News

New Chess960 World Champion!!!

Before we get into the brief recap of the Fischer Random Championships, there is dire news for the chess world. Anatoly Karpov, an icon of the game, is reported as being hospitalized in serious condition after being found unresponsive. I ask that anyone reading this blog keeps him in their thoughts.

For those who are unfamiliar, Chess960, formally known as Fischer Random Chess, is a variant of chess where the pieces on the back rank are scrambled up. This gives you a potential 960 positions to open up the game (including the standard starting position). Since 2019, the world champion of this format has been the world class Grandmaster Wesley So, who has reigned since 2019 due to Covid. But after 8 GM’s qualified to play in the 2022 Fischer Random Championship, one has emerged as the clear winner: streaming legend and chess mogul Hikaru Nakamura!

Here is the starting position from the game that won Hikaru the title:

Both players begun this game by opening both corner bishops, and the center became tense quickly as both players also pushed their E and F pawns forward. Development ensued in a dynamic fashion, and actually led to a disadvantage for Hikaru out of the opening where he needed a win to seal the title. Queens were actually traded, seemingly spelling doom for Hikaru, but he grinded Nepo into an endgame where his pieces were much better coordinated. Hikaru went on to make a mating net, and won!

Hikaru has had nothing short of a riveting chess career. He revolutionized content creation for chess with his various videos and streams about chess, and is now the number one chess streamer by far, and one of the top chess Youtubers as well. But it’s clear it’s had no true effect on his competitive play, as he tied with Grandmaster Teimour Radjabov for third place in the coveted Candidates tournament of 2022, and of course, took the trophy for 960 World Champion just yesterday.

Many, including myself, were hoping to see the matchup between World Champion Magnus Carlsen and GM Nakamura, the “El Clasico” of chess if you will. But in astonishing fashion, Magnus was defeated in his semi-final match against the man who he defeated last year to retain his title: Ian Nepomniachtchi. It was a close match between he and Hikaru, but in the tiebreaking Armaggedon matchup, Hikaru clutched out a win.

This adds to his towering stack of accomplishments since becoming the king of chess streaming. This includes the aforementioned performance in the Candidates tournament, as well as last year winning the St. Louis Rapid & Blitz in undefeated(!!!) fashion. It’s almost scary how one can balance two cumbersome careers at the same time, demonstrating such finesse in both.

In other news, chess.com today announced the 2022 US Collegiate Rapid & Blitz Championships. The rapid championship will be held on the 13th of November, and the blitz on the 20th. This is sure to present a great opportunity to fresh faces of the chess world, hungry and ready to establish themselves. Last year, the Peruvian Grandmaster Jose Martinez was crowned the rapid champion, and Grigoriy Oparin the blitz champion.

I always love to see these kinds of events in the horizon, especially when sponsored by a chess monolith like chess.com. Seeing the younger generation scrappy and ready to fight is quite inspiring to the chess world, and I am no exception. It pumps me up like nothing else to see a relatively young guy like Oparin rise through the ranks and become a quickly growing chess superstar.