Vladimir Kramnik did what every other top-tier challenger had failed to do for fifteen years: he defeated Garry Kasparov in a world-championship match. The 2000 match in London ended without Kramnik losing a single classical game — an outcome so unexpected that the chess world spent the following decade analysing how he had done it. The answer, in short: the Berlin Defense.

Early years

Kramnik was born in Tuapse, a small port city on the Black Sea coast. He moved to Moscow as a teenager to study at the Botvinnik School — the institution that had previously produced Kasparov and Karpov. Botvinnik himself supervised Kramnik’s training in the late 1980s, before his death in 1995.

Kramnik’s tournament breakthrough came at Manila 1992. As a 16-year-old reserve on the Russian Olympiad team, he scored 8.5/9 on first board — a result that established him as Soviet chess’s next-generation prospect. He earned the grandmaster title later that year at 16 years and 11 months.

By the late 1990s Kramnik was in the world’s top 5. He won the World Cup in 1995, was Linares co-champion in 1997 and 1998, and reached the world No. 1 rating briefly in 1996 — the only player other than Kasparov to do so during Kasparov’s reign.

London 2000

The 2000 Classical World Championship match (organised by the Brain Games Network rather than FIDE) ran from October 8 to November 2, 2000. The match format was best-of-16. Kramnik won 8.5–6.5: two wins, no losses, thirteen draws. Kasparov did not win a single game.

The match’s defining feature was Kramnik’s choice of opening with Black. In every black game, Kramnik used either the Berlin Defense (in the Ruy Lopez) or the Nimzo-Indian. The Berlin — particularly its endgame after early queen exchanges — was a line Kasparov had assumed he could break. He could not. The Berlin held seven straight times.

The match transformed the Berlin Defense overnight. A line previously considered slightly drawish became the most-studied endgame in modern opening theory, and remains so. Every world-championship match since 2000 has featured the Berlin in at least some form.

The Classical title years

Kramnik held the Classical world title from 2000 until 2006, when a unification match against Veselin Topalov (the FIDE champion of the period) was scheduled in Elista. The match was famously tumultuous: a dispute over Kramnik’s bathroom usage led to him forfeiting game 5; Kramnik refused to play games until FIDE reversed the forfeit; FIDE eventually negotiated a compromise. The match itself, when it resumed, was won by Kramnik in tiebreaks (8.5–7.5 overall).

Kramnik then held the unified title for less than a year. He played in the 2007 World Championship tournament in Mexico City — a six-player double round-robin — and finished second to Viswanathan Anand. The format had been agreed before the championship was unified; Kramnik’s loss of the title at a tournament rather than a match was unusual.

The 2008 defense

Kramnik’s challenge match against Anand, held in Bonn 2008, was the most analyzed of all his championship contests. Anand opened the match with three sharp Semi-Slav games, including a famous novelty in game 3 (the Meran with an exchange sacrifice that Kramnik had not anticipated). Kramnik never recovered. He lost 6.5–4.5.

The match’s significance for opening theory is considerable. Kramnik’s Catalan setups as White were among the most influential elite Catalan practice ever produced; his Semi-Slav defense — though it lost the match — established several lines as standard modern theory.

Later career

Kramnik continued to play at the highest level after losing the title in 2008. He was world No. 1 briefly again in late 2008. He played in the World Championship Candidates tournaments of 2011, 2013, 2014, and 2016 — finishing close to qualifying for the title match each time without succeeding.

He announced his retirement from classical chess in 2019, at age 43, citing diminishing motivation. He has since focused on training (he was Caruana’s second for the 2018 World Championship match against Carlsen), online events, and chess promotion. His most public role in 2024-2025 has been as a controversial commentator on online cheating issues.

References

For original sources and further study:

Cross-links inside Caissly: his Berlin practice is the defining material in the Berlin Defense and Berlin Rio Gambit articles. His Catalan practice is referenced in the Catalan Opening article.