I can’t count the times I have lagged seemingly hopelessly far behind, and nobody except myself thinks I can win. But I have pulled myself in from desperate [situations]. When you are behind there are two strategies - counter-attack or all men to the defences. I’m good at finding the right balance between those.

Some people think that if their opponent plays a beautiful game, it's OK to lose. I don't. You have to be merciless.

Once you're a chess player, you spend a lot of time thinking about the game and you can't get it completely out of your head.

It's just not my nature to go around idolizing people.

I don't really watch too many movies. I don't have the patience usually to watch one, one and a half or two hours in a row.

In my experience, when I went to school, and especially in after-school, and during breaks, a lot of people wanted to sit down and play chess up till a certain age when it was not supposed to be cool anymore and people wanted to do other things.

Contrary to many young Colleagues, I do believe that it makes sense to study the Classics.