Grandmaster (GM) is a title awarded to chess players by the world chess organization FIDE. Apart from World Champion, Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain. Once achieved, the title is held for life, though exceptionally it has been revoked for cheating.
Maurice Ashley is a Jamaican-born American chess player, author, and commentator. In 1999, he earned the FIDE title of Grandmaster (GM), making him the first Black person to do so.
The term chess prodigy refers to a young child who possesses an aptitude for the game of chess that far exceeds what might be expected at their age. Their prodigious talent will often enable them to defeat experienced adult players and even titled chess masters. Some chess prodigies have progressed to become World Chess Champions.
Christopher Hikaru Nakamura is an American chess grandmaster, Twitch streamer, five-time U.S. Chess Champion, and the reigning World Fischer Random Chess Champion. A chess prodigy, he earned his grandmaster title at the age of 15, the youngest American at the time to do so. Nakamura won the 2011 edition of Tata Steel Chess Tournament Group A and has represented the United States at five Chess Olympiads, winning a team gold medal and two team bronze medals. With a peak rating of 2816, Nakamura is the tenth-highest rated player in history. In May 2014, when FIDE began publishing official rapid and blitz chess ratings, Nakamura ranked No. 1 in the world on both lists; he has remained at or near the No. 1 rank on both lists ever since. As of December 2022, he has won all of the last five Chess.com Speed Chess Championships.
Alejandro Tadeo Ramírez Álvarez is a Costa Rican-American chess Grandmaster and commentator. At the age of 15, he became the first Central American to achieve the title of Grandmaster and the second youngest chess grandmaster in the world at the time. Born in Costa Rica, he represented Costa Rica before switching to the United States in 2011.
Ian Alexandrovich Nepomniachtchi is a Russian chess grandmaster.
Harika Dronavalli is an Indian chess player who holds the FIDE title of Grandmaster (GM). She has won three bronze medals in the Women's World Chess Championship, in 2012, 2015 and 2017. Dronavalli was honored with the Arjuna Award for the year 2007–08 by the government of India. In 2016, she won the FIDE Women's Grand Prix event at Chengdu, China and rose up from world no. 11 to world no. 5 in FIDE women's ranking. Vladimir Kramnik, Judit Polgar and Viswanathan Anand are her chess inspirations. In 2019, she was awarded the Padma Shri for her contributions towards the field of sports.
The World Blitz Chess Championship is a chess tournament held to determine the world champion in chess played under blitz time controls. Since 2012, FIDE has held an annual joint rapid and blitz chess tournament and billed it as the World Rapid & Blitz Chess Championships. The current world blitz champion is the Norwegian Grandmaster Magnus Carlsen. Bibisara Assaubayeva from Kazakhstan is the current women's blitz world champion. Magnus Carlsen has won the event a record six times.
Ahmed Adly is an Egyptian chess Grandmaster. As a chess prodigy, Adly acquired his International Master title in 2001 at the age of 14 at the U20 Championship of 2004. Adly then went on to earn his Grandmaster title in 2005, making him the first Egyptian and the youngest ever African to achieve this feat. As of May 2022, Adly holds the second-highest rating in Egypt and Africa.
Susan Polgar is a Hungarian-American chess grandmaster. Polgár was Women's World Chess Champion from 1996 to 1999. On the FIDE's Elo rating system list of July 1984, at the age of 15, she became the top-ranked female chess player in the world. In 1991, she became the third woman to be awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE. She won eleven medals at the Women's Chess Olympiad.
Katwe is an area in the city of Kampala, Uganda's capital.
Phiona Mutesi is a Ugandan chess player. She has represented Uganda at four Women's Chess Olympiads, and is one of the first titled female players in Ugandan chess history. Mutesi is the subject of a 2012 book and a 2016 film called Queen of Katwe.
The Uganda Chess Federation (UCF) is the governing body of chess competition in Uganda and a member of FIDE, the international chess federation. It administers the official national chess rating system which awards both numeric ratings and titles of distinction. The UCF was founded in 1972, became affiliated with the National Council of Sports in 1973, and in 1978 was affiliated with FIDE, the first Federation in East Africa to achieve this.
Queen of Katwe is a 2016 American biographical sports drama film directed by Mira Nair and written by William Wheeler. Starring David Oyelowo, Lupita Nyong'o, and Madina Nalwanga, the film depicts the life of Phiona Mutesi, a girl living in Katwe, a slum of Kampala, the capital of Uganda. She learns to play chess and becomes a Woman Candidate Master after her victories at World Chess Olympiads.
Madina Nalwanga is a Ugandan actress known for her lead role as Phiona Mutesi in Queen of Katwe (2016). The film depicts the life of Mutesi, a Ugandan girl living in a slum in Katwe who learns to play chess and becomes a Woman Candidate Master. This role earned her the Most Promising Actor award at 2017 Africa Movie Academy Awards in Lagos, Nigeria. She also won an NAACP Image Award, a Women Film Critics Circle Award, and was nominated for a Critic's Choice Award.
Tanitoluwa Emmanuel Adewumi is a Nigerian-American chess player who currently holds the title of FIDE Master (FM). A chess prodigy, he won the 2019 K-3 New York State chess championship at the age of 8 after playing the game for only a year while living with his refugee family in a homeless shelter in Manhattan.
This article is about the participation of women in chess and its culture.
Tunde Onakoya is a Nigerian chess master, coach and founder of Chess in Slums Africa. He has organized a number of interventions for children across slums in Lagos state including Majidun (Ikorodu), Makoko and recently, Oshodi. The children are engaged in a 2 week's session that seeks to unlock their potential through the game of chess while learning to read, write and acquire basic literacy skills.
Robert Katende is a Ugandan chess coach, footballer, and engineer. He is also the executive director of Sports Outreach.
Gloria Nansubuga is a Ugandan Chess player who became the youngest chess player in Ugandan history to be awarded a chess title of Woman FIDE Master by the year 2018.
