Indian-origin American Abhimanyu Mishra became the world’s youngest chess grandmaster in history today. He defeated the 15-year-old Indian GM Leon Luke Mendonca with the black pieces, securing a performance rating higher than 2600 over nine rounds.
The 12 years, 4 months, and 25 days old Abhimanyu from New Jersey scored his third GM norm in Budapest and crossed the required 2500 Elo rating barrier. Abhimanyu broke GM Sergey Karjakin‘s record that has stood for 19 years. In 2002, Karajakin won the Grandmaster title at the age of 12 years and seven months. He also claimed the world championship challenger in 2016.
Sergey Karjakin on Abhimanyu breaking his record:
“Somehow I am quite philosophic about this because I felt like it has been almost 20 years and it is really too much! It had to be broken. Sooner or later I was sure that it will happen. (https://hopeclinical.com/) I was completely sure that one of the Indian guys would do it much earlier. Somehow I was very lucky that it didn’t happen.” he told Chess.com
“Yes, I am a little sad that I lost the record, I don’t want to lie, but at the same time I can only congratulate him and it’s no problem. I hope that he will go on to become one of the top chess players and it will be just a nice start to his big career. I wish him all the best.” Karjakin added.
Abhimanyu has been in Budapest since April, chasing the record. He had attained the first and second GM norms in April and May. Mishra scored both his first and second GM norms in Budapest too, at the April Vezerkepzo tournament and the May 2021 First Saturday tournament. But he had to wait till mid-July for the third GM norm due to fewer tournaments on the horizon. And in his final attempt this month, he succeeded and created a record.
Mishra’s coach, GM Arun Prasad on Abhimanyu’s achievement to chess.com
“My congratulations to Abhi for this great achievement. He fully deserves this success, as I have seen all of his hard work firsthand. His father also deserves applause for all of the sacrifices he has made for Abhi to reach this milestone. Personally, this is a big moment to see my student become a GM!”
The youngest chess GMs in history
| Sr. No | Player Name | Country | Age |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Abhimanyu Mishra | USA | 12 years, 4 months, 25 days |
| 2 | Sergey Karjakin | Ukraine* | 12 years, 7 months, 0 days |
| 3 | Gukesh Dommaraju | India | 12 years, 7 months, 17 days |
| 4 | Javokhir Sindarov | Uzbekistan | 12 years, 10 months, 5 days |
| 5 | Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu | India | 12 years, 10 months, 13 days |
| 6 | Nodirbek Abdusattorov | Uzbekistan | 13 years, 1 month, 11 days |
| 7 | Parimarjan Negi | India | 13 years, 4 months, 22 days |
| 8 | Magnus Carlsen | Norway | 13 years, 4 months, 27 days |
| 9 | Wei Yi | China | 13 years, 8 months, 23 days |
| 10 | Raunak Sadhwani | India | 13 years, 9 months, 28 days |