Why did Bobby Fischer quit playing for 20 years after becoming World Champion?
This was an answer I did on Quora some years ago. Click on the date below to see the original Quora post and answers by other people, too.
He had a dispute with FIDE (the governing body of chess) over the terms of the up and coming match with Karpov. Bobby Fischer wanted it to be the first one to get to 10 wins draws not counting, but if it became a 9–9 tie, then the match would be drawn, but he would retain the title of the champion. There were some other disputes, but I think this was the one that broke the camel’s back so to speak. FIDE wanted a 24 game format total with draws counting. Fischer in a rather simple statement said that he resigned his FIDE world championship title.
Why the 20 year delay until he fought Spassky again? He had a lot of money. He finally ran out of it after 20 years. That is when he wanted to fight Spassky again. I think he bagged $5 million for his rematch with Spassky. Bobby defeated Boris quite handily in the rematch, which shows that chess ability doesn’t really decline if you don’t keep at it because Boris did play during Bobby’s downtime of 20 years.
I read that Yasser Sierawan estimated Bobby’s rating upon coming back at about 2600 by looking at and analyzing the first game he played upon his return. That’s not bad for not having…
