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8-year-old chess prodigy makes history as youngest ever to defeat grandmaster
An 8-year-old chess prodigy made history as the youngest player to defeat a chess grandmaster. The boy, Aswath Kaushik, beat Jacek Stopa at a chess tournament in Switzerland.
Kaushik, who was born in India but lives in Singapore, handed 37-year-old Stopa of Poland a loss during the Burgdorfer Stadthaus Open on Sunday, according to Chess.com, a chess website and social media platform for players.
Last week, Serbia’s Leonid Ivanovic, who was 8 years, 11 months old at the time, replaced the previous youngest player Awonder Liang to become the first under the age of nine to defeat a grandmaster in a classic tournament game. But that didn’t last long as Kaushik, who is four months younger than Ivanovic, became the new record holder. Grandmasters are titles given to the best chess players in the world by the World Chess Federation. Apart from world champion, it’s the highest title given in chess and only about 2,100 players have earned the distinction.
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“It felt really exciting and amazing, and I felt proud of my game and how I played, especially since I was worse at one point but managed to come back from that,” Kaushik told Chess.com.
His father, Sriram Kaushik, told the chess news outlet that the boy learned the rules of the game at the age of four and pointed out that neither he nor his wife play chess.
“He picked it up on his own, playing with his grandparents,” he told Chess.com. The boy’s father added that the child spends up to seven hours a day on chess and “solves long complex puzzles visually.”
Even with his early success, Kaushik –who has played several tournaments globally– wants to keep going until he becomes the world champion, he said. He also wants to obtain a chess player rating of 2000, which he’s close to attaining.
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A teacher and student killed in a shooting earlier this week at a school in Madison, Wisconsin, were identified Wednesday by authorities.
The Dane County Medical Examiner’s Office said in a news release provided to CBS News that 42-year-old Erin West and 14-year-old Rubi Vergara were fatally shot Monday morning at Abundant Life Christian School.
Preliminary examinations determined the two died of “homicidal firearm related trauma.” Both were pronounced dead at the scene, the medical examiner said.
An online obituary on a local funeral site stated Vergara was a freshman who leaves behind her parents, one brother, and a large extended family. It described her as “an avid reader” who “loved art, singing and playing keyboard in the family worship band.”
West’s exact position with the school was unclear.
The medical examiner also confirmed that a preliminary autopsy found that the suspected shooter, 15-year-old Natalie Rupnow — a student at the same school — was pronounced dead at a local hospital Monday of “firearm related trauma.” Madison Chief of Police Shon F. Barnes had previously told reporters that Rupnow was pronounced dead while being transported to a hospital.
Police had also previously stated that she was believed to have died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
The shooting at the private Christian K-12 school was reported just before 11 a.m. Monday. In addition to the two people killed and the shooter, six others were wounded.
Police said the shooting occurred in a classroom where a study hall was taking place involving students from several grades.
A handgun was recovered after the shooting, Barnes said, but it was unclear where the gun came from or how many shots were fired. A law enforcement source said the weapon used in the shooting appears to have been a 9 mm pistol.
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