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Simen Agdestein
Simen Agdestein
	Agdestein at the Norwegian Chess Championship in Bergen, July 2009
Country	Norway
Born	15 May 1967 (age 57); Asker, Norway
Title	Grandmaster (1985)
FIDE rating	2564 (November 2024)
Peak rating	2637 (July 2014)
Peak ranking	No. 16 (July 1989)
Height
Height	1.88 m (6 ft 2 in)
Position(s)	Forward
Senior career*
Years	Team
1984–1992	Lyn
International career
1988–1989	Norway
	*Club domestic league appearances and goals

Simen Agdestein (born 15 May 1967) is a Norwegian chess grandmaster, chess coach, author, and former professional footballer as a striker for the Norway national football team.

Agdestein won nine Norwegian Chess Championships between 1982 and 2023. He is also the former coach of Magnus Carlsen, and brother of Carlsen's manager, Espen Agdestein. He has authored and co-authored several books on chess, including a biography of Carlsen.

Chess career

Agdestein became Norwegian national champion at the age of 15, an International Master at 16 and a grandmaster at 18.

On a local level, his regular dominance of the Nordic and Norwegian Chess Championships during the 1980s amply demonstrated that there were few players who could resist his enterprising and inventive style. In international competition, he finished second at the 1986 World Junior Championship behind Walter Arencibia but ahead of Evgeny Bareev, Viswanathan Anand and Jeroen Piket. A little later, his Elo rating rose to over 2600.

In the late 1980s, Agdestein combined top-flight chess with a full-time football career, representing his country at both.^[2] In the early 1990s, a knee injury cut short his football activities. In 1999, Agdestein returned to winning ways, topping the Cappelle la Grande tournament that year and the Isle of Man tournament in 2003.^[3] Agdestein scored two tournament victories in 2013, when he won the Open Sant Martí in Barcelona with 8½ points out of 9 possible, with a rating performance of 2901,^[4] and the Oslo Chess International-Håvard Vederhus' Memorial with 7 points out of 9.^[5]

Agdestein has represented his country seven times at the Chess Olympiad, mostly playing first board and winning an individual (board 4) gold medal at his first appearance in 1982.^[6]

As a player of the white pieces, he shows a preference for the queen pawn openings, while with Black, favours the Ruy Lopez, Dutch Defence and Semi-Open Games.

Agdestein works at the sports academy Norges Toppidrettsgymnas [no], where he teaches chess and football. He has been a chess coach to many young talents, including world champion Magnus Carlsen.

His handle on the Internet Chess Club (ICC) is "Gruk".

Football career

Club performance			League		Cup		Total
Season	Club	League	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals
Norway			League		Norwegian Cup		Total
1984	Lyn Oslo^[1]		2	0	-		2	0
1985			4	1	-		4	1
1986			4	1	-		4	1
1987			19	8	-		19	8
1988			17	13	1	0	18	13
1989			17	5	-		17	5
1990			17	8	3	0	20	8
1991		Premier League	2	0	-		2	0
1992		Premier League	10	1	2	6	12	7
Total	Norway		92	37	6	6	98	43
Career total			92	37	6	6	98	43

Personal life

He was born in Oslo as a son of civil engineer Reidar Frank Agdestein (1927–2002) and secretary Unni Jørgensen (1934–).^[7] He is a maternal grandson of runner and botanist Reidar Jørgensen.^[8] In 1995, he was awarded a master's degree from the Department of Political Science at the University of Oslo.^[9] In October 1996 he married Marianne Aasen, a later Member of Parliament.^[7] The couple had three children, but separated in 2008.^[10]

Bibliography

Source: BIBSYS^[11]

As an author or co-author

Sjakkleksjoner med Simen Agdestein (1987)
GATT, u-landene og miljøet : rapport fra en konferanse i Oslo 20. og 21. oktober 1994 (1994)
Regionalt samarbeid versus apartheid : SADCC-landenes bestrebelser på å redusere transportavhengigheten til Sør-Afrika på 1980-tallet (1995) (Master thesis, University of Oslo)
Simens sjakkbok (1997)
Et hefte om internasjonalisering (1998)
Den unge sjakkspiller (2001)
Sjakk: Fra første trekk til sjakkmatt (2002)
Wonderboy : how Magnus Carlsen became the youngest chess grandmaster in the world : the story and the games (2004)
Sjakk (2007)

Books about Agdestein

Arne Danielsen, Bjarte Leer-Salvesen, Bjarke Sahl, Atle Grønn. Simen Agdestein (2008)

References

^ ^a ^b "Simen Agdestein som Lynspiller". Retrieved 4 December 2016.
^ Norway – International Players – Landslaget
^ Pein, Malcolm (8 October 2003). "Agdestein nets a winner". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 6 June 2010.
^ Valaker, Ole (21 July 2013). "Simen (46) vant storturnering i Spania" (in Norwegian). Nettavisen. Archived from the original on 25 August 2013. Retrieved 21 July 2013.
^ Valaker, Ole (6 October 2013). "- Han spiller som han var 23 år!" (in Norwegian). Nettavisen. Retrieved 6 October 2013.^{[permanent dead link]}, Crosstable of Oslo Chess International (TournamentService)
^ Bartelski, Wojciech. "OlimpBase :: Men's Chess Olympiads :: Simen Agdestein". Retrieved 4 December 2016.
^ ^a ^b Brekke, Øystein. "Simen Agdestein". In Helle, Knut (ed.). Norsk biografisk leksikon (in Norwegian). Oslo: Kunnskapsforlaget. Retrieved 3 February 2012.
^ Bøckman, Knut (19 September 1989). "Navn i nyhetene: Simen Agdestein". Aftenposten (in Norwegian). p. 6.
^ UiO:DUO Research Archive. https://www.duo.uio.no/handle/10852/14709
^ Ekker, Bjørn (12 September 2008). "Her er "Skal vi danse"-bruddene". Se og Hør (in Norwegian). Archived from the original on 25 November 2009. Retrieved 3 February 2012.
^ "BIBSYS – Vi gjør kunnskap tilgjengelig". Archived from the original on 15 December 2016. Retrieved 4 December 2016.