Rafael Leitao is a chess Grandmaster who blends high-level competition with engaging streaming. A titled player who earned the Grandmaster title from FIDE, Rafael also makes his mark as a popular streamer under the handle GMRafpig, sharing insights, humor, and a love for fast-paced chess with a global audience.
Career highlights
Rafael has built a storied Blitz career, with a peak Blitz rating of 2873 in 2025. His journey features impressive streaks and steady growth across the years, including a longest winning streak of 46 games and a current strong run. He remains a vibrant force in top-level Blitz play through 2025, balancing competition with content creation for fans who crave sharper, quicker battles on the board.
Opening repertoire and playstyle
In Blitz, Rafael favors a balanced mix of solid structure and sharp ideas, with notable strengths in several systems. Highlights from his opening performance include:
Italian Game: Two Knights Defense: 40 games, 67.5% win rate
King's Indian Defense: Orthodox Variation: 27 games, 66.67% win rate
Streaming and community
A devoted content creator, Rafael streams his games, explains his reasoning live, and interacts with a growing community of chess enthusiasts. For a glimpse into his profile, explore Rafael Leitao.
Career snapshot
Preferred time control appears to be Blitz. His career features a remarkable Blitz peak and a pattern of strong results across the 2020s, underscored by a long winning streak and continuous activity.
Coach Chesswick
Overview of your blitz progress
Your recent rating momentum shows positive movement, with the strongest trend over the last three months. Shorter windows also trend upward, indicating you are building confidence and practical strength in fast games. The longer (twelve month) view suggests some variability, which is common in blitz, but the near-term gains are a good sign you’re on the right track with focused practice.
What you’re doing well
Strong results in sharp, tactical openings. For example, the Ruy Lopez, Brix Variation, has a high win rate (about 76% across 29 games), showing you handle active play and complex tactics well in this line.
Consistent performance in the Italian Game: Two Knights Defense with a win rate around 68%, indicating good piece activity and knight maneuvers in the early middlegame.
Good results in the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian (about 65% wins across 37 games), which reflects solid tactical awareness and initiative in dynamic positions.
Flexible English opening results, including Four Knights Nimzowitsch Variation and Agincourt Defense, signaling you can adapt to different pawn structures and plans.
Solid performance in the Caro-Kann family, showing you can switch to solid, steadily improving positions when the position dictates.
Your strength-adjusted win rate is around the 50% mark, which means you’re in a strong zone for further improvement with targeted work.
Areas to improve
Time management in blitz: Even with good openings, you’ll benefit from reducing early middlegame time spend and making solid, quicker decisions to keep enough time for critical moments later in the game.
Conversion of advantages: Focus on turning favorable middlegame positions into decisive endings. When you gain the initiative, push for concrete plans rather than shuffling pieces to safe squares.
Endgame technique: Practice common rook endings and simple knight vs bishop endgames to convert small advantages into points under time pressure.
Repertoire consolidation: You perform well in several openings, but blitz fatigue can creep in. Consider narrowing your main openings to 2–3 trusted lines per color and study their typical middlegame plans more deeply.
Actionable plan for the next weeks
Openings focus: Select 2 white openings and 2 black responses you enjoy and study them in depth. Create a simple plan for the middlegame in each, including typical pawn structures and common tactical motifs.
Daily tactics: Solve about 10 tactical puzzles with a timer, targeting motifs that frequently appear in blitz, such as forks, skewers, and discovery tactics.
Endgame drills: Do 5–10 minutes of endgame practice daily, focusing on rook endings and king activity with pawns on one side of the board.
Practice with intent: In training games, aim for a clear plan by the 15th move and minimize unnecessary exchanges that simplify into drawn positions.
Notes
If you’d like, I can tailor a 2-week personalized plan based on your most-used openings and typical time controls. Just tell me which openings you want to prioritize and your available practice time.
