It’s now well-known that formally Gukesh Dommaraju of India is the 18th and youngest chess World Champion within the historical past of the game that dates again to earlier than 1900. However since his official coronation, there have been a number of messages on social media stating that there’s a small disclaimer to be added to this report. That asterisk comes within the title of Ukrainian Grandmaster Ruslan Ponomariov.
Chess journalist and photographer David Llada posted on Friday: Let’s not neglect that Ponomariov was 18 years, 3 months and 12 days previous when he turned World Champion. It’s not his fault that the chess world was such a multitude on the time.” Peter Heine Nielsen, coach for each Vishy Anand and Magnus Carlsen posted an image on X that had a truck with a textual content “Asterisk supply” together with the caption: “The FIDE van arrived at Ponomariov´s home as we speak.”
In accordance with Chess.com, the appropriate approach to describe Gukesh’s achievement could be: “youngest universally acknowledged champion within the historical past of chess. Ponomariov gained a separate FIDE world title in a knockout event in 2002 at a barely youthful age, however not by beating the reigning champion in a match.”
Let’s not neglect that @Ponomariov was 18 years, 3 months and 12 days previous when he turned World Champion. It’s not his fault that the chess world was such a multitude on the time. pic.twitter.com/C1gYRrGNAh
— David Llada ♞ (@davidllada) December 13, 2024
Ponomariov was a prodigy, and in 1997 he turned the youngest to earn the Grandmaster title in historical past when he was 14 years, and 17 days previous. The report was subsequently damaged in 1999 by Bu Xiangzhi (13 years, 10 months, 13 days) after which got here alongside Sergey Karjakin who achieved his GM title at 12 years, 7 months, and held the report for almost 20 years. In 2002, Ponomariov certainly turned the FIDE World Champion however at the moment, the chess world was divided. He achieved the title by way of a 128-player knockout event, through which the “classical” world champion at the moment (Vladimir Kramnik) didn’t play.
Since a breakaway from 1993 involving the reigning world champion Garry Kasparov, there have been two world champions until 2006: one thought of the “classical” world champion and the opposite, FIDE World Champion. Certainly, the primary of Anand’s 5 world titles got here in 2000 within the latter class.
So within the chronology that makes Gukesh the 18th world champion, the likes of Ponomariov together with Alexander Khalifman, Rustam Kasimdzhanov, and Veselin Topalov are usually not thought of as a result of they gained the FIDE World Champion titles throughout that interval. So formally, Gukesh is certainly the youngest undisputed world champion.
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