A holiday has always been a rarity in my life as a professional. This has mostly been the case because the summers have the best tournaments and if you plan it well, you can spend months playing without stopping. I still remember the years when I was playing in Spain for months on.

This year is somewhat different because of the Chess Olympiad. I am always very serious when it comes to events of this scale as I like to be prepared. This means good planning of rest, work and play. So now for me is rest time. This will be followed by playing, again one of my most favourite tournaments, the Paleochora tournament in Crete (you can see the starting list here) and then the whole August will be devoted to preparation for the Olympiad. Hope it all works out well!

Room with a view (click to enlarge)