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Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

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Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#131
post #46
post #5

For being the headline, they sure hid his age pretty well. Not at the opening paragraph nor end of the article, nor photo captions near the top or bottom. cmd+f "years" 0 results cmd+f "age" 0 results And scanning for numbers is useless since most of the article is chess moves written out.

For someone who has complained a LOT about this information not being readily available, you haven't put it here for us either.

You bothered to comment but didn't bother to help either. Here, I'll do it, Gukesh is 18, Ding is 32.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#132

Remarkable to watch the reactions in real-time, of both players and fans from India at the moment the decisive move is played. https://www.youtube.com/live/5-uuDuGQLQA?t=14497s . Only started following chess due to the covid shutdowns, much for fun from a fans point of view than I had imagined it would be. Having the computer evaluation at the side really helps novices like me to know what's going on, interestingly a…

Wow, that's a really fun video -- thanks!

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#133

Must be amazing getting started off in life with such an amazing title out of the gate

He didn't become a Master yesterday to say "out of the gate", in his eyes he's been playing chess seriously for "all" of this life, and professionally for half of it.

It's a weird thing to say to someone who overcame so much while still young. He wasn't given anything "out of the gate".

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#135

That was a absolutely horrible finish to a really exciting championship if you ask me. For anyone who doesn't know, there was a lot of drama because Gukesh was playing amazingly coming into this (eg winning the gold medal on board 1 at the olympiad in crushing style) and Ding had been playing terribly. Then there were 13 games of back and forth with stalwart defending and imaginative computer preparation by both side…

Gukesh took him into the deep water the entire time, putting every possible strain on Ding's energy and reserves. It was the unrelenting pressure of an 18yo badass that cracked Ding, whom I truly feel sorry for. He is a great player and a very, very nice human being. What is crazy is that Gukesh has only been playing chess for a little more than 11 years. ETA: And Ding fought like a lion!

Gukesh is born in 2006, so he started playing at 7.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#136
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm explicitly not a chess player but this reminds me of Dave Sirlin's "Play To Win" where he starts by explaining that if doing a thing makes you not lose, you do that, and then eventually by definition you win.

chess has a lot of draws, and plenty of drawish strategies. Playing to not lose will not at all lead to winning.

Yes and if all you can do is draw in the world championship then you’ll be in trouble when the faster time controls are brought in to resolve the match.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> imaginative computer preparation Are people training AIs to play in the style of the people they're going to play against so they can practice?

No, they use chess engines to find interesting lines of play that the opponent presumably is not prepared for. Say, an odd move that looks weak, but a few moves later is back at even, and the player that pushed down this line is now prepared to play on from there (with perhaps further traps laid ahead), while the opponent is somewhat in the dark and has to analyze the situation correctly.

Has anyone tried playing one of these "chess engines" against a human?

We may have an opportunity to cut out the middleman here (no pun intended).

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#138

Wow. What a match. Been watching with my son, a chess lover since we started watching the Magnus-Fabi match. Now, my son loves his chess club and has retired me from playing :-) Two thoughts: 1) Gukesh took Ding into the deep water the entire time. Few people realize how draining chess is, especially at that level for this time control. It's beyond gruelling. Only programming is more difficult ;-) 2) Gukesh had an ex…

"Only programming is more difficult....". Programming is definitely easier for me. In chess, my ego gets in the way. I hate to lose.

Programming is easy. There is no opponent!

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#139

That was a absolutely horrible finish to a really exciting championship if you ask me. For anyone who doesn't know, there was a lot of drama because Gukesh was playing amazingly coming into this (eg winning the gold medal on board 1 at the olympiad in crushing style) and Ding had been playing terribly. Then there were 13 games of back and forth with stalwart defending and imaginative computer preparation by both side…

If anyone’s interested in what a GM’s thought process on the game looks like there’s a really great recap here which was produced without engines [1] https://youtu.be/97RZHG2rcbc?si=O41BRi2EC8Ryu0v2

[1] With the intention of trying to as honestly as possible replicate the situation for the players where obviously they have to think for themselves and don’t have access to an engine while playing.

Re: Gukesh becomes the youngest chess world champion in history

#140

Wow. What a match. Been watching with my son, a chess lover since we started watching the Magnus-Fabi match. Now, my son loves his chess club and has retired me from playing :-) Two thoughts: 1) Gukesh took Ding into the deep water the entire time. Few people realize how draining chess is, especially at that level for this time control. It's beyond gruelling. Only programming is more difficult ;-) 2) Gukesh had an ex…

"Only programming is more difficult....". Programming is definitely easier for me. In chess, my ego gets in the way. I hate to lose.

Writing good prose can be similarly taxing.
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