Chess News - Page 15

World champion Gukesh Dommaraju (left) and Levon Aronian during the first day of the St Louis Rapid and Blitz tournament. (PHOTOS: Lennart Ootes via grand Chess Tour)

Gukesh loses to Levon Aronian’s ‘grandpa style of chess’ at St Louis Rapid and Blitz

August 12, 2025 14:30 IST

Gukesh, meanwhile, said that he had paid the price for getting "careless in that one moment" against Aronian.

While there exists a good camaraderie between India’s top trio of Gukesh, Pragg and Arjun Erigaisi, what is also undeniable is the competition. (Photo Credit: Jurriaan Hoefsmit via Tata Steel chess)

How R Praggnanandhaa made peace with inevitable feelings of rivalry with D GukeshSubscriber Only

August 11, 2025 22:56 IST

Realising that there were several fish to fry in oceans around the world and not just fellow Indians in a small pond, helped settle all feelings of negative competitiveness

India's Divya Deshmukh and China's Lei Tingjie in action. (Andrei Anosov/FIDE)

Divya Deshmukh dominates again, topples China’s Lei Tingjie to reach Women’s Speed Chess Championship quarterfinals

August 11, 2025 22:47 IST

Divya annihilated Lei 10-3 to reach the quarterfinals of the Women’s Speed Chess Championship 2025 on Monday.

Bodhana Sivanandan, a 10-year-old British girl with Indian roots, is now the youngest girl to defeat a grandmaster. (PHOTO: Yuri Krylov via English Chess Federation.)

Bodhana Sivanandan, 10-year-old British prodigy with Indian roots, becomes youngest girl to beat a grandmasterSubscriber Only

August 12, 2025 22:36 IST

Unsurprisingly, Capablanca is one of her favourite players, while Carlsen, who has become a reference point for most young prodigies, only gets mentioned third in her list of favourites. “I really like Capablanca because of his end games,” she had told The Indian Express.

How Gukesh was celebrated in Poland: Helicopter ride, cheering fans holding name, speech for young kids, and face on coffee foam

August 13, 2025 12:11 IST

Gukesh has a special connection with Poland, because his team for the world chess championship last year against Ding Liren was filled with more Polish members than Indians. Gukesh's trainer since 2023 Grzegorz Gajewski also is Polish.

At this juncture, Magnus Carlsen played a move so good that it made Sergey Karjakin resign in two seconds. It was the final move of the 2016 World Chess Championship. (Photos: Partha Paul/Express Photo, Lichess)

Can you think like Magnus Carlsen? Guess move that made his opponent Sergey Karjakin resign in 2 seconds in 2016 world championship

November 24, 2025 13:52 IST

When Carlsen made the move, GM Peter Svidler remarked: “Woah! This is fantastic. I’m so unbelievably impressed by this.” GM Jan Gustaffson added: “Wow! That is a cute finish!” Could you find out the ‘cute finish’ that left Svidler ‘unbelievably impressed’?

Casablanca chess 2024: Magnus Carlsen vs Vishwanathan Anand

Viswanathan Anand explains how a ‘limited’ young Magnus Carlsen became chess’ unbeatable beast

August 11, 2025 23:35 IST

Viswanathan Anand became the World Champion for the first time in 2000 when he defeated Spanish Grandmaster Alexei Shirov for the title.

India's Vaishali Rameshbabu (extreme left), Praggnanandhaa (second from left) and Gukesh D (centre) will be competing at the Candidates this year. Arjun Erigaisi will miss out. (PHOTO: FIDE/Lennart Ootes)

Praggnanandhaa on how success of Gukesh and Arjun Erigaisi have inspired him

August 10, 2025 22:23 IST

Praggnanandhaa (World No. 4), Arjun (World No. 5) and Gukesh (World No. 6) are currently ranked India No. 1, 2 and 3 in the live rating list.

Five-time World Champion Viswanathan Anand during Chennai Grand Master 2025 event. (Photo: MGD1)

How can chess players ace the multi-format juggle? Vishy Anand has a solutionSubscriber Only

August 11, 2025 10:51 IST

Five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand has a simple solution—“never rule out any format mentally”.

File images of Magnus Carlsen and R Praggnanandhaa at the Tata Steel Rapid and Blitz tournament in Kolkata. (Express Photos by Partha Paul)

Praggnanandhaa explains what makes Magnus Carlsen great and answers what he has that world no.1 doesn’t

August 13, 2025 14:41 IST

At the 2024 Norway Chess, the now 19-year-old also notched up his first classical win over Carlsen. In July 2025, Praggnanandhaa pulled off a stunning double over Carlsen within three days at the Las Vegas Freestyle Chess event.

India's R Praggnanandhaa takes on Magnus Carlsen in a SuperUnited Rapid and Blitz Croatia game earlier this year in Zagreb. (PHOTO: Lennart Ootes/ Grand Chess Tour)

Praggnanandhaa: ‘When I told my dad I’d beaten Magnus Carlsen, he just said “good” and fell asleep’

August 12, 2025 22:47 IST

Praggnanandhaa, who turned 20 on Sunday, also spoke about the psychological impact of defeating Carlsen for the first time. Pragg said: "It was important for me back then. It gave me a lot of confidence. I realized that the top players are not invincible, you can beat them."

(LEFT) Chess legend Garry Kasparov during a Grand Chess Tour event; Indian prime minister Narendra Modi with Russia's Vladimir Putin. (PHOTOS: Lennart Ootes/GCT, Narendra Modi X)

‘Donald Trump is a clown, but…’: Chess legend Garry Kasparov fires warning to PM Narendra Modi about his friend Vladimir Putin

August 15, 2025 20:56 IST

In the past week, American President Donald Trump has criticised India for buying oil from Russia and slapped the country with exorbitant 50 per cent tariffs. In one tweet, Trump even ranted that he did not care if India and Russia “take their dead economies down together”.

Chennai Grand Masters: Nihal Sarin turns to Vishnu Prasanna to improve his classical gameSubscriber Only

August 9, 2025 22:07 IST

‘His early chess education is not traditional, there's a gap there,’ says new coach.

(LEFT) Popular streamer Levy Rozman (known as Gotham Chess) reacts after world champion Gukesh (RIGHT) traps his queen in a Freestyle Friday game. (PHOTOS: Screengrabs via Chess.com and Gotham Chess YouTube)

When Gukesh forced world’s top chess streamer, Gotham Chess, to resign in just nine moves

August 11, 2025 00:12 IST

Rozman (who goes by the name Gotham Chess) is an International Master, which is only one step below the grandmaster title. Rozman's peak rating has been 2421.

Hans Niemann jokes about buying a castle as he detoxes in nature after Freestyle Chess high in Las Vegas

August 9, 2025 16:59 IST

He said that he had played 261 classical games in 2021, then 180 in 2022. Then the cheating scandal happened.

xAI's Elon Musk (left), Open AI's Sam Altman and five-time world champion Magnus Carlsen. (PHOTOS: AP, Partha Paul/Express Photo)

‘He doesn’t have greatest respect for chess’: When Magnus Carlsen met Elon Musk, and played with Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerberg

August 13, 2025 12:17 IST

Magnus Carlsen said he played in a team with Demis Hassabis, DeepMind Technologies CEO, who was recently awarded a Nobel Prize in Chemistry. "I told him ways he could get around (opponent’s tricks in the opening). Lo and behold, the game starts, he forgets everything," Carlsen chuckled.

The six-month ban on Li Haoyu from FIDE-rated events was effective from July 31. (FIDE/Anna Shtourman)

Li Haoyu, ex-Chinese chess prodigy, banned for ‘sandbagging’ after dropping 400 ELO points in year, losing 13 games in row

August 10, 2025 09:12 IST

In his defence at one point, Li Haoyu compared himself to ex-world champion Ding Liren. "My strategy has always been to apply pressure on my opponents through time management, a tactic employed by... Ding Liren in the World Championship match (vs Gukesh)."

Harika Dronavalli 2 year old daughter peak into life

At Chennai Grand Masters, a chance for Harika Dronavalli to give her 2-year-old daughter a peek into her lifeSubscriber Only

August 8, 2025 21:16 IST

Harika on bringing her daughter Hanvika to Chennai Grand Masters: "I would love to have her everywhere. Even now, I don't think it's easy. But this (the tournament in Chennai) is so close to my place. I'm happy she could witness my life in a way,”

(LEFT) A young Gukesh meditates on the beach; (RIGHT) Gukesh during a felicitation event hosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the Indian teams' Chess Olympiad victory last year. (PHOTOS: Gukesh Instagram, Narendra Modi X)

Gukesh reveals how meditation changed him from ‘impulsive, short-tempered kid’ into a calm world champion at age of 18

August 10, 2025 09:13 IST

When the host asked Gukesh to show the crowd some yoga techniques, he said: "I'm not really a yoga master."

As Elon Musk's Grok 4 made blunder after blunder in the final, five-time world champion Magnus Carlsen was at hand to commentate -- and laugh -- at the errors. (PHOTOS: AP, Partha Paul/Express Photos)

Magnus Carlsen roasts Elon Musk’s Grok 4 as it gets humbled by OpenAI’s o3 in chess tournament

August 11, 2025 00:10 IST

While chess software and engines like AlphaZero and Leela have grown stronger than any chess players alive, LLMs are still just starting on the trajectory of learning the sport.

Chennai Grand Masters: Meet GM Awonder Liang, laidback, witty and ‘not intense’Subscriber Only

August 9, 2025 10:44 IST

He lost a close game to Erigaisi, but is not too fussed and sees the lighter side of it

Former world champion Magnus Carlsen waits for matches to begin in the recent Global Chess League. (PHOTO: GCL)

Global Chess League to be hosted by India this year after two seasons abroad

August 7, 2025 19:41 IST

The first edition of the Global Chess League was hosted in Dubai while last year, the event was in London. GCL frequently sees some of the top stars in the sport like former world champions Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand and Hou Yifan.

World champion Gukesh Dommaraju analyses a game after losing to Jan-Krzysztof Duda at an exhibition match in Katowice, Poland. (Screengrab via YouTube)

Getting checkmated, losing on time: Gukesh’s blitz woes continue as he loses 5-1 to Duda, who helped him become world champion

August 9, 2025 20:01 IST

In the fifth game of the exhibition match against Jan-Krzysztof Duda, world champion Gukesh blundered from an equal position to get checkmated.

World champion Gukesh competes in the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour event in Weissenhaus. (PHOTO: Lennart Ootes via Freestyle Chess)

Susan Polgar on Gukesh’s loss to Jan-Krzysztof Duda: ‘Cannot approach rapid and blitz same way as classical chess’

August 8, 2025 15:36 IST

Polgar also said that because the World Championship format includes rapid and blitz playoff, Gukesh's approach might potentially pose a problem for him when he defends his title.

Indian players representing Velammal MHS School pose at the Closing Ceremony of the 2025 World Schools Team Championship. (PHOTO: FIDE via Michal Walusza)

Another gold for India in chess: Chennai’s Velammal wins 2025 World Schools Team Championship

August 8, 2025 20:01 IST

Some of India's top chess players have studied at Velammal educational institutions. This includes current world champion Gukesh Dommaraju and top players like Praggnanandhaa, Vaishali Rameshbabu and Leon Luke Mendonca.