At 12 years, 10 months and 13 days Chennai’s Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu created history as he became the second youngest Grandmaster (GM) in the world. He has a FIDE (World Chess Federation) rating of 2529. He achieved his first GM norm at the FIDE World Junior Chess Championshipin November 2017 where he finished with 8.0 points.
He bagged his second norm at the Heraklion Fischer Memorial GM Norm tournament in Greece in April 2018.On 23 June 2018 he achieved his third and final GM norm at the Gredine Open in Urtijei, Italy by defeating GM Luca Moroni in the eighth round to become the second youngest person ever to achieve the status of GM. Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine had achieved the GM title at the age of 12 years and 7 months.
Praggnanandhaa’s extraordinary feat was possible because of his dedication and hard work of many years. Equally paramount were the role of his parents and coach who initiated him into the sport and them hand-held him thus far. His sister, Vaishali too is a professional chess player like him and has won her second WGM (Woman Grandmaster) norm.
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