Gilles Mirallès was born in Grasse on 8 February 1966. In 1982 he became French Junior Champion and in 1986 and 1989, Mirallès won the French National Championship. In 1990 he came third, half a point ahead of Boris Spassky. Between 1986 and 1990, Gilles Mirallès represented France three times in Chess Olympiads.
As a junior, Mirallès liked to open his games with 1.b4.
In the 1980s and 1990s Mirallès played in many tournaments, and his best results include winning the Cannes International Tournament 1986, ahead of Andras Adorjan and Viktor Kortschnoi, and winning in Marseille 1990, ahead of Chernin and Bareev. In 1987, he finished shared second behind Josef Klinger in an international tournament in Zug.
From 1992 to 1996 Mirallès was Technical Director of the French Chess Federation as a trainer. He also worked for the federation magazine "Echecs et Mat". Mirallès then moved to Geneva, where he became president of the Geneva Chess Federation and, from 1998, director of the Geneva Chess School. Mirallès organised tournaments and was involved in the "Chess in Schools" initiative.
In 1985 Mirallès became an International Master, in 1997 he became a Grandmaster.
In France, Mirallès played for Monaco and other clubs. In Switzerland Mirallès played for Geneva for many years and last season, in 2021, he had excellent result and scored 5.5 out of 7.
Gilles Mirallès died on 28 January in Ferney-Voltaire. He was 55 years old.
