A Swashbuckling Grandmaster
Valery Popov, known to online chess fans as NewZorro, carries the FIDE Grandmaster title with the swagger of his username. He is a bullet specialist at heart, and his stats show a player who loves the sword fight, the clock, and the long grind. His bullet game climbed from 2248 in late 2015 to a peak of 2770 in October 2019, while his blitz rating touched 2836 in the same wild week.
traces the journey.The Comeback King
NewZorro plays chess like a matador who refuses to fall down. He reaches the endgame in about 81 percent of his games and averages nearly 80 moves per contest, making him a marathon runner in a sprint format. His comebacks are legendary: he wins 51 percent of the time even after losing a piece and posts a comeback rate near 79 percent. He once strung together 36 consecutive victories, though the reverse also exists, a 19-game losing streak that shows just how high the stakes are.
Opening Repertoire
As White, NewZorro favors the Réti Opening and English structures, often steering into the King's Indian Defense Exchange Variation or the sharp Diemer-Duhm Gambit. With Black he is a loyal disciple of the Caro-Kann Defense and the Sicilian Defense: Najdorf Variation, where his blitz win rate approaches 79 percent. He also enjoys chaos openings like the Amazon Attack: Siberian Attack and the Colle System Rhamphorhynchus Variation, proving a Grandmaster can still have fun.
A Nemesis Named lordillidan
No profile of NewZorro is complete without his greatest rival: Richard Rapport. The two have battled 143 times, and lordillidan owns the series with 120 wins. It is a lopsided score that would send most players running, yet NewZorro keeps coming back for more. Against the rest of his regular opposition he is a predator, with a 40 to 6 record versus vm2027, 23 to 8 versus gavrisha, and a healthy plus score against shenron-z and lostabet95.
Peak Days and Quirks
NewZorro's peak ratings are impressive: 2770 (2019-10-24) in bullet and 2836 (2019-10-23) in blitz. He is also a creature of habit, playing his best chess at 10:00 AM with a perfect win rate in that hour. His white pieces score 56.13 percent and his black pieces 51.96 percent, balanced enough to keep opponents guessing until the very last move.