Bengaluru: Javokhir Sindarov spent a good chunk of last year working 10 hours a day on chess with his coach Roman Vidonyak in Munich. The Uzbek GM believes it’s that hard work that was visible in his results at the Candidates tournament in March-April – he dominated and won with a record score to earn the right to challenge reigning world champion D Gukesh in the title match.
The 20-year-old is in Oslo for Norway Chess to support his close friend and rumoured girlfriend, Kazakh GM Bibisara Assaubayeva, who currently has a nearly unassailable lead in the tournament with two rounds left.
He will challenge Gukesh for the world title in a battle of 20-year-olds roughly six months from now. When asked, he named Cyprus – the setting of his Candidates victory this year – as a preferred choice of a “hot country” unlike the freezing conditions at that time of the year in Uzbekistan, for the match.
“I don’t have any match experience. I think it will be very hard. Both Gukesh and I will have the same chances,” Sindarov told the Indian media in Oslo, “I worked really hard last year with my coach Roman – 10 hours a day for 80-90 days. So, it’s not that I was lucky to win the Candidates, a lot of hard work went into it. If I work on this system, in my opinion, I will be one of the strongest chess players in the world.”
A self-confessed Counter-Strike junkie, Sindarov was having trouble with his account a couple of days ago. “I think everyone in the chess world should be more professional than me,” he said, laughing. “I like to play Counter-Strike. I don’t see anything bad in playing games. Yesterday I got a problem with my account, so maybe it’s a message to focus on chess.”
As a four-year-old, Sindarov would often sneak out of bed at night while everyone else at home was asleep and play computer games till daybreak. His grandfather taught him chess and he went on to beat everyone at home and won the national U-10 title at the age of six.
“When I started playing chess, I wanted to become like Magnus Carlsen, a world champion.” His admiration of the world No.1 and five-time world champion is one of the reasons he prefers to analyse on a chess board rather than on a computer.
“Roman always told me not to work too much on the computer. My team works with the computer but I choose to analyse on the board because it’s what Magnus does…I feel if I had trained a lot when I was young, I would have already been a world champion by now. I never really trained much, maybe 15 hours a week. It’s not of Grandmaster level. It was hard to find a good coach. When I finally started working with Roman, I improved a lot and gained around 80 Elo points in a year.”
The reminder he carries with himself almost like a mental flashcard is – double check – it’s what Roman always tells him to do during games, especially when he’s winning.
The rise of powerful engines such as Stockfish and Leela Chess Zero has pushed chess beyond human capabilities and Sindarov, who works with computers during tournaments, said he prefers Leela because it can “think like a human”.
Though he’s a contender for the world champion title this year, Sindarov considers it a sacrilege when asked if he considers himself the best player of his country. He’s happy to offer that distinction to his compatriot and world No.5, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, and spells out a silver lining to it. “If you are the best chess player in your country and no one can beat you, it’s always very hard to improve.”
The conversation finally veers to Bibisara – who he’s in Oslo for and is seen dropping off dutifully to the venue every day. It was during the Candidates tournament – they were both were participating – that they appeared to acknowledge their bond publicly. “We know each other from our youth, so we grew up together, and we help each other a lot in tournaments. She helps me a lot, and I hope I also help her a lot. We have very good memories…but I don’t like to tell everything.”
