Yasser Seirawan is the highest-rated American chess professional on the Federation Internationale des Echecs (FIDE) rating ladder and the first American to vie for the World Championship title since Bobby Fischer. He is a three-time U.S Champion, the 1989 Western Hemisphere Champion and an eight-time member of the U.S chess Olympiad team. Currently one of the worlds top-ranked chess players, he is one of only a handful of players to have defeated world champions Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov in tournament play.