It doesn’t matter if you follow the riveting world of professional chess or not, you have to admit that there is a lot of brainpower churning away at the board.
Nobody knows this better than Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, who was able to defeat the world champion chess player in only 39 moves.
At 16 years old, Rameshbabu is the youngest player to ever defeat the 31-year-old champion, Magnus Carlsen. It was especially difficult for the young player to topple the champion because he had to stay up all night to play due to a time difference.
The match was part of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour 2022 and young Rameshbabu was still up at 3 AM his time playing the game. He even managed to stay up a little longer to celebrate after the match was over.
How does a 16-year-old chess champion celebrate? His first step was to text message his coach and then he woke up his father to let him know he had won the match.
Carlsen may have lost the match but he still is the International Chess Federation world title champion. That being said, the loss was still a blow. He is already reeling from the aftereffects of COVID-19. He said that his thinking is still somewhat clouded as a result of the illness.
He was able to best the younger player back in January when they first met for a match. Praggnanandhaa was at a disadvantage during that match because he had the second move due to playing with the black pieces.
He started strong but it still took a lot of effort for him to eventually swarm the king and call checkmate.
We are all rejoicing on the success of the young genius R Praggnanandhaa. Proud of his accomplishment of winning against the noted champion Magnus Carlsen. I wish the talented Praggnanandhaa the very best for his future endeavours. @rpragchess
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) February 23, 2022
Messages came in from many people when the morning broke in India and the word spread about the victory. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was one who sent him a congratulatory tweet, saying: “We are all rejoicing on the success of the young genius R Praggnanandhaa. Proud of his accomplishment of winning against the noted champion Magnus Carlsen. I wish the talented Praggnanandhaa the very best for his future endeavors.”