World No 1 GM Magnus Carlsen went on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast and detailed why he doesn’t believe that GM Hans Niemann cheated using anal beads, an unsubstantiated rumour that had started swirling on social media when cheating allegations against Niemann were brought about.
Magnus Carlsen was asked at the start of the podcast by Joe Rogan about the internet theory that Hans Niemann was using anal beads to cheat in over-the-board games, a theory that Carlsen promptly said he didn’t believe in.
“It (the rumour) actually started in one of my friend’s streamer channel’s. A random guy made a comment about anal beads and he was like ‘Yeah, maybe’. I think it started making the rounds on Reddit and then Elon (Musk) saw it, tweeted about it and then obviously it blew up,” said Carlsen. He then made it clear that he didn’t think it really happened. “I really, really don’t believe that that has happened. I think that has no connection to reality but it just became a thing of its own.”
Niemann has in the past admitted to cheating on some casual online games but never over-the-board. This admission, according to Carlsen, was not the true extent of the cheating he believes that Niemann indulged in.
“He has not admitted to nearly the extent of his cheating,” remarked Carlsen.
Explaining that thought further, the Norwegian said that there were multiple factors that made him think that Niemann was cheating earlier.
“There was a combination of things, based on the chess level that I thought that he had, and that I had seen from his games. Both by playing against him and analyzing a bit with him and by looking at his games. There were a lot of stories back then,” Carlsen said. He added: “There were a lot of factors that made me very, very suspicious. I think ever since then he has become better. But there’s still something off, both then and now.”
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“He doesn’t seem to be playing….or he didn’t at that point seem to be playing with a particular style. It seemed that he either played, kinda eh, or he more or less played any position very well in certain games. He could just switch from tactical to positional play very easily,” said Carlsen on why he believed Niemann was cheating.
When Rogan asked Carlsen how people could cheat in over-the-board chess, the Norwegian said that invisible ear pieces were being used by people but that security against them had also been ramped up.
“An invisible earpiece that people use for exams and so on,” answered Carlsen. “Yeah, he would. That would not have been detected by the security system that they used at that tournament. They amped up the security after the whole thing happened. They started checking our ears.”
The back-and-forth between the two has now reached a point where neither party trusts the other. Carlsen said that everyone has moved on a little after the lawsuit but there is still distrust among all parties involved.
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“It didn’t smell good to me. It still doesn’t, but to some extent, he had his lawsuit and we have all kind of moved a little bit on. I don’t trust him, and a lot of top players still don’t trust him. He certainly doesn’t trust me or Chess.com, Hikaru, or whoever he felt wronged by.”
