Gary Lane, Sass and the SIO

The following article appeared in Sass magazine this week:

Gary Lane International Master (chess player) and author
My brother taught me to play chess when I was about eight and I haven’t stopped since.
These days it doesn’t take young kids very long to become great at it because they can play all sorts of people 24 hours on the net.


Chess is like tennis, you play circuits around the world – competing against the top players from each country. I’ve played exhibition matches with world champion Gary Kasparov but my proudest moment was winning the Australian Championship in 2004.
Playing a chess game is a bit like sitting for a school exam. You do a bit of background reading to prepare and try to remain composed. The game is quite psychological because you need to look at people’s expressions. You’ll find that many poker professionals are ex-chess players.
Some people try to cheat because there’s a lot of money involved if you win. There was one Indian guy banned for 10 years for taking a portable computer into the competition with him. He was a moderate player and people started wondering why he was beating chess legends all of a sudden!
I’ll be coming to Parramatta to play in the Sydney International Open Chess Tournament at Parramatta Town Hall from April 10–14. It’s a premier event, the biggest in Australia, and it will attract a lot of international chess players.

You can see this article, together with a photograph of Gary holding a giant chess piece, at http://www.sassmagazine.com.au/people.php