Dommaraju Gukesh shared how his life has completely changed since becoming the youngest chess World Champion at 18.
Gukesh Reflects on Life After Becoming World Champion
For the unversed, Gukesh beat Chinese player Ding Liren in a challenging match that lasted three weeks, testing both players mentally and physically. He also became younger than Garry Kasparov to achieve this title.
“In certain ways, yes. Like, there’s obviously more attention back home,” he told Take Take Take.
“Obviously, there is less privacy at home. I mean, in a sense that like when I go out on streets, it’s not the same as before.”
“But in the way that I see myself or I see where my career is, nothing has changed. Still want to improve and do a lot of more things.”
Gukesh is India’s youngest grandmaster, missing the title of the world’s youngest by just 17 days. He is also the youngest-ever winner of the Candidates tournament, which earned him a chance to compete for the World Championship. Additionally, he became the first Indian chess player to end Viswanathan Anand’s 36-year reign as the top-ranked Indian player.
Gukesh’s Reaction to Winning the World Championship
Reacting to the win, the world champion said: “Yeah, it was certainly a cool moment.”
“I mean, it was like my childhood dream had come true. And yeah, for a few days I was quite excited, quite happy. And then it settled down, I moved on to the next tournaments and started preparing.”
“So, yeah, I mean, it’s obviously nice that everything went like a dream. And yeah, now on to the next thing.”
The current world champion Gukesh is currently participating in the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour in Weissenhaus, Germany.
Furthermore, during the interview, Gukesh also explained how he wants to improve his game in the future. He said:
“I see myself more as just an enthusiastic player trying to improve rather than as a world champion who wants to play or not,”
“So, playing or not is not a question. I surely want to play. And I just want to achieve a lot more things.”
“I think this world championship was one thing, one nice thing, but just a part of the journey.”
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