'Toiletgate': Critic of chess grandmaster found dead was caught up in cheating scandal of his own

Vladimir Kramnik, the Russian chess master accused by his peers of bullying Daniel Naroditsky — the U.S. grandmaster who was found dead last week — has himself been hit with unfounded cheating allegations in the past — a 2006 chess scandal that came to be known as “Toiletgate.”

The Russian chess master accused by his peers of bullying Daniel Naroditsky, the U.S. grandmaster who was found dead last week, has himself been hit with unfounded cheating allegations in the past — a 2006 chess scandal that came to be known as “Toiletgate.”

The manager of Vladimir Kramnik’s opponent in that title match, Veselin Topalov, claimed the Russian was using the bathroom up to 50 times per match to surreptitiously look up chess moves on a computer — a charge that Kramnik’s manager hotly denied.

“It should also be mentioned that Mr. Kramnik has to drink a lot of water during the games” and likes to pace in the bathroom, Carsten Hansel added, according to news reports.

Chess grandmaster Daniel Naroditsky dies at 2902:33Kramnik eventually won the match and became the undisputed world champion of chess, but only after agreeing to World Chess Federation (FIDE) demands that he use the same bathroom as his opponent. It was a concession Kramnik initially protested with a sit-in near the bathroom, causing him to forfeit one of the games in the match.

Later, Topalov and his manager were sanctioned by the FIDE Ethics Commission for “making unsubstantiated accusations of cheating.”