Winner of International Chess Festival "Nakhchivan-2019" interview with American TimurGarayev
- Timur, we congratulate you on the occasion of winning the festival. How will this chess holiday be remembered for you?
- Yes, the excitement of the chess from May 1 ended, and I'm already a winner of this tournament. . Today I agreed for stand-off with the Belarusian chess player Vadim Malakhatko and this was enough for my championship.

After a tense and exciting game, I feel happy to reach my result.

In addition, this summer I have the opportunity to visit the ancient land of Azerbaijan, to see history, culture and beautiful nature with my own eyes.I” am 31 years old and I say that Nakhichevan is a place among the places I've been seeing so far.
- What would you say about games as a winner of the tournament?
- First of all, it should be noted that Nakhichevan is a great place to play chess. Here I was deeply concentrating behind the chessboard. On the other hand, the game proses increased my chances. After the victory over the Uzbek and Iranian rivals, which was a tour before the end of the festival, I increased the gap between my closest Azerbaijani chess player Nijat Abasov and in the last round I was satisfied with stand-off.
- Is this your first trip to Nakhichevan…?
- Yes, I have been once in Baku, I came to Nakhichevan for the first time.

When I was given the opportunity to participate in this festival, I agreed with it, and as you see, nowI give you an interview as a winner of this great tournament.

Undoubtedly, it is a great joy to be recognized by everyone in the first 10 days of the trip, and I express my gratitude to the organizers of this festival for the happiness I enjoyed. When we were traveling through Nakhichevan in our leisure time, the people I met here had a great hospitable Eastern culture impression.

Though I have not been to everywhere in the world, I have visited many countries in participating in international tournaments and what I have seen in Nakhichevan further enriched these impressions.
- What difficult moments do you remember during games?
- In this tournament, the win was not easy, and I had to play with high-profile rivals. For example, in the game with Nijat Abasov, I missed the victory, and even had some danger of becoming matched after certain inaccuracies. This game was very intense. And I can say that I was fortunately, after the difficult situation I faced with Farid Abbasov.

Generally, all the chess players in the A group were world-class and it was not easy for me to pass the Nakhichevan chess players in the first two rounds. While many people call chess a tense intelligence game, this is an opportunity for players to get to know each other more closely.At the festival, I met many chess players and became friends. Once again, I would like to thank the organizers for the exciting chess games I spent in this beautiful city.
-Thank you for the interview.

Ali CABBAROV

Translator Metin Sultanov