'I beat the strongest player in the world. Gukesh is in a different situation because Magnus is there'
India's Koneru Humpy crashed out of the World Women's chess championship after drawing the second game of the semi-final match against nemesis Yifan Hao of China.
Nine-year-old Delhi boy Aarit Kapil has become the youngest Indian to beat a chess Grandmaster.
'I like to challenge myself. Competing against players much younger than me is something that I want to keep doing,' says Chess Legend Viswanathan Anand
Chess icon Viswanathan Anand feels the current crop of Indian players, that he has had a role in shaping, has turned out to be "great" in grabbing crucial opportunities.
Arjun Erigaisi briefly reached a career-high live rating of 2771.2 earlier this week and is the only Indian since Vishwanathan Anand to do so.
World champion Viswanathan Anand retained his World Chess Championship crown after winning the final game against Veselin Topalov of Russia in Sofia, Bulgaria, on Tuesday.
The 18-year-old Indian drew with top seeded Grandmaster Ferenc Berkes of Hungary in the final round to emerge champion.
'You need hard work along with talent to reach exceptional heights.'
Norway's Magnus Carlsen continues to be the undisputed world No.1 with 2832.5 points, followed by United States' Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura (2802) and country-mate Fabiano Caruana (2798).
Grandmaster Koneru Humpy took an early lead against Ju Wenjun of China while GM norm holder D Harika played out a draw with another Chinese, Ruan Lufei, in the first game of the quarter-finals of the World Women's Chess Championship in Hatay, Turkey. With another victory in the first game itself, Humpy now needs just a draw in the return game to make it to the last four stage that has been her performance till date in a World Championship.
The second, fourth, fifth and sixth games had ended in draws.
Indian chess prodigy D Gukesh sealed a remarkable Chess Olympiad campaign with a decisive victory over GM Vladimir Fedoseev on Sunday in Hungary.
In a groundbreaking moment for Indian chess, Arjun Erigaisi has become the second player from India and the sixteenth player globally to surpass the 2800 live rating mark.
Nine-year-old Aarit Kapil from Delhi came close to defeating World No 1 Magnus Carlsen before settling for a draw in the 'Early Titled Tuesday' chess tournament on a leading online platform.
'The Indian Open team was extremely well prepared and motivated to win the gold medal.' 'With two players in the world top 10 club, and four players with over 2,700 ELO points (GMs Arjun Erigaisi, D Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa, all below 20) and Vidit Gujrathi and P Harikrishna, it was a solid team.'
D Gukesh credited mental conditioning coach Paddy Upton for helping him tame the 'emotional pressure' of competing at the World Chess Championship.
After the first game against the same opponent ended in a draw, Harika was with black pieces in the second and she employed a French defence and Kosteniuk did not have many answers.
Gujrathi, who was a part of India's gold-winning campaign in the Chess Olympiad recently, says the sport's ecosystem needs a major overhaul to ensure players have more balance in life.
Grandmaster Alexandra Kosteniuk ended a 44-year-old drought for Russia by clinching the World Women's Chess Championship after playing out a draw with Yifan Hao of China in the fourth game of the finals that concluded in Nalchik (Russia).
Women's World Cup winner Divya Deshmukh, who has also qualified for the Women's Candidates, has opted out of the women's section to compete with the best in business.
'Again this year was not going well, I was working very hard but somehow the results were not going my way, this win is very crucial.'
Magnus Carlsen was held to a draw by more than 143,000 people worldwide playing against him in a single, record-setting online game, on Monday.
Indian Grandmaster Koneru Humpy won the FIDE Women's Grand Prix 2024-25 (Pune leg) title on the basis of her superior tie-breaks over Zhu Jiner of China after the two players were tied for the top spot on Wednesday.
Dronavalli Harika proved her superiority in the endgame to outplay Anna Muzychuk in the second rapid tie-breaker and sail into the third round of the ongoing World Women's Chess Championship in Nalchik (Russia).
The world governing body of chess, FIDE, has postponed the Olympiad, scheduled for August 5-17 in Moscow, to 2021 owing to the coronavirus pandemic. The global chess body issued a statement saying that the Olympiad and the FIDE Congress, slated to be held in August in Moscow and Khanty-Mansiysk respectively, are rescheduled to the summer of 2021 at the same locations.
Nine-year-old Mumbai girl Ananya Gupta has claimed a bronze medal in the World School Chess championship held at Haldikki in Greece.
World Championship challenger Dommaraju Gukesh survived by the skin of his teeth against compatriot Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa.
Grandmaster and former world junior champion Abhijeet Gupta won the Commonwealth Chess Championship after settling for a draw with Indian national title holder G Akash in the 11th and final round that concluded here at the Boardwalk.
S Vijayalakshmi is the lone Indian left in the fray.
Chess master-turned-cricketer Yuzvendra Chahal went back to his old passion, headlining an online blitz event organised by chess.com, and said the sport taught him to be patient on the cricket field. A former national Under-12 chess champion, India cricketer Chahal has the distinction of having represented the country at the World Youth Chess Championships, and is listed on the World Chess Federation (FIDE) website. His Elo rating is 1956.
Playing chess all year round can take a huge toll on the physical and mental aspects of a player and Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa acknowledged that sometimes he has to completely take his mind off the sport to prepare for the upcoming challenges.
Chess960, created by former world champion Bobby Fischer in 1996, has been gaining in popularity after an invitational tournament played last year at the Weissenhaus Luxury Resort, which hosted the G7 Foreign Minister summit in 2022.
Humpy, the world rapid champion, overcame her Chinese opponent in a close match with the Indian winning the decisive bullet game.
The Indian chess team spanked Brazil 3.5-0.5 in the final round to end the World Team Chess Championship with a bronze medal in Bursa, Turkey.
In the women's event, the country's top player Koneru Humpy has 3.5 points with two wins and three draws after five rounds as does R Vaishali who has scored three victories to go with a draw apart from a loss.
Grandmaster Viswanathan Anand said by winning his fourth World Chess Championship title early this month he has proved critics who accused him of lacking in killer instinct wrong.
In the two-game final, Anand drew the first game and brilliantly outplayed Vladimir Kramnik in the return game to win the coveted title for the first time.
Talking about his journey, Vishwanathan Anand said he had to work hard to become the player he is today.
A world title in the current format is something that will add to the glittering cupboard of the world number one.
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