Chess is no longer Henrique Costa Mecking’s favorite subject. Known as Mequinho and about to turn 70, the greatest chess player in Brazil prefers to talk about religion.
“I was chosen by Jesus as a prophet of the apocalypse 12 years ago,” he says. According to him, he still needs to be anointed by a bishop to be recognized by the entire Catholic Church. When that happens, he says, a lot will change.
“From there, I will be able to help the Church, the world, everything in the best possible way. And, naturally, save Brazil from communism and the bloody civil war”, he says, referring to punishments mentioned in the supposed apparition of Our Lady in Cimbres, in the district of Pesqueira (PE).
His intense relationship with religion is ancient. It started in March 1978, when he started to attend a Catholic Charismatic Renewal group in Rio, where he lived.
Months earlier, Mequinho had discovered that he suffered from myasthenia gravis, a disease that affects the muscles and, in more severe cases, can lead to death.
His condition became dramatic, with uncontrollable cold, muscle weakness and inability to swallow, to the point of eating food from a blender. He believed he would die in a matter of weeks.
According to Mequinho, in May 1979, a miracle occurred: in a prayer led by a lady known as Tia Laura, he was healed by Jesus Christ, who saved him from 99% of the disease.
Mequinho insisted on continuing to play chess, but fatigue prevented him from playing longer matches. He had to leave the boards for a total of 17 years. Tried to go back in the 1990s, without success; then he got it in 2000, but not at the same level.
Before stopping, in the 1970s, Mequinho was tipped to be world champion. In the ranking of Fide (International Federation of Chess, in the French acronym), he came to appear in third place, the peak of a chess player who emerged as a child prodigy in a country with no tradition in this sport.
Born in Santa Cruz do Sul (RS) on January 23, 1952, Mequinho learned to play chess around the age of six in São Lourenço do Sul (RS), where he had gone to live as a baby. He startled small-town residents when he faced adults toe-to-toe when he was seven years old and could barely reach the pieces on the table.
At the age of eight, he moved to Pelotas (RS), a municipality that was bigger and brought together some of the best players in the country. The boy evolved. He became municipal and state champion at 12 and Brazilian at 13, a feat that caught the attention of chess players around the world.
In early 1967, shortly after turning 15, Mequinho won the South American cup, an unprecedented feat in the history of chess.
Thanks to his performance in the continental tournament, the prodigy has reached the level of an international master. Before him, in Brazil, only Eugênio German, from Minas Gerais, had stepped on this step, in 1952, at the age of 21.
At that time, Fide separated the chess elite into two categories: international master and international grandmaster (nowadays, below these there are still candidates for Fide master and Fide master).
In an analogy, they are like the sashes in martial arts. Achieving them demands meeting certain requirements and performance compatible with the best in the sport. In Brazil in the 1960s, nobody had a black belt (in Argentina there were six great masters, including three naturalized foreigners).
With the aim of becoming a grandmaster and world champion, Mequinho dedicated himself exclusively to chess from 1970 onwards, although long before that he no longer thought about anything else.
He reached his first goal in 1972, at the Hastings International Tournament (England), the most traditional in chess and one of the most prestigious at the time. He added up the necessary points by drawing with the Romanian Victor Ciocaltea on January 13, at the age of 19 (his new status was only recognized by Fide at the end of the year, but it was a mere formality).
“I felt the greatest emotion of my life and I remembered the Brazilian people, on the other side of the Atlantic. I offer my victory to all Brazilians”, declared the newly-grandmaster at the time. And he made a request: “I want a lot of people at the airport. I like the human warmth, my people, my friends”.
It was attended to. When he arrived at Galeão on January 18, he found numerous Flamengo fans (a club for which he played) and students from Universidade Gama Filho (where he was a professor), in addition to several chess players. Congratulations banners decorated the lobby and Mangueira percussionists guaranteed the samba.
Mequinho paraded through Rio in a fire engine. Private vehicles and buses formed the procession, while here and there a firecracker erupted. But the entourage only stopped traffic on Avenida Rio Branco, and at no time there was the rain of shredded papers that paid tribute to the three-time football champions.
Two days later, the chess player kicked off Flamengo x Vasco at Maracanã, in a match valid for the Summer Tournament. He was cheered by an audience of over 29,000 people.
His fame, which was already great, grew even more. A frequent figure in newspapers, magazines and television programs, including Chacrinha, Mequinho became a celebrity.
Raul Seixas talks about the chess player in his song “Super-Heróis”, from 1974. The poet Carlos Drummond de Andrade, in a column in Jornal do Brasil, complained about the lack of emphasis on literature and the “surplus of applause distributed to Pelé, Mequinho” . At that time, the athlete of the century, the grandmaster and the pilot Emerson Fittipaldi constituted the trinity of Brazilian sport.
In 1973, Mequinho won the Interzonal Tournament, which was a kind of first phase of the world championship and attracted the best chess players on the planet. Three years later, he repeated the feat.
However, he was never able to progress in the knockout stage that precedes the dispute for the title of world champion.
After Mequinho, Brazil only had a grandmaster again in 1986. Today there are 14 in all, the same as Iceland, with its 366,000 inhabitants.
This is Mequinho
– 1964: Champion of Pelotas
– 1964: Champion of Rio Grande do Sul
– 1965: Brazilian Champion
– 1967: South American Zonal Champion
– 1972: International grandmaster
– 1973: Interzonal Champion
– 1976: Interzonal champion
Main books*
– “How Jesus Christ Saved My Life”
– “Mequinho – The Chess of a Grand Master”
– “Grand Master Mequinho’s Chess Matches and Finals”
*books can be found at https://xadreztotal.com.br/gmmecking/
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