The chairman of Mahindra Group, Anand Mahindra, took to social media and hailed Indian teen chess sensation R Praggnanandhaa following his stunning victory over world number one Magnus Carlsen and world number two Fabio Caruana at the ongoing Norway Chess competition. Pragananadhaa continued with his dominating ways in the ongoing Norway Chess competition as he defeated the world number two player Fabiano Caruana in round five in a classical chess game on Saturday night.
“Pragg. Now, it was the world #2 in the bag.” Anand Mahindra wrote on X. With this victory, he defeated both world number one Magnus Carlsen of Norway and world number two Caruana in classic chess for the first time ever. His heroics in the ongoing competition have also brought him into the top ten of the Inter-National Chess Federation (FIDE) World Rankings.
The 18-year-old had defeated Carlsen in round three. Using white pieces, the runners-up from last year’s FIDE Chess World Cup battled it out with some intelligent moves against Carlsen for a win. Earlier in his budding career, Pragananadhaa had notched some wins over Carlsen in rapid and blitz chess games.
Just a day after registering his first classical win over the five-time World Champion Magnus Carlsen, India’s star prodigy Praggnanandhaa R went down against America’s Hikaru Nakamura in Round 4 of the Norway Chess 2024 at the SpareBank 1 SR-Bank on Thursday.
Nakamura displayed tremendous preparation against Praggnanandhaa, who sacrificed a knight in a desperate bid to save the game. Nakamura, having anticipated this very sacrifice, played flawlessly, and secured a convincing victory to climb to the top spot of the overall standings. Pragg’s sister, Vaishali, on the other hand, continued her dominant performance by defeating the legendary Pia Cramling, extending her lead to a total of 8.5 points.
Indian Women’s Chess Grandmaster Humpy suffered a loss in the classical game against Anna Muzychuk in round 4. In another exciting game of the Norway Chess Women’s Tournament, Ju Wenjun triumphed over her compatriot Lie Tengjie in the fourth Armageddon tiebreak of the tournament. The local
Hero Carlsen registered a narrow victory over Fabiano Caruana in the Norway Chess main event to bag three points. Caruana had a golden opportunity to close the rating gap with Carlsen to just four points, but the game, initially calm, took a dramatic turn in the endgame. Carlsen capitalized on a small advantage, almost clinching the win when Caruana blundered with only seconds left on his clock.