THE WIDE GRIN on his face said it all. It had been several days since Vidit Gujrathi, grandmaster and Indian team captain, and his team of 12 were declared joint winners by the International Chess Federation (FIDE) in the first-ever online chess Olympiad. The victory was yet to sink in fully. “Right now, I am just waiting for the gold medal to arrive,” said Gujrathi, who turns 26 in October.
India’s number three chess player, Gujrathi had aimed to break in to the world top ten this year, before the pandemic struck. He has a popular YouTube chess channel, is a strong advocate of meditation and loves basketball.
On August 30, the Indian team made history when it was awarded the chess Olympiad gold jointly with Russia, overturning the original decision in Russia’s favour. Two junior players, Nihal Sarin and Divya Deshmukh, lost their internet connections during the last match and forfeited on time, prompting Gujrathi to file an appeal immediately. FIDE ruled in India’s favour despite protests from Russia.
The victory was every bit hard-earned and fair. It tops the Indian team’s previous best performances—in 2014, when it won the bronze in the open section, and the women’s team’s best performance of a fourth-place finish in the 2012 edition.
India was seeded seventh with an average rating of 2419 at the recent Olympiad, which had 163 nations participating, and was placed in Pool A alongside formidable teams like China and Georgia. Each team had to include one male and one female player aged 20 years or less. The top three teams from the three pools advanced to the knockouts.
Nashik-born Gujrathi is currently ranked 24 in the FIDE world rankings; the only Indians above him are Viswanathan Anand (15) and Pentala Harikrishna (20). He was a part of the Indian team in 2016 and 2018 as well. The ongoing infighting in the All India Chess Federation (AICF) led to him being made captain after R.B. Ramesh, who served as India’s non-playing captain for a decade, stepped down. “Both Hari and Vidit have the capability to carry the team along,” said Ramesh, who is a member of the selection committee. “They do not inflict any punishment on players who lose a match. Hari, however, was playing in a tournament, so we asked Vidit to lead the team, and he agreed.” Srinath Narayanan, 26, was made vice-captain, as he has worked with the juniors in the Indian team.
The victory is sweeter given that the credit goes solely to the players amid the turmoil in the national chess body. “Our problems were not chess-related but off-the-board problems,” said Gujrathi. “We had three-four days to install extra internet and power backup when we reached the knockouts. When the tournament started, I had one bad internet [connection]. Now I have three stable connections!”
The captain and his deputy approached power secretaries and other top officials of state electricity boards to prevent load shedding during matches of all players. As a result, Koneru Humpy had an engineer and linesman stationed outside her house during matches and Anand’s neighbourhood had no power cuts for a change. The team did not even have a dedicated server due to the lack of federation support, but as they progressed, the duo arranged for one with the help of some Indian fans.
Viswanathan Anand and Vidit Gujrathi
“When R.B. Ramesh asked me to be the captain, I asked him what the job would entail,” said Gujrathi. “He said team selection and strategising, and that sealed the deal for me. I like to strategise. In certain team events, if one player lost, they immediately replaced him. His confidence would be shattered. That is one thing I was very mindful of. I was very clear we would select a team that was good for India, even if it meant dropping myself. As soon as I became captain, I realised I had to be ready to take responsibility for whatever happens. I had to be the problem solver.”
After much bickering between the two AICF factions, the team was carefully selected. “There has been no precedence to this event as we never had this format at the Olympiad before,” said Ramesh. “It was the first time there was a mix of seniors and juniors…. Online, there is likely to be less pressure than while playing over the board. It would have been easy for juniors to get overwhelmed, but all of them came through with flying colours.”
In normal circumstances, the AICF would organise preparatory camps before the Olympiad, but not this time. Giving an insight into the backroom work that had to be done before the tournament, Gujrathi said, “The first thing I had to do was take care of a lot of administrative work, correspond with FIDE and understand the rules. Srinath and I share a good rapport. We made a database about where every member stood. We planned an internal competition and the juniors agreed. This made us understand everybody’s style, strengths and weaknesses. It helped later on in the tournament to take a decision on who was better against China.”
Gujrathi and Narayanan drew the best out of the teenagers. Deshmukh, 14, played a stellar role in the tournament, as did R. Praggnanandhaa, 15, as they starred in crucial wins against a strong China in Pool A. But a loss in an earlier round put Deshmukh under pressure. Gujrathi reassured her. “She lost on time in one of the games,” he said. “It was not her fault but she was very upset. I told her that in the next few games, if she lost it would be my responsibility, and if she won, the credit would go to her. After that she won all the games.” Other senior members like Anand and Humpy, too, had called Deshmukh and encouraged her.
It was not easy leading the team, considering Gujrathi had to prepare for his own matches too. “It used to be crazy,” he said. “Matches would happen between 1:30pm and 4:30pm. As soon as these finished, I would get on call with the team or Srinath to figure out who would play the next matches. The entire night used to be spent over the selection of juniors, and then I prepared for my matches in the mornings. During my games, Srinath took over completely.”
Gujrathi had a fantastic 2019-20 season, hitting a high of 2736 in ELO ratings and even becoming the second-highest ranked Indian for a while. “Before the pandemic, I felt I was at my peak,” he said. “I had a very good tournament in Prague. The pandemic came at the wrong time, in that sense. Game-wise, I am [up] there, but I will use this year for preparation, so that when I am able to travel, I will go all out. I aim to be in the top five.”
With no competitions happening in India right now, Gujrathi spends time growing his streaming channel. He likes to multitask. “I have a lot of ambitious plans,” he said. “One of the things different in this Olympiad was the huge following. Even when I stream every day, I see a lot of people following. I plan to make it bigger and better from my end, maybe with some interesting collaborations.”
Early in his career, Gujrathi was known to be a very emotional player. He has mentally trained himself to be calmer, more focussed. To take his game to the next level, he should have ideally been in Europe now, but due to visa and travel restrictions, he is training remotely with his coaches—grandmasters Vladimir Chuchelov and Alon Greenfeld. His stint with Anish Giri led to a marked improvement in his game, which also reflected in the results last year. “To be the best you have to train like the world’s best,” said Gujrathi. “You need a professional outlook and environment. I feel in India there is a lack of professionalism in sports. When I trained with Anish in the Netherlands, we had complete Olympic-level training—diet, fitness and the best trainers.”
Amid the high of winning the Olympiad and gaining an online following in chess, Ramesh has some cautious words of praise for the Indian captain. “It is heartening to see how he has evolved over the years,” said Ramesh. “He is already working with strong players like Giri, who has been a good influence on him. He is more active on YouTube these days, and it could work both ways for him. I hope he can handle all these things maturely as his chess preparations should not suffer.”