Editing Alexander Alekhine (section)

==Assessment==
{{algebraic notation|pos=section}}

===Playing strength and style===
{{Main|Comparison of top chess players throughout history}}

Alekhine's peak period was in the early 1930s, when he won almost every tournament he played, sometimes by huge margins. Afterward, his play declined, and he never won a top-class tournament after 1934. After Alekhine regained his world title in 1937, there were several new contenders, all of whom would have been serious challengers.<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames"/>

{{Chess diagram small
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 |[[Richard Réti|Réti]] vs. Alekhine, <br />Baden-Baden 1925
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 |One of Alekhine's most famous and complicated wins. 31...Ne4 forces the win of White's knight at b7 in twelve moves.<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames"/>
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Alekhine was one of the greatest attacking players and could apparently produce [[Combination (chess)|combinations]] at will. What set him apart from most other attacking players was his ability to see the potential for an attack and prepare for it in positions where others saw nothing. [[Rudolf Spielmann]], a master tactician who produced many brilliancies, said, "I can see the combinations as well as Alekhine, but I cannot get to the same positions."<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames"/> Dr. Max Euwe said, "Alekhine is a poet who creates a work of art out of something that would hardly inspire another man to send home a picture post-card."<ref name="focusdepEuwe">{{cite web |url=http://www.focusdep.com/quotes/authors/Max/Euwe |title=Max Euwe quotes, biographies & pictures |access-date=2008-05-23 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080105104501/http://www.focusdep.com/quotes/authors/Max/Euwe |archive-date=2008-01-05 }}</ref> An explanation offered by Réti was, "he beats his opponents by analysing simple and apparently harmless sequences of moves in order to see whether at some time or another at the end of it an original possibility, and therefore one difficult to see, might be hidden."<ref>Réti 1923, p.129</ref> [[John Nunn]] commented that "Alekhine had a special ability to provoke complications
without taking excessive risks",<ref name="lifemasterajRetiAlekhine1925">{{cite web |url=http://www.lifemasteraj.com/old_af-dl/bg_reti-alek1g0.html |title=Reti - Alekhine, Baden-Baden 1925 |author=Goldsby, A.J. |year=2007 |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2011-07-27 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110727134703/http://www.lifemasteraj.com/old_af-dl/bg_reti-alek1g0.html |url-status=live }}</ref> and [[Edward Winter (chess historian)|Edward Winter]] called him "the supreme genius of the complicated position".<ref name="compulsivereaderReview107GreatChessBattles"/>

Nevertheless, [[Garry Kasparov]] said that Alekhine's attacking play was based on solid positional foundations,<ref name="chessbaseAljechinVsKasparov">{{cite web |url=http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=1283 |title=Alexander Aljechin vs. Garry Kasparov |author=Müller, K. |date=2003-11-15 |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2009-02-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090207005548/http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=1283 |url-status=live }}</ref> and [[Harry Golombek]] went further, saying that "Alekhine was the most versatile of all chess geniuses, being equally at home in every style of play and in all phases of the game."<ref name="GolombekGameOfChess"/> [[Reuben Fine]], a serious contender for the world championship in the late 1930s, wrote in the 1950s that Alekhine's collection of best games was one of the three most beautiful that he knew,<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames"/> and Golombek was equally impressed.<ref name="GolombekGameOfChess">Golombek 1955</ref>

Alekhine's games have a higher percentage of wins than those of any other World Champion, and his drawn games are on average among the longest of all champions'.<ref name="Fischer2004ChampionsDraws">{{cite web |url=http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2096 |title=World Champions and Draws |author=Fischer, J. |date=2004-12-23 |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2011-06-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629204957/http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2096 |url-status=live }}</ref> His desire to win extended beyond formal chess competition. When Fine beat him in some casual games in 1933, Alekhine demanded a match for a small stake. And in [[table tennis]], which Alekhine played enthusiastically but badly, he would often crush the ball when he lost.<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames" />

[[Bobby Fischer]], in a 1964 article, ranked Alekhine as one of the ten greatest players in history.<ref name="Fischer_p56-61">{{cite news |title=The Ten Greatest Masters in History |author=Fischer, B. |work=Chessworld |date=January–February 1964 |pages=56–61 |url=http://chess.eusa.ed.ac.uk/Chess/Trivia/Fishers10.html |access-date=2009-01-01 |author-link=Bobby Fischer |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090206215606/http://chess.eusa.ed.ac.uk/Chess/Trivia/Fishers10.html |archive-date=6 February 2009 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Fischer, who was famous for the clarity of his play,<!-- I neutralise this reference because I do not think it is really necessary<ref>{{cite book |title=How to Beat Bobby Fischer |author=[[Edmar Mednis|Mednis, E.]] |year=1997 |publisher=Dover Publications |pages=xxv-xxvii |isbn=0-486-29844-2 |no-pp=true}}</ref> --> wrote of Alekhine: <blockquote>Alekhine has never been a hero of mine, and I've never cared for his style of play. There's nothing light or breezy about it; it worked for him, but it could scarcely work for anyone else. He played gigantic conceptions, full of outrageous and unprecedented ideas.&nbsp;... [H]e had great imagination; he could see more deeply into a situation than any other player in chess history.&nbsp;... It was in the most complicated positions that Alekhine found his grandest concepts.<ref name="Fischer_p56-61"/></blockquote>

Alekhine's style had a profound influence on Kasparov, who said: "Alexander Alekhine is the first luminary among the others who are still having the greatest influence on me. I like his universality, his approach to the game, his chess ideas. I am sure that the future belongs to Alekhine chess."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1005464 |title=Garry Kasparov's Best Games |access-date=2008-05-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080602071351/http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1005464 |archive-date=2 June 2008  |url-status=live}}</ref> In 2012, [[Levon Aronian]] said that he considers Alekhine the greatest chess player of all time.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.whychess.com/en/node/2836 |title=Aronian names Alekhine best player of all time |publisher=WhyChess |access-date=2012-09-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121119113805/http://whychess.com/en/node/2836 |archive-date=2012-11-19 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===Influence on the game===
{{Chess diagram small
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 |Alekhine <br />Endgame study
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 |{{hidden |ta1=left |fw1=normal |White to move and win<ref name="vanDerHeijdenAlekhineMiniEndgameStudy" /> |''Solution:'' 1.g5{{chesspunc|!}} Kc6 2.Ke5 Kd7 3.Kd5! (3.Kf6{{chesspunc|?}} Kxd6 4.Kxf7 Ke5) Kd8 4.Kc6 and White wins.}} 
}}

Several [[chess opening|openings]] and opening variations are named after Alekhine. In addition to the well-known [[Alekhine's Defence]] (1.e4 Nf6) and the Albin-Chatard-Alekhine Attack in the "orthodox" Paulsen variation of the [[French Defense]],<ref name="FineIdeasBehindOpenings">Fine 1943</ref> there are Alekhine Variations in: the [[Budapest Gambit]],<ref>{{cite web |url=http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adam.bozon/budapest.htm |title=Budapest Gambit |author=Adam Bozon |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110805061337/http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adam.bozon/budapest.htm |archive-date=2011-08-05 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.markalowery.net/Chess/ECO-List/ECO_A00-A99_Text.html |title=ECO Information and Index: A00-A99 |author=Mark Lowery |access-date=2009-06-21 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110928104209/http://www.markalowery.net/Chess/ECO-List/ECO_A00-A99_Text.html |archive-date=2011-09-28 |url-status=dead }}</ref> the [[Vienna Game]], the Exchange Variation of the [[Ruy Lopez]], the Winawer Variation of the French Defense; the Dragon Variation of the [[Sicilian Defense]], the [[Queen's Gambit Accepted]], the [[Slav Defense]], the [[Queen's Pawn Game]], the [[Catalan Opening]] and the [[Dutch Defense]] (where three different lines bear his name).<ref name="ChessOpsFullGroupListOpenings">{{cite web |url=http://www.eudesign.com/chessops/ch-list.htm |title=ChessOps - Full Group-List of Openings, Defences, Gambits and Variations |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2011-07-21 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721161926/http://www.eudesign.com/chessops/ch-list.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> [[Irving Chernev]] commented, "The openings consist of Alekhine's games, with a few variations."<ref>{{cite book |last=Chernev |first=I. |title=Twelve Great Chess Players and Their Best Games |publisher=Dover Publications |year=1995 |pages=163–64 |chapter=Alekhine |isbn=978-0-486-28674-7 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0k7DtVTRvdUC&q=capablanca+chess+record%22without+losing%22&pg=PA164 |access-date=2009-08-14 |archive-date=2021-10-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211029220632/https://books.google.com/books?id=0k7DtVTRvdUC&q=capablanca+chess+record%22without+losing%22&pg=PA164 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Alekhine also composed a few [[endgame studies]], one of which is shown in the diagram, a miniature (a study with a maximum of seven pieces).<ref name="vanDerHeijdenAlekhineMiniEndgameStudy">Harold van der Heijden endgame study database (2005).</ref>

Alekhine wrote over twenty books on chess, mostly annotated editions of the games in a major match or tournament, plus collections of his best games between 1908 and 1937.<ref name="WallAlekineBooks">{{cite web|author=Wall, W.|title=Alekhine's Writings|url=http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lab/7378/alekbook.htm|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091026151322/http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lab/7378/alekbook.htm|archive-date=2009-10-26|access-date=2008-05-20}}</ref>{{unreliable source?|failed=y|date=December 2013}} Unlike [[Wilhelm Steinitz]], Emanuel Lasker, Capablanca and Euwe, he wrote no books that explained his ideas about the game or showed beginners how to improve their play.<ref name="compulsivereaderReview107GreatChessBattles">{{cite web |url=http://www.compulsivereader.com/html/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1830 |title=A review of 107 Great Chess Battles 1939&ndash;1945 by Alexander Alekhine |author=Kane, P. |access-date=2008-05-23 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101022004614/http://www.compulsivereader.com/html/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1830 |archive-date=October 22, 2010}}</ref> His books appeal to expert players rather than beginners:<ref name="Fine1952WorldsGreatChessGames"/> they contain many long analyses of variations in critical positions, and "singularities and exceptions were his forte, not rules and simplifications".<ref name="compulsivereaderReview107GreatChessBattles"/>

Although Alekhine was declared an enemy of the Soviet Union after his anti-Bolshevik statement in 1928,<ref name="chessarchAlexey"/><ref name="KotovAlekhine" /> he was gradually rehabilitated by the Soviet chess elite following his death in 1946. [[Alexander Kotov]]'s research on Alekhine's games and career, culminating in a biography, ''Alexander Alekhine'', led to a Soviet series of Alekhine Memorial tournaments. The first of these, at Moscow 1956, was won jointly by Botvinnik and [[Vasily Smyslov]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://storiascacchi.altervista.org/storiascacchi/tornei/1950-59/1956mosca.htm|title=Mosca 1956 Aljechin Memorial|last=Sericano|first=Claudio|website=La grande storia degli scacchi|language=it|access-date=2019-11-19|archive-date=2016-04-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160412220148/http://storiascacchi.altervista.org/storiascacchi/tornei/1950-59/1956mosca.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> In their book ''The Soviet School of Chess'' Kotov and [[Mikhail Yudovich|Yudovich]] devoted a chapter to Alekhine, called him "Russia's greatest player" and praised his capacity for seizing the initiative by concrete tactical play in the opening.<ref name="KotovYudovichSovietSchool">Kotov 1958</ref> Botvinnik wrote that the Soviet School of chess learned from Alekhine's fighting qualities, capacity for self-criticism and combinative vision.<ref name="Botvinnik100SelectedGames">Botvinnik 1951</ref> Alekhine had written that success in chess required "Firstly, self-knowledge; secondly, a firm comprehension of my opponent's strength and weakness; thirdly, a higher aim&nbsp;–&nbsp;... artistic and scientific accomplishments which accord our chess equal rank with other arts."<ref name="AlekhineNYTimes8Sep1929">{{Cite journal |journal=The New York Times |date=September 8, 1929 |author=Alekhine, A. |url=http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/seven.html |title=New York Times |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2008-03-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080317072353/http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/seven.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Accusations of "improving" games===
{{Chess diagram small
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 |Famous and much-analysed position from the "Five Queens" game
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[[Samuel Reshevsky]] wrote that Alekhine "allegedly made up games against fictitious opponents in which he came out the victor and had these games published in various chess magazines."<ref>Reshevsky 1976, p.78</ref> In a recent book [[Andy Soltis]] lists "Alekhine's 15 Improvements".<ref>Soltis 2002</ref> The most famous example is his game with [[Promotion (chess)|five]] [[Queen (chess)|queens]] in Moscow in 1915. In the actual game, Alekhine, playing as Black, beat Grigoriev in the Moscow 1915 tournament; but in one of his books he presented the "Five Queens" variation (starting with a move he rejected as Black in the original game) as an actual game won by the White player in Moscow in 1915. (He did not say in the book who was who in this version, nor that it was in the tournament.)<ref name="FiveQueens">The original game, without the five queens, was Grigoriev vs. Alekhine, Moscow 1915, which Alekhine annotated for the February 1916 issue of ''Shakhmatny Vyestnik''. But he presented the "Five Queens" version in a note to Tarrasch vs. Alekhine, St. Petersburg 1914, which is game 26 in Alekhine 1985. In the same book, Alekhine presented as a note to game 90 (Alekhine vs. Teichmann, Berlin 1921) a 15-move win against O. Tenner, which Tenner claimed was actually a variation that arose in their post-game analysis of their 23-move draw.</ref>

In the position shown in the diagram, which never arose in real play, Alekhine claimed that White wins by 24.Rh6, as after some complicated play Black is mated or goes into an [[Chess endgame|endgame]] a queen down. A later computer-assisted analysis concludes that White can force a win, but only by diverging from Alekhine's move sequence at move 20, while there are only three queens.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.xs4all.nl/~timkr/chess/al5q.htm |title=Alekhine's 5 Queen game |author=Krabbé, T. |year=1985 |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2008-04-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080407014849/http://www.xs4all.nl/~timkr/chess/al5q.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

Chess historian [[Edward Winter (chess historian)|Edward Winter]] investigated a game Alekhine allegedly won in fifteen moves via a queen [[sacrifice (chess)|sacrifice]] at [[Sabadell]] in 1945.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1013604 |title=Alekhine - Munoz, Sabadell 1945 |access-date=2008-05-24 |archive-date=2009-02-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090213075119/http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1013604 |url-status=live }}</ref> Some photos of the game in progress were discovered that showed the players during the game and their chessboard. Based on the position that the chess pieces had taken on the chessboard in this photo, the game could never have taken the course that was stated in the published version. This raised suspicions that the published version was made up. Even if the published version is a fake, however, there is no doubt that Alekhine did defeat his opponent in the actual game, and there is no evidence that Alekhine was the source of the famous fifteen-move win whose authenticity is doubted.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/sabadell.html |title=Mysteries at Sabadell, 1945 |author=Winter, E. |year=2005 |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-date=2008-03-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080317071915/http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/sabadell.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Accusations of antisemitism===
During World War II, Alekhine played in several tournaments held in Germany or German-occupied territory, as did many strong players in occupied and neutral countries.<ref name="SBchessVignettes"/><ref>These players included, among others, Keres, Bogoljubov, Stoltz, [[Erik Lundin]], [[Bjørn Nielsen]], [[Nicolaas Cortlever]], [[Karel Opočenský]], [[Jan Foltys]], [[Luděk Pachman]], [[Gedeon Barcza]], [[Mario Napolitano]], [[Braslav Rabar]] and [[Teodor Regedziński]].</ref> In March 1941, a series of articles appeared under Alekhine's name in the ''Pariser Zeitung'', a German-language newspaper published in Paris by the occupying German forces. Among other things, these articles said that Jews had a great talent for exploiting chess but showed no signs of chess artistry; described the [[Hypermodernism (chess)|hypermodern]] theories of Nimzowitsch and Réti as "this cheap bluff, this shameless self-publicity", hyped by "the majority of Anglo-Jewish pseudo-intellectuals"; and described his 1937 match with Euwe as "a triumph against the Jewish conspiracy".<ref name="winterWasAlekhineNazi"/><ref>{{Cite web | url=http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/alekhine5.html | title=Two Alekhine Interviews (1941) by Edward Winter | access-date=2018-06-09 | archive-date=2018-06-11 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180611202908/http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/alekhine5.html | url-status=live }}</ref>

During interviews with two Spanish newspapers in September 1941, Alekhine criticised Jewish chess strategy. In one of these, he said that Aryan chess was aggressive but "the Semitic concept admitted the idea of pure defence", thus the "Jewish" style was supposed to focus merely on exploiting the opponents' mistakes. He also praised rival chessplayer Capablanca for taking the world title from "the Jew Lasker".<ref name="winterWasAlekhineNazi" /> He is reported to have expressed similar views in an interview to the Czech media Svět in 1942.<ref>[https://www.svoboda.org/a/30999674.html Помесь схимника с хищником. Внезапные ходы шахматиста Алехина]</ref>

Almost immediately after the liberation of Paris (and before World War II ended), Alekhine publicly stated that "he had to write two chess articles for the ''Pariser Zeitung'' before the Germans granted him his exit visa&nbsp;... Articles which Alekhine claims were purely scientific were rewritten by the Germans, published and made to treat chess from a racial viewpoint." He wrote at least two further disavowals, in an open letter to the organizer of the 1946 London tournament (W. Hatton-Ward) and in his posthumous book ''¡Legado!''. These three denials are phrased differently.<ref name="winterWasAlekhineNazi" />

Extensive investigations by [[Ken Whyld]] have not yielded conclusive evidence of the authenticity of the articles. Chess writer Jacques Le Monnier claimed in a 1986 issue of ''Europe Échecs'' that in 1958 he saw some of Alekhine's notebooks and found, in Alekhine's own handwriting, the exact text of the first antisemitic article, which appeared in ''Pariser Zeitung'' on March 18, 1941. In his 1973 book ''75 parties d'Alekhine'' ("75 of Alekhine's games"), however, Le Monnier had written "It will never be known whether Alekhine was behind these articles or whether they were manipulated by the editor of the ''Pariser Zeitung''."<ref name="winterWasAlekhineNazi" />

British chess historian [[Edward G. Winter]] notes that the articles in the ''Pariser Zeitung'' misspelled the names of several famous chess masters, which could be interpreted as evidence of forgery or as attempts by Alekhine to signal that he was being forced to write things that he did not believe; but these could simply have been [[typesetting]] errors, as Alekhine's handwriting was not easy to read. The articles contained (probably) incorrect claims that [[Lionel Kieseritzky]] (''Kieseritsky'' in English, ''Kizierycki'' in Polish) was a Polish Jew, although Kieseritzky was neither Polish nor Jewish.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review243.pdf |title=Immortal loser |first=Marek |last=Soszynski |access-date=2009-01-29 |archive-date=2009-02-25 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090225055650/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review243.pdf |url-status=live |url-access=subscription}}</ref> Winter concludes: "Although, as things stand, it is difficult to construct much of a defence for Alekhine, only the discovery of the articles in his own handwriting will settle the matter beyond all doubt." Under French [[copyright]] law, Alekhine's notebooks did not enter the [[public domain]] until January 1, 2017.<ref name="winterWasAlekhineNazi">{{cite web |url=http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/alekhine.html |title=Was Alekhine a Nazi? |access-date=2008-05-20 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080511193958/http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/alekhine.html |archive-date=11 May 2008  |url-status=live}} Winter cites many original documents including:
*''Alekhine Nazi Articles'', a privately printed booklet edited by Ken Whyld, that contains an English translation of the ''Pariser Zeitung'' articles;
*Alekhine's disavowal of these articles in ''News Review'', November 23, 1944, also reported in ''British Chess Magazine'' December 1944 and ''Chess'' January 1945;
*Alekhine's posthumous book ''¡Legado!'';
*interviews in the September 3, 1941, editions of ''El Alcázar'' and ''Informaciones'', which report Alekhine as making anti-Semitic statements about chess.</ref>

There is evidence that Alekhine was not antisemitic in his personal or chess relationships with Jews. In June 1919, he was arrested by the [[Cheka]], imprisoned in [[Odessa]] and sentenced to death. [[Yakov Vilner]], a Jewish master, saved him by sending a telegram to the chairman of the [[Ukraine|Ukrainian]] Council of People's Commissars, who knew of Alekhine and ordered his release.<ref>{{cite web|author=Wall, W.|title=Russian Chess History|url=http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lab/7378/russia.htm|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091026151255/http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lab/7378/russia.htm|archive-date=2009-10-26|access-date=2008-05-20}}</ref>{{unreliable source?|failed=y|date=December 2013}} Alekhine accepted and apparently used chess analysis from [[Charles Jaffe]] in his World Championship match against Capablanca. Jaffe was a Jewish master who lived in New York City, which Alekhine often visited, and upon his return to New York after defeating Capablanca, Alekhine played a short match as a favour to Jaffe, without financial remuneration.{{sfn|Saidy|Lessing|1974|pp=190–191}} Alekhine's second for the 1935 match with [[Max Euwe]] was the master [[Salo Landau]], a Dutch Jew. The American Jewish grandmaster [[Arnold Denker]] wrote that he found Alekhine very friendly in chess settings, taking part in consultation games and productive analysis sessions. Denker also wrote that Alekhine treated the younger and (at that time) virtually unproven Denker to dinner on many occasions in New York during the 1930s, when the economy was very weak because of the [[Great Depression]]. Denker added that Alekhine, during the early 1930s, opined that the American Jewish grandmaster [[Isaac Kashdan]] might be his next challenger (this did not in fact take place).<ref name="DenkerParr"/> He gave chess lessons to 14-year-old prodigy [[Gerardo Budowski]], a German Jew, in Paris in spring 1940.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.tablerotico.com/colaboraciones/gbudowski/jrc_budowski_madre.htm |title=Gerardo Budowski en Torneo de Ajedrez por Equipos 2005 |language=es |access-date=2009-01-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090206224857/http://www.tablerotico.com/colaboraciones/gbudowski/jrc_budowski_madre.htm |archive-date=2009-02-06 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Alekhine also married an American woman who may or may not have had Jewish ancestry, Grace Wishaar, as his fourth wife. Grace Alekhine was the women's champion of Paris in 1944.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/winter18.html |title=Chess Notes Archive [18] |access-date=2008-05-23 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080509145147/http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/winter18.html |archive-date=9 May 2008 |url-status=live}}</ref>