2026 chess season tracker

[Gollum]

 

[MechEng]

11 hours ago, Gollum said:

 

 

This pic reminds me of typical South Indian families where everyone would go to bed at 8:30 pm sharp and wake up at 5:00 am, practice chess or study, and follow a strict timetable.

[Mariyam]

Many congrats to Vaishali!

 

It would have been so nice if Pragg won the candidates! Now that he hasn't, he can become Vaishali's second.

 

 

[Gollum]

1 hour ago, Mariyam said:

Many congrats to Vaishali!

 

It would have been so nice if Pragg won the candidates! Now that he hasn't, he can become Vaishali's second.

 

 

Brother and sister as world champs at some point will be epic. Can see that happening in the future, both are still very young.

 

Pragg had a shocker of a tournament but he will be back I am sure. Age is on his side, just 20, and he is also a high ceiling guy. 

[Gollum]

Nihal has been in very good form lately, hope he keeps growing. Lovely guy, always have a soft corner for him because of how long I have been following him, was as good as Pragg in junior days, then stagnated for a long time while his peers made it to elite ranks, now he is gaining ground. 

 

Uzbeks have better (more in-form) players in their top 2 boards but we will have better 3rd/4th boards. Olympiad will be interesting. 2026 chess is mostly about Indians vs Uzbeks, Samarkand Olympiad and then WCC.  

 

Board order will be interesting, but surely Gukesh, Pragg, Arjun, Nihal for us. Reserve board will be interesting, Vidit's game has fallen off a cliff, Hari is barely active. Aravindh or Pranav will be my choice. Pranav is a wildcard pick but I think he will make a big move soon, Carlsen has a lot of praise for him. Aravindh is a confidence based player as per his coach (GM Ramesh), he can play as a 2750 guy or 2600 level, no in-between for him. 

Edited April 16 by Gollum

[randomGuy]

2 minutes ago, Gollum said:

Nihal has been in very good form lately, hope he keeps growing. Lovely guy. 

 

Uzbeks have better (more in-form) players in their top 2 boards but we will have better 3rd/4th boards. Olympiad will be interesting. 

 

Board order will be interesting, but surely Gukesh, Pragg, Arjun, Nihal for us. Reserve board will be interesting, Vidit's game has fallen off a cliff, Hari is barely active. Aravindh or Pranav will be my choice. Pranav is a wildcard pick but I think he will make a big move soon, Carlsen has a lot of praise for him. Aravindh is a confidence based player as per his coach (GM Ramesh), he can play as a 2750 guy or 2600 level, no in-between for him. 

Vidits peak rating is 2747, not like 2780-90. Average has been 2720, not too different from current rating. But yes, not in India top 4 right now.

 

More concern should be for gukesh, pragg and arjun. The first 2 have fallen from cliff i would say.

 

 

[Gollum]

3 hours ago, randomGuy said:

Vidits peak rating is 2747, not like 2780-90. Average has been 2720, not too different from current rating. But yes, not in India top 4 right now.

 

More concern should be for gukesh, pragg and arjun. The first 2 have fallen from cliff i would say.

 

 

I think they need a break. Playing non-stop, especially overload of freestyle, rapid/blitz, online in last one year, seems to have taken a toll on them. Let us hope they peak once again at the right time, before the Olympiad. 

 

Nihal has made gains since he cut down on online speed chess. 

[vvvslaxman]

GOod that Dhawan has noticed it.

 

 

[rangeelaraja]

Dravidian Brahminical DNA, forged on curd rice, lemon rice, rasam, sambar, and poriyal - is the epitome of intellectual superiority.

 

Proven time and again by our South Indian tech titans who dominate Silicon Valley, by the legendary exploits of Vishy, and by the countless intellectual giants South India has produced across generations.

 

The Turkic primates lot from Central Asia  Uzbeks, Kyrgyz, Kazakhs and their ilk, brought nothing but barbarism inherited from Gengis Khan's genetic influence are intellectually way inferior.  Their intellect has not evolved since the 14th century.

 

Based on these empirical datapoints Gukesh should crush Sindarov.

[randomGuy]

38 minutes ago, rangeelaraja said:

Dravidian Brahminical DNA, forged on curd rice, lemon rice, rasam, sambar, and poriyal - is the epitome of intellectual superiority.

 

Proven time and again by our South Indian tech titans who dominate Silicon Valley, by the legendary exploits of Vishy, and by the countless intellectual giants South India has produced across generations.

 

The Turkic primates lot from Central Asia  Uzbeks, Kyrgyz, Kazakhs and their ilk, brought nothing but barbarism inherited from Gengis Khan's genetic influence are intellectually way inferior.  Their intellect has not evolved since the 14th century.

 

Based on these empirical datapoints Gukesh should crush Sindarov.

 btw sindarov is big favorite on form and Gukesh may want to forfeit the match if reads this post.

[rangeelaraja]

19 minutes ago, randomGuy said:

 btw sindarov is big favorite on form and Gukesh may want to forfeit the match if reads this post.

 

Am glad you finally saw the deliberately racist sarcasm in my post. 

 

But more seriously - I hate the central asians. They are genuinely racist. 

 

Do you remember that other Uzbek....Nordirbek Yakkub or something ...who did not shake hands with Vaishali because "religious" reasons, while his own compatriot Sindarov from openly cuddles and hugs that Kazakh girl ( bibisira or whatever her name )....no Islamic values now ?

 

I was rooting for Fabi - easily the most likable legends of the game. If not Fabi, Anish.

 

Hope Gukesh crushes this Uzbek guy. 

 

Don't forget Gukesh on form - just destroyed everything in his way in the Olympiad on Board 1.  And won the candidates that also had 2 time contender - Nepo, along with an Fabi and Nakmura.

 

 

 

[randomGuy]

42 minutes ago, rangeelaraja said:

 

Am glad you finally saw the deliberately racist sarcasm in my post. 

 

But more seriously - I hate the central asians. They are genuinely racist. 

 

Do you remember that other Uzbek....Nordirbek Yakkub or something ...who did not shake hands with Vaishali because "religious" reasons, while his own compatriot Sindarov from openly cuddles and hugs that Kazakh girl ( bibisira or whatever her name )....no Islamic values now ?

 

I was rooting for Fabi - easily the most likable legends of the game. If not Fabi, Anish.

 

Hope Gukesh crushes this Uzbek guy. 

 

Don't forget Gukesh on form - just destroyed everything in his way in the Olympiad on Board 1.  And won the candidates that also had 2 time contender - Nepo, along with an Fabi and Nakmura.

 

 

 

Enjoy reading your posts bro. Always factual or not,who cares , maybe they aren't meant to be  but they spice up things.

Edited April 18 by randomGuy

[rangeelaraja]

Magnooos has done his job. Delivered a nice panauti to Sindarov. 

 

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/VERbRtWZ130

 

[vvvslaxman]

https://www.newyorker.com/sports/sporting-scene/after-magnus-carlsen-chess-has-entered-a-new-age?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=dhfacebook&utm_content=null

 

After Magnus Carlsen, Chess Has Entered a New Age
A new book by Jordan Himelfarb follows the game’s rising young players, including the reigning world champion Gukesh Dommaraju, as they compete in an era defined by computers.

 

 

When Gukesh Dommaraju was a small child growing up in Chennai, India, his parents wanted him to be an athlete. Tennis, they thought. But Gukesh was drawn to another tactical game: chess. He was one of millions of Indian children who grew up under the influence of Viswanathan Anand, whose five world-championship titles led to an explosion of interest across the country. When Gukesh was seven, he watched Magnus Carlsen, then twenty-two years old, defeat his hero, Anand, to become the new world champion. Gukesh dreamed of being the one to bring the title back to India. In the fourth grade, he won the under-nine Asia championships, which convinced his parents of his potential, and they made the sort of sacrifices that families of aspiring champions in any sport often make—especially in chess, a game in which early specialization can bring outsized rewards.

 

Gukesh’s training was unusual in certain respects. For one thing, his coach, the grand master Vishnu Prasanna, eschewed computer chess engines for young players. Almost alone among the new generation of top players, Gukesh did not start working with computers until after he became a grand master—at twelve years, seven months, and seven days, the second-youngest ever to achieve that rank.

 

It has been a long time since any human has stood a chance against a computer in chess. What that means, exactly, remains an ongoing debate. There are those who once thought that the superiority of machines would cause a crisis for chess—and for humanity. But the game has not only survived the rise of computers, its popularity has soared because of them. The internet has made the game more accessible than ever, and has created new opportunities for training at every level.

 

The effect of computers on the top ranks of the game has been different but no less profound. Grand masters typically spend countless hours studying and memorizing long sequences of moves suggested by computer programs. These days, when a player makes a novel move, it is usually studied and tested on computers ahead of time, and is often intended to force his competitor out of his own computer-aided preparation “and lure them, alone, into the deep, dark, forest,” as Jordan Himelfarb writes in his new book, “Interregnum: Inside the Grueling and Glamorous Battle to Become the Next King of Chess.”

 

Prasanna, Gukesh’s coach, wasn’t a Luddite. He simply believed that young chess players benefitted from the discipline of a more analog approach, and he wanted Gukesh to build his understanding of the game piece by piece, instead of working backward from the insights of a machine. And it seemed to work: Gukesh was rarely unnerved by a difficult position. Playing a flexible, countering style, he made steady progress, becoming the youngest player ever to surpass a rating of 2750, breaking a record previously held by Carlsen, arguably the greatest player in history. Gukesh’s calm at the board was buttressed by an unusual focus in his training, on psychology, alongside the more traditional tactical and strategic instruction. He shunned publicity, which he found draining, worked extensively with a mental coach, and meditated before his first moves. From a young age, he seemed to grasp that the deep, dark forest could be scary, particularly if you are carrying the weight of expectations from one’s family, one’s peers, and even one’s country.

 

Gukesh is a central figure in “Interregnum,” which follows several of the world’s top chess players from tournament to tournament during the course of 2024, as they vie to become the challenger to the defending world champion, then a thirty-two-year-old from China named Ding Liren. (The world championship is generally contested every two years.) Chess can seem abstruse and forbidding to the uninitiated, but Himelfarb’s account of it is as readable and comprehensible as any more familiar sports story—or, for that matter, any narrative in which a bunch of ambitious people pursue a single goal.

 

What stands out, in fact, is not Himelfarb’s illumination of the mechanics of chess but his insights regarding the psychologies of people. The ones he follows closely are so stamped by their differences that they become almost a full array of archetypes. (Almost—there are, notably, no women among the contenders.) There is the lamb-like dreamer, Wesley So, and the trollish Hikaru Nakamura, who believes that his unprecedented success as a streamer has secured him a greater legacy than any prestigious chess title would. Carlsen, whose continued presence in the chess world shadows the hunt for a new king, is aggressive in asserting his opinions. (In 2022, Carlsen announced that he would no longer contend for the world championship, but he participates in other tournaments, usually with faster time controls, and often wins.) The true feelings of Anish Giri, in contrast, are “obscured by a fog of irony.” Fabiano Caruana, a precise, brilliant American forever on the precipice of a world title, is described as a kind of “scientist,” while Ding, who plummeted into a depression after winning the world championship in 2023, has a sensitive, poetic soul.

 

Gukesh has a maturity that seems connected to his openness to instinctual play, and to his awareness of the depth and power of human feeling. He is also, in the end, the victor. The world championship between Ding and the young Indian comes down to a thrilling final game, when both players manage to find not only inner resources but also inspiration from each other. Eventually, Ding moves his bishop to a square where it can be trapped, and the game is over; Gukesh is the youngest outright world champion in history, the game’s new king.

 

Or is he? Although he had one brilliant win over Carlsen last year, at the Norway Chess tournament—one of Carlsen’s rare appearances in a classical chess tournament—Gukesh has otherwise played so badly in the aftermath of winning the title that he tumbled out of the world’s top ten. Meanwhile, a new enfant terrible has risen: Javokhir Sindarov, age twenty, who rampaged through the Candidates Tournament earlier this month with a record score, and will challenge Gukesh for the world title later this year.

 

There is something comforting, to me, about this churn of champions and challengers. Lately, it has been hard not to feel a little cynical, or even nihilistic, about the prospects of human beings in the age of A.I. Why play chess, if a computer always wins? Why write this column, if a large language model can do it? But stories like the one that Himelfarb tells are reminders that the thing we really care about is not the end result—a simple set of plays or sequence of words—but what happens in the hearts and minds of the people involved in them. The beauty of chess goes beyond logic; it includes desires, ideas, and feelings. That is the game’s difficulty, too.

ity of machines would cause a crisis for chess—and for humanity. But the game has not only survived the rise of computers, its popularity has soared because of them. The internet has made the game more accessible than ever, and has created new opportunities for training at every level.

 

 

 

 

Edited April 27 by vvvslaxman

[Gollum]

Arjun can win a classical tournament ahead of Carlsen, albeit a very short tournament. Just 1 more round. 

Edited May 7 by Gollum

[Gollum]

 

[bsriharsha]

5 hours ago, Gollum said:

 

Just got back to playing chess. Mainly to teach my son. I was a university level player then. Not sure how I'd rate now considering chess has become so much more accessible with various online engines etc. 

 

And have been increasingly seeing more videos on gukesh , magnus etc. 

 

I think magnus has more propensity to tunnel vision. His set up is excellent but he's liable to walk into some traps as well. His tunnel vision comes from his propensity to eschew the longer format and instead focus on speed chess. 

 

Gukesh has more of an analytical mindset and is more accustomed to the traditional form. 

 

Just seems to be my opinion. Magnus is still the world's best but his impatience leads him to make mistakes at times 

 

 

[New guy]

On 5/7/2026 at 5:42 PM, bsriharsha said:

Just got back to playing chess. Mainly to teach my son. I was a university level player then. Not sure how I'd rate now considering chess has become so much more accessible with various online engines etc. 

 

And have been increasingly seeing more videos on gukesh , magnus etc. 

 

I think magnus has more propensity to tunnel vision. His set up is excellent but he's liable to walk into some traps as well. His tunnel vision comes from his propensity to eschew the longer format and instead focus on speed chess. 

 

Gukesh has more of an analytical mindset and is more accustomed to the traditional form. 

 

Just seems to be my opinion. Magnus is still the world's best but his impatience leads him to make mistakes at times 

 

 

Just create an account on chess.com.or lichess. You will know where you stand in terms of rating 

[bsriharsha]

1 hour ago, New guy said:

Just create an account on chess.com.or lichess. You will know where you stand in terms of rating 

Will have to do that at some point. 

[Mariyam]

@Gollum

 

My daughter recently came second (girls) and 8th (open) in an U-13 Mumbai Schools Chess Tournament.

Provisionally rated 1750.

Format 15 mins , no increment.

 

While she has the knack for it, there is no consistency. She is super eager to learn on some days and then for the next few months she would much rather try out some other hobby. 

Edited May 9 by Mariyam