Editing Yasser Seirawan (section)

== Career ==
Seirawan began playing chess at 12; at 13, he became Washington junior champion. At 19, he won the [[World Junior Chess Championship]]. He also won a game against [[Viktor Korchnoi]], who had two years earlier narrowly lost a match for the world championship. Impressed, Viktor then invited Seirawan to Switzerland, where Korchnoi was training for his [[World Chess Championship 1981|1981 world title match]] against [[Anatoly Karpov]].<ref>{{cite journal |first=William |last=Tracy |url=http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/199002/the.right.moves.htm |journal=Saudi Aramco World |volume=41 |number=2 |date=March–April 1990 |title=The Right Moves |access-date=2005-11-06 |archive-date=2012-07-16 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120716222155/http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/199002/the.right.moves.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Seirawan qualified for the 1985 and 1988-1990 [[Candidates Tournament]]s. In the 1985 tournament in Montpellier he scored 7/15 placing joint 10th,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=83304|title = Montpellier Candidates (1985)}}</ref> and in the [[World Chess Championship 1990#1988–90 Candidates Tournament|1988–1990 tournament in St John]], a knockout tournament, he was knocked out by [[Jon Speelman]] in the preliminary round.

Seirawan was the highest rated American player on 19 monthly FIDE rating lists between July 1982 and January 2002.<ref>https://2700chess.com/top50-for-any-month</ref>


In 1990, he won a match against [[Jan Timman]] sponsored by KRO by the score of +3-1=2.

For 12 years, he was the chief editor of the ''Inside Chess'' magazine.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.worldchesshof.org/exhibitions/project/lecture-series-with-yasser-seirawan/ |title=GM Yasser Seirawan Lecture Series |date=April 9, 2013 |work=World Chess Hall of Fame}}</ref> The magazine was sold to the [[ChessCafe.com]] website, on which old articles were featured.

In 1999, Seirawan played a ten-game match against [[Michael Adams (chess player)|Michael Adams]] in [[Bermuda]]. The match was drawn +2–2=6.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Crowther |first=Mark |date=February 8, 1999 |title=TWIC 222: Adams-Seirawan in Bermuda|url=http://theweekinchess.com/html/twic222.html#6|publisher=The Week in Chess|access-date=January 25, 2016}}</ref>

In 2001, Seirawan released a plan called "Fresh Start" to reunite the chess world, which at that time had two [[World Chess Championship|world champions]]: [[Ruslan Ponomariov]] had gained the title under the auspices of [[Fédération Internationale des Échecs|FIDE]], while [[Vladimir Kramnik]] had beaten [[Garry Kasparov]] to take the Classical title. It called for one match between Ponomariov and Kasparov (the world number one), and another between Kramnik and the winner of the 2002 Einstein tournament in [[Dortmund]], who turned out to be [[Péter Lékó]].<ref>{{cite web |first=Yasser |last=Seirawan |title=A Fresh Start for chess |url=http://en.chessbase.com/post/yaer-seirawan-proposes-i-a-fresh-start-i-for-che |website=ChessBase |date=March 2, 2002 |access-date=January 23, 2015}}</ref> The winners of these matches would then play each other to become undisputed World Champion. This plan was signed by all parties on May 6, 2002, in the so-called "Prague Agreement". The Kramnik-Leko match took place (the match was drawn, with Kramnik retaining his title); the Kasparov-Ponomariov match was canceled in 2003, and this particular plan became moot when Kasparov retired in 2005. In the end, the [[FIDE World Chess Championship 2006]] between Kramnik and [[Veselin Topalov]] reunited the world championship title.

Following a series of events, such as Seirawan participating in the Beijing Chess Challenge in September 2003,<ref>{{Cite web|date=2003-09-28|title=The Beijing Chess Challenge|url=https://en.chessbase.com/post/the-beijing-che-challenge|access-date=2021-08-30|website=Chess News|language=en}}</ref> there were reports that he would be retiring as a professional player. In the July 2007 [[FIDE]] list, Seirawan had an [[Elo rating]] of 2634, placing him in the top 100 chess players in the world, and America's number four, behind [[Hikaru Nakamura]], [[Gata Kamsky]], and [[Alexander Onischuk]]. He played six games in the July 2007 FIDE update.{{citation needed|date=January 2015}}

In 2007, Seirawan unveiled a [[chess variant]] created in collaboration with Bruce Harper, called [[Seirawan chess]] or SHARPER chess. SHARPER chess introduces two additional pieces, a "hawk" and an "elephant"—a rook/knight and a bishop/knight combination that in other variants are called the [[Empress (chess)|Empress]] and [[Princess (chess)|Princess]], respectively. The initial position is that of standard chess. Whenever the player moves a piece from its starting position, one of the extra pieces in hand may be placed immediately on the square just vacated. Likewise, pawns may [[promotion (chess)|promote]] to a hawk or an elephant in addition to the standard pieces. The first ever event was a 12-board simultaneous exhibition held on March 31, 2007, in [[Vancouver]], British Columbia, Canada.<ref>{{Cite web|title=First Ever Seirawan Chess Event!|url=http://nwchess.com/articles/events/2007/Seirawan_simul.htm|access-date=2021-08-30|website=nwchess.com}}</ref>

In May 2011, Seirawan returned from hiatus to competitive chess, playing for the U.S. team in the world team championship in China, where he won silver in first alternate. He had wins versus top GMs [[Judit Polgar]] and [[Shakhriyar Mamedyarov]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://chess-results.com/tnr53136.aspx?art=9&lan=1&snr=38 |title=Yinzhou Cup 2011 World ChessTeam Championship – Player Info: Seirawan Yasser|website=Chess-Results.com |access-date=July 27, 2011}}</ref> He only lost one game.

Seirawan won the 2011 and 2012 Dutch Open Blitz championship.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.snelschaakmarathon.nl/SSM2011/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=151&Itemid=98 |title=Hall of fame (list of winners Dutch Open Blitzchess championship) |work=Snelschaakmarathon.nl |access-date=2013-03-24 |archive-date=2021-04-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414205437/http://www.snelschaakmarathon.nl/SSM2011/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=151&Itemid=98 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Seirawan is widely known for his expert commentary in live broadcasts on the Internet during important events. He has been named by the chess historian [[Edward Winter (chess historian)|Edward Winter]] as one of the top five Internet broadcasters.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://chesshistory.com/winter/winter127.html#9085._Live_chess_broadcasts_on |first=Edward |last=Winter |title=9085. Live chess broadcasts on the Internet |work=Chess Notes}}</ref> In 2019, he joined the Chessbrahs and provided coverage for the 2019 World Cup.