Cover Story / 2014 Sinquefield Cup THE CARUANA STORY
Fabiano Caruana's victory at the 2014 Sinquefield Cup placed a spotlight on the 22- year-old Italian, whose rise to the top of world chess has rarely been documented.
Here, in an interview with GM Ian Rogers, Caruana talks of his childhood in the U.S. and life after his family moved to Europe.
GM Fabiano Caruana: I have a brother and a sister, much older than me. They have their own families. My brother has two kids and lives in Florida. My sister has two kids and lives in New Jersey.
I went to school until the age of 12. I went to Public School 321 right across from my house at 52nd Street in Brooklyn, [NewYork], then to Andries Hudde, another public school.
22 November 2014 | Chess Life
I played the piano when I was six or seven. It was brief—only about one year and I have forgotten everything.
I played at the Marshall Chess Club pretty much every night. It wasn’t such a long drive. The club was in Manhattan but travel took some time with New York traffic.
Then at the end of 2004 Caruana and his parents moved to Europe.
My father is American though his mother is Italian and his grandparents as well. My mother is from Italy so I am pretty much entirely Italian heritage. I have a lot of cousins and aunts and uncles from all over Italy. My mother wanted to go back for some time. Part of the idea was that I would be able to focus more time on my chess and get proper
experience playing classical tournaments.
The first plan was to go to Italy but for some reason it got changed to Spain. I wasn’t involved in the change. So we all moved. At first the plan was for me to go to school in Spain, not to play chess, but I managed to maneuver. Once we moved to Madrid I didn’t go to school at all. I don’t know if it was allowed in Spain to not go to school but I think they didn’t even know I was there.
My father was always pretty supportive but my mother thought I should stay at school— she was a bit more apprehensive. If I had wanted to drop chess at any time she would have supported me. My father would have said don’t—keep playing chess. I had a coach in Spain, Boris Zlotnik.
PHOTO: AUSTIN FULLER, CCSCSL
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