3 min readMar 26, 2026 02:24 PM IST While 8 candidates line up in women to seal the sole spot for the World Championships to take on Ju Wenjun, the woman considered the greatest ever, Hou Yifan has gone on to leave chess behind and become an academician. In an Ask Me Anything organised by FIDE, the lapsed World No 1 – in women – who was never overtaken, answered what was tougher – finding tenure as a professor or winning a world title, she had a hearty laugh. “If we are talking about women’s World championship, then becoming a tenured professor is tougher! But an open world title is much tougher,’ she would quip. “By the way I’m still waiting on it.” Yifan went to Oxford after taking a break in 2018, and earned her masters in public policy at St Hilda’s. She had completed her undergrad in international relations at Peking University. She joined as the youngest prof at Shenzhen Uni at 26. “With what I’m studying I have kept my connection with …