Chess star R Vaishali turned grandmaster after crossing 2500 ELO score factors on Friday, December 1. Vaishali, who occurs to be grandmaster Praggnanandhaa’s elder sister, achieved the feat on the IV El Llobregat Open in Spain the place she defeated Turkey’s FM Tamer Tarik Selbes in the second spherical. Vaishali and Praggnanandhaa have now become the first brother-sister duo to realize the GM standing.
The 22-year-old Vaishali had obtained her third GM norm in October on the Qatar Masters event and wanted to extend her ELO score. Vaishali turned the 84th Indian to realize the chess grandmaster title and solely the third girl after Koneru Humpy and D Harika.
Vaishali and Praggnanandhaa will even become the first brother-sister duo to compete on the Candidates event in 2024. Praggnanandhaa had attained the Grandmaster standing in 2018 when he was simply 12. Humy had carried out it at 15 in 2002 and was the world’s youngest girl to become GM.
“I am very happy to finally completed the title. It’s just two rounds. I am also focusing on the tournament. But I am really happy with the GM title,” Vaishali instructed chess.com
“I’ve finally achieved a goal of mine since I started playing chess. I was so close to it so, I was really excited but there was some pressure as well. My game was not so good in the middle but somehow, I managed to win,” she added.
Indian chess legend Viswanathan Anand took to X (previously Twitter) to congratulate Vaishali on changing into a GM. Anand talked about that Vaishali put in plenty of effort in the previous couple of months and this title is a results of that, which retains her in good stead forward of the Candidates event.
“Congratulations to @chessvaishali for becoming a GM. She worked very hard the last few months and this augurs well as she gets ready for the candidates. Her parents and just maybe the competition at home should be congratulated. @Rameshchess & Aarthie for being her rock,” he wrote.
