller. Champion of the Voluntary Sport Societies () in 1952 and () in 1961. Participant of several matches . Among his best pupils are the world champion (1999) Alexandre Khalifman, world vice-champion among women (1984) Irina Levitina, international grand master Eugeny Solozhenkin. V.Byvshev participated in the Great Patriotic War, being in the rows of the Soviet Army from 1940. In October, 1941, he was shell-shocked; after recovery he served in the anti-aircraft defence troops; He was marked by a row of rewards.

Beyond these lines chary of words was a long, full of events, life. When in the spring of 1982 I firstly saw ave seen the first Vasily Mikhailovich in the still Leningrad Palace of Pioneers and Schoolchildren he was already sixty. That time the Palace arranged annually the Day of Open Doors, and the strongest (in chess) children not taught inside its walls could measure swords with the trainers of this indeed city's chess Mecca in displays of multi-board chess-play. V.M. did not participate in them himself but attentively watched all the events taking place on boards - it occurred so, that I, unexpectedly for myself, became his pupil in the fall of the same year, and I thank the fate for this choice so far. Being already not young and not sufficiently wealthy man, Vasily Mikhailovich paid a lot of his energy and knowledge to his pupils. I also was not deprived of this attention. At that time, just as now, Leningrad chess players showed good results in various tournaments and competitions. I remember the celebration in honor of Sasha Khalifman who became a USSR champion in chess among young people in 1982.

Byvshev's precepts

I completely agree with the opinion that the main task of a trainer is to teach his puple to work on his own. It is not easy to reach this goal: he must know what and in what sequence he has to study after accumulation of initial knowledge. This is just what an experiemed trainer has to prompt to his pupils. Vasily Mikhailovich was an expert in it. He was a wonderful Methodist. I remember, how after studying by his recommendation the two-volume P.A.Romanovsky's "Mittelspil" (Middle Games), I became much stronger in playing middle games. The technique of playing rook endings was worked out by the best, on my mind, book by G.Ja.Levenfish and V.V.Smyslov. But I think V.Byvshev must of all appreciated the D.I.Bronshtein's book as a treatise for understanding a chess game - at home he had several tens of copies of this book. I even have remained the original sagged by the hand of Vasily Mikhailovich with number of games requiring the obligatory investigation. Being a very strong practical chess-player and the best chess trainer, he, nonetheless, often remained in the shadow of V.G.Zack. In this sense, he probably lacked dictatorship, the quality some other trainers had in abundance. This may be explained, in some degree, by his exceptional modesty and some kind of conformism. At the same time, he took hard the departure of his best (and not only best) pupils, when they left hin. Concluding, I would like to present here one of the best Byvshev's games against the future world champion Vasily Vasilievich Smyslov. It is especially interesting that he played this game not in his natural, tactical way, but consistently overplayed his formidable opponent and rather accourately realized his advantage:

Byvshev V.- Smyslov V. [C97]

20-th championship of the USSR, Moscow, 1952

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.c3 0-0 9.h3 Na5 10.Bc2 c5 11.d4 Qc7 12.Nbd2 Bd7 13.dxc5 dxc5 14.Nf1 Rfe8
It was preferable to play 14...Rad8 15.Qe2 Nh5 16.N3h2 g6 17.Bh6 Rfe8 18.Ne3 Be6, and Black has equal chances (Levenfish-Lisitsyn, Leningrad, 1946)

15.N3h2
The goel of this starting manoeuvre is to change one of the Black's pieces controlling d5-square.

15...Rad8 16.Qf3 Be6 17.Ng4 Nxg4 18.hxg4 h6
Black, to no purpose, weakens the castling position, what White successfully eser later. It was nessary to occupy thr file "d" by rooks to prevent Knights' incursion into d5-square.

19.Ne3 Bg5 20.Nd5 Bxd5 21.Bxg5 hxg5 22.exd5
As result of Black's inaccuracy, White gained a fine position; He has a passing pawn in the center and good attacking possibilities in both flanks.

22... Qe7
The loss of time. He should be played 22...g6.

23.a4!
Now it is impossible to play 23...b4 besause of 24.Qd3 with the threats to h7 and a6 squares.

23... Nc4 24.axb5 axb5 25.Ra6

25...Rd6.
26.Qh3 was the threat.It wasunsatifactory 25...g6 26.Bxg6 fxg6 27.Rxg6+ Kh7 28.Qf5 Kh8 29.Rh6+ Kg8 30.Qg6+ Qg7 31.Qh5 with White wins. In my view, Black had to play 25...Nd6.

26.Rc6 g6.
If 26...Nxb2 27.Qe4 g6 28.Rxc5 Rb6 29.Qb4 etc.

27.b3 Rxc6 28.dxc6 Nb6.
In the case if 28...Nd6 29.Qd5! Nc8 30.Bxg6 Nb6 31.Bxf7+ White would get four pawns for a Knight

29.Be4 Kg7
[29...Na8 30.Rd1 Rd8 31.Rxd8+ Qxd8 32.Bd5 Qe7 33.Qd3!]

30.Qe2 c4 31.Rb1 Qc5
[31...Rb8 32.bxc4 Nxc4 (32...bxc4 33.Rb4) 33.Bd5 Na3 34.Ra1]

32.b4 Qe7 33.Ra1 Rd8
did not help. 33...Ra8 34.Ra5 Rxa5 35.bxa5

34.Qe3 Na8.
If 34...Nd5 the 35.Ra7! won, but 35...Nc7 led to the position happend in the real game; If 35...Nxe3 36.Rxe7 Nxg4, then 37.Bf3 winning; if 35...Qf6 36.Bxd5 Rxd5 37.c7 Qc6 38.Qf3

35.Nc7 Qf6 36.Bxd5 Rxd5 37.c7 Qc6 38.Qf3 35.Ra7 Nc7

Åñëè 35...Rd1+, òî 36.Kh2 Qd8 37.Qc5 Qh8+ 38.Kg3 Qh4+ 39.Kf3 Qh2 40.Qe3 Nb6 41.Qxg5

36.Qb6 Rc8
[36...Rd1+ 37.Kh2 Qf6 38.Qxc7 Qf4+ 39.g3 Qxf2+ 40.Bg2 Rd2 41.Qxf7+ Qxf7 42.Rxf7+ Kxf7 43.c7]

37.Rxc7 Qxc7 38.Qxb5 Ra8 39.Qxc4 Qd8 40.Qd5 Ra1+ 41.Kh2 Qh8+ 42.Kg3 Qh4+ 43.Kf3 Qh2.
The game was postponed in this position. As the analysis showed, the attack is not dangerous to Black.

44.Qd2 Rg1 45.Ke2 Qh4 46.Bf3 Qh8 47.Qd6! Qh1
[47...Qc8 48.Qd7]

48.Qxe5+ Kh7 49.Kd2 Ra1 50.Kd3 Qf1+
[50...Re1!?]

51.Qe2 Qb1+ 52.Kd4 Qc1 53.Qe3 Qa3 54.Qxg5 Qa7+ 55.Qc5 Qc7 56.Qe5 Qa7+ 57.Qc5 Qc7 58.Kc4 Ra3 59.Bd5 Qe5 60.Qd4 Qe2+ 61.Kc5 Qe1
[61...Qe7+ 62.Kb5 Qe2+ 63.Bc4 Qe7 64.Qd7 Qe5+ 65.Bd5 Rxc3 66.Qxf7+ Kh6 67.f4+-]

62.Qf6 Rxc3+ 63.Kd6 Rd3 64.Qxf7+ Kh6 65.Qf4+ Kg7
[65...Kh7 66.Qh2+ Kg7 67.Qe5+]

66.Qe5+ 1-0

The best V.Byvshev's games in -cbv format.

update 15-08-2002