R Praggnanandhaa's longtime trainer drops big secret as 19-year-old becomes India No. 1: ‘Did not want to go public…'

Hindustan Times

4 hours ago

The spotlight has been on R Praggnanandhaa, who became the new India No. 1 after clinching the UzChes Cup Masters title. The 19-year-old defeated Uzbek GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov, with black pieces in the final round win. Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa in action during a match.(PTI)
The line-up in the tournament consisted of the likes of Arjun Erigaisi, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Richard Rapport, Javokhir Sindarov, Nodirbek Yakubboev and Shamsiddin Vokhidov.
Dissecting the Indian GM's win, his longtime trainer RB Ramesh spoke to Indian Express. 'Pragg is quite good in attack, but he was playing too solid in 2024. At least that was my impression. We discussed this and talked about being more adventurous, which you can see now,' he said.
'His chess was always quite good. Now he's also been adding new openings and trying a lot more variety of openings in games.'
Ramesh also dropped a bombshell revelation, claiming that Praggnanandhaa also had plenty to thank his second, Vaibhav Suri. 'Vaibhav has been helping us longer than this year. But we did not want to go public earlier (and reveal his association with Pragg). He has been with us for some time, but only recently he has started accompanying Pragg for tournaments and that has been very helpful,' he said.
'It's good to have someone you know well, who believes in you, travel with you during important tournaments. When you are going through difficult times, it will be easier to believe in ourselves,' he added.
In the live chess ratings, Praggnanandhaa is the new world No. 4, with an Elo rating of 2778.3. Meanwhile, D Gukesh is fifth with a rating of 1776.6, and Arjun Erigaisi (2775.7) is sixth. Norwegian Magnus Carlsen (2839.2) occupies top spot, followed by American GMs Hikaru Nakamura (2807) and Fabiano Caruana (2784.2). Praggnanandhaa will be looking to build on his form, and climb higher up the standings.