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CK: Didn’t you play chess
before taking up the great game of racquetball? We’ve seen pictures of
you in Chess Life and Review and Minnesota Chess News of the rising
Asian American player in 1996? Wasn’t that the same year that you
started playing racquetball?
MM: Yes, I had a whole lot
of fun playing chess and being part of the chess community from
1992-1996.
But I got bored and fat from playing chess. Don’t get me
wrong. I got the marvelous opportunities to meet and play some tough
players, like Jason Drake (top board for the University of Minnesota
chess team in 1994-1996, International Grandmaster and state champion
four times running Alex Blandin, Master Vadim Rubinchik, Master and
three times state pro chess champion Nathan Hoover, International Master
and 2 times state champion Leonard Johnson, Brandon Miller, Mohamed T,
Master Alex Graham (this guy’s tough!) Raiz Khan, Robert Tenney, Sean and
Erin Wheats, and many more, but it’s just that I needed something to
work my mind and my body and I found it in racquetball.
CK: Wow Doc, you got to play
and meet some top players! We dug up some Minnesota Chess Championship
Games and you were one of the highest rated Asian American players in
the United States in 1995 and 1996 with your Mikhail Petrosian style of
chess, what the heck is the Petrosian style of chess?
MM: Why are you asking me
about chess, when this is an interview about my racquetball game?
CK: Because Doc, in many
ways, what you do in the past influence your future choices? And in this
interview, we are trying to get know the Real Marcus McClayson, not just
one aspect of him, racquetball only. Please tell us what type of chess
player were you?
MM: Well, my fellow Russian
chess experts and the St. Paul Snelling Chess Club voted me the Most
Boringest Chess Player in Minnesota because of my Petrosian style of
plays.
To give you a little history: Petrosian was a Great Russian
Grandmaster who won the World Chess Championship in 1968 and he was
known as the "Do nothing Grandmaster, he hardly ever sacrifices, he just
took space, and he protected all his weakness."
He was the ultimate
ultra-high percentage grandmaster and yes, going over his games, for
many people, were like watching grass grows and paint dry, but I love
his games and took it as my style.
CK: Is this the style that
you use to be successful at racquetball?
MM: Exactly, I try not to
get intimidate by any player, I just play the ball. Trust me, I’ve been
thoroughly nervous before in competition. I think I developed a very
high percentage and positional chess style because I took a lot of
beatings from all the top players for over four years and I learned a
lot about protecting my king after all those brutal chess beatings.
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