These past few days R. Vaishali has been making news. For someone who has been overshadowed by her prodigious younger brother for most of her career, that must have been a different experience.
The Chennai girl is putting up a fine show at the FIDE Chess.com Women’s Speed Chess. Vaishali said she had prepared well for the tournament. She, of course, has an excellent sparring partner at home, R. Praggnanandhaa. “He has been of great help,” she said.
In the first of the four Grand Prix legs, she finished fourth on Sunday.
Commendable effort
It was a commendable effort from Vaishali, who made the final draw of the online event after going through the gruelling qualifiers. The 19-year-old stunned former World champion Antoaneta Stefanova of Bulgaria in the first round and made short work of Munkhzul Turmunkh of Mongolia to reach the semifinals. The India No. 3 fought spiritedly in the last four before narrowly losing to Ukraine’s Anna Ushenina, the eventual champion.
Vaishali had, in fact, beaten runner-up Valentina Gunina in the qualifiers to book her berth for the main event. “The qualifying section was pretty tough,” she told The Hindu over the phone. “A player gets six chances; while I made it on my fifth attempt, Gunina qualified from her last.”
Vaishali, a former World under-14 and under-12 champion, finds the concept of Speed Chess thrilling. Matches are played in three segments, with games of five, three and one minute durations.
She said playing online chess was exciting. “But it can also be challenging,” she said. “Sometimes your internet connection may go off or you could end up making a blunder because your mouse lets you down; I lost my queen in one of my games thus.”
Vaishali said she was getting bored during the lockdown in Chennai. “So I have been studying for my B. Com course,” said the first-year student of MOP Vaishnav College, who will resume her Speed Chess campaign on Wednesday when the second leg kicks off.