Tag: R Praggnanandhaa

As I type these words, the chess career of Rameshbabu “Pragg” Praggnanandhaa resembles the culmination of the first act of a biopic about a child prodigy destined for greatness and his place amongst the geniuses of history.

Highlights of this time are known to all those who have not been living under a rock the past decade and especially the past few days. From learning the game at 3, becoming the youngest International Master of all time (since beaten), becoming the second-youngest grandmaster of all time (since broken), the youngest-ever to cross the 2600 FIDE rating-barrier and many, many other achievements, rival the legendary feats of legends and biopic icons like Tendulkar, Federer, and the “Mozart of Chess”, best player of all time by universal opinion, Magnus Carlsen himself.

Framed within this narrative, the FIDE World Cup 2023 held in Baku, Azerbaijan, became the battleground of two mutually opposing biopics-in-the-making over the course of a month of enthralling, exciting, almost-scripted chess. One of them was the greatest player of all time, Carlsen, chasing the only trophy still missing from his GOAT cabinet comprising five Classical, four Rapid and six Blitz World-Championships. Pragg, the David to this Goliath, meanwhile, entered the tournament having never lost to Carlsen in the Classical time-format and beaten him in a series of history-making Rapid and Blitz encounters over the past year, becoming the youngest player ever to beat Carlsen in the process. However, that didn’t mean his journey was devoid of the minor conflicts fuelling the narrative.

For instance, Pragg, trailblazer of the path his fellow child prodigies grandmasters Nihal Sarin, Arjun Erigaisi, and D. Gukesh have followed, had lagged slightly behind in FIDE ratings which determine global chess rankings compared to his peers. Pragg entered the tournament at 2690 rating points, perilously close to breaking the 2700 barrier – the equivalent of a double-century to a century in Grandmaster Chess – which awards the player the unofficial moniker of a Super-GM.

Both Gukesh and Erigaisi have already breached this barrier and made their ways into the World’s Top-20 players, while Gukesh, the youngest of the prodigies, has already stormed into the top-10, becoming the first Indian to surpass Viswanathan Anand in close to four-decades. To top it all, all four prodigies are classmates at the WestBridge-Anand Chess Academy, set up on the example of the Soviet Chess Schools of legend for nurturing chess talent.

On the cusp of turning into an adult, Pragg entered the tournament with the scene set for a great coming-of-age climax, seeded 31st. The rest, as they say, proceeded in Baku as if it were written. A bye in the first round and victories over grandmasters Maxime Lagarde and David Navarra in the round of 16 went unremarkably well, like matches shown briefly with the results, 1.5-0.5 in Pragg’s favour, written over a scene. The highlight came on Pragg’s 18th birthday, his initiation as an adult voting-citizen of India. It was akin to a chess equivalent of an initiation ritual, reminiscent of King Leonidas’ slaying of the wolf in Zack Snyder’s 300 or Hercules’ slaying of the Nemean Lion in Greek mythology.

Pragg faced grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura, ranked second in the world and in the best form of his life over the past year since 2022, on his 18th birthday, securing a draw in a Classical game, forcing tie-breaks the following day in Rapid and Blitz. The following day, he stunningly beat Nakamura – called the “Speed-Demon” of Chess for his mastery in faster time-controls – in two consecutive games, knocking him out of the tournament. Magnus Carlsen, playing his own game after having narrowly escaped elimination by a child prodigy himself in an earlier round, got up from his ongoing game to congratulate Pragg upon the result – a gesture almost unheard-of in tournament chess. 

Asked in an interview what he told the Indian, Carlsen repeated the mantra Pragg’s coach grandmaster R.B. Ramesh has been telling anyone who will listen at Carlsen’s Norwegian camp for chess’s wunderkinds: “I told him today we all want to “be like Pragg”. A smooth victory over grandmaster Ferenc Berkes followed in the fifth round before the drama shifted to internal conflicts: in the quarter-finals, Pragg was to play “best-friend”, classmate, and compatriot grandmaster Arjun Erigaisi. The winner would effectively seal his spot in the Candidates Tournament to decide a challenger for the World Chess Championship.

Before the match both players confessed to spending their time between matches hanging out with each other, discussing chess, and playing TT. They professed to doing the same on the rest day before their match as well, discussing everything except chess, but when the pieces aligned and the clock struck, all bets were off. 

Arjun got the lead in the first Classical match, forcing Pragg to win on demand in the second Classical game the following day. He did, forcing tie-breaks which was some of the most up-and-down emotionally nerve-wracking chess-watching experience ever produced at the World Cup. It took nine games across 25 minutes, 10 minutes, and finally 5 minutes per side where both friends traded blow-for-blow, both beating each other on demand to keep the match going until Pragg scored the final victory, finishing half-a-point ahead, through to the semis. 

Four Indians entered the last eight of the tournament – the best by far India has ever done, the dawn of a new “era of youngsters” in Ramesh’s words. When the semis began, Pragg was the lone survivor, the only Indian since Anand to make it this far. His opponent, ranked third in the world, grandmaster Fabiano Caruana – a former World-Championship challenger to Magnus himself. The match proceeded as their ratings would suggest, with Fabiano bearing down on Pragg, pushing his position to the brink of defeat in both Classical games. 

However, Pragg showed extraordinary resilience and nerve to keep finding defensive resources in a worse position, suffering for hours on both days in order to deny Caruana the win. Legends marveled at the teenager’s resiliency, and the ongoing come-of-age of a boy-wonder they were all witnessing on the board. The same pattern largely followed in shorter time-controls in tie-breaks, with Caruana pressing and Pragg forced to defend, which he did remarkably creatively and doggedly. The narrative flipped for just one game where Pragg managed to get an advantage with White, and he went on to convert his advantage the only time he got it in the match, knocking out another giant of the game. 

He became the youngest player to ever make it to the finals of the World Cup in the process. He also qualified for the Candidates Tournament – the only one since Anand, and the third-youngest ever behind two of the games’ greatest: Bobby Fischer and Carlsen himself, Pragg’s opponent in the final. He’d also crossed the 2700 rating barrier by some distance, on the cusp of World top-20, the lowest-seed ever to make it to the final at the World Cup. Everything was set for the ultimate David versus Goliath story.

Everything except Carlsen’s own story in the World Cup. The Norwegian, who is synonymous in chess with the GOAT in a sport where other players are called demons and monsters, had already knocked out Gukesh on his way to the final, determined to win it as the missing feather in his bejeweled cap. Unfortunately, Carlsen’s will, as it often does, dictated the result. Despite Carlsen battling a stomach bug and Pragg drawing both Classical games to remain unbeaten against Carlsen in this format, Carlsen broke through with a win in the first game of the tiebreak, drawing the second game to finish half-a-point ahead as the winner of the 2023 World Cup.

Despite the end-result, this performance in the first-arc has determined the trajectory a nation of experts and fans alike expects from the rest of the story. For the first time since Anand, an Indian is in the candidates, only 18 years old, and material for a montage of a nation proud and legends fawning can be found on virtually any news platform. Narendra Modi to Sachin Tendulkar to Anand Mahindra – adulation has poured in from all directions. “If Pragg wins around the time Chandrayaan lands, it’ll be too much,” Vishwanathan Anand told NDTV, evoking a nostalgia of the space-race and the rise of Bobby Fischer during the same time.

The expectational narratives for Pragg are nested in the explosive narrative of the growth of chess and its budding “golden generation” in India, well on its way to be the next dominant chess-power in the world, gifted with the best Junior (under 20 years) players in the world being mentored by former world champions like Vladimir Kramnik, Boris Gelfand, Magnus Carlsen and Anand himself, besides their personal coaches like Ramesh who are amongst the best in the world as training staff. Performances like Pragg’s and Gukesh’s have inspired thousands, especially children, and brought eye-balls to chess on a whole new level, leading to sponsorships and increased access for more to play the sport. 

It’s safe to say that the atmosphere is set for the second-act’s commencement. For his part, Pragg is already off to play in his next tournament. A milestone has been set at the Candidates Tournament, and Pragg admits of his ambition to be world champion as his long-term goal in chess. This tournament requires training in a way no other tournament does in chess, and Pragg has booked his seat quite in advance. Cue the training montage – all of India better watch out for this sporting story!

Binit Priyaranjan has a masters in philosophy from St. Stephens College, Delhi.