All posts tagged: Hou Yifan

What is Hou Yifan, the greatest women’s chess player up to? ‘Making tenure as professor tougher than women’s World title!’ she jokes | Chess News

What is Hou Yifan, the greatest women’s chess player up to? ‘Making tenure as professor tougher than women’s World title!’ she jokes | Chess News

Published by Webster

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 …

‘Removing women-only events would kill Women’s Chess’: FIDE CEO Emil Sutovsky

‘Removing women-only events would kill Women’s Chess’: FIDE CEO Emil Sutovsky

Published by Webster

The debate over the relevance of women-only titles and tournaments in chess has been ongoing for several months, with various grandmasters voicing their opinions. Most recently, FIDE CEO Emil Sutovsky defended the continuation of such events, claiming that removing them would deprive women players of critical development opportunities. “If we were to remove all the possibilities to compete in women-only events, if we were to remove the possibility to support travel and so on, I think we would deprive many of these talents of opportunity under a false pretence that we will try to prove that women can grow in open tournaments better than they can by competing in women-only events,” Sutovsky said in an interview on FIDE’s official YouTube channel. According to Sutovsky, while top women players previously reached a rating of 2500 at ages 15-17, today only a few are rated above 2400 by that age. Currently, no female player apart from Hou Yifan has crossed the 2600 mark in recent years. “It is also important to rely on real data and not …

Global Chess League: How Magnus Carlsen blundered against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave to lose with white | Chess News

Global Chess League: How Magnus Carlsen blundered against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave to lose with white | Chess News

Published by Webster

Magnus Carlsen sat on his seat looking up in the sky, muttering away. He could not believe what he had just done. It was a blunder from the five-time world champion which was unexpected and uncharacteristic in equal measure. It took a while to sink in for the Norwegian. But finally, Carlsen threw in the towel against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and exited the playing hall in a huff. What made matters worse was that his team, the Alpine SG Pipers, lost 5-14 to the upGrad Mumba Masters with defeats for Richard Rapport and Daniel Dardha. Rapport, in fact, allowed Pragg’s coach Peter Svidler — who had not experienced a win in his six games at the second edition of the Global Chess League — his first victory after two defeats and four draws. Only Praggnanandhaa managed a victory for the Pipers’, beating Vidit Gujrathi, his senior teammate from the Indian gold medal-winning Chess Olympiad team. The rest of the games in the clash — Hou Yifan vs Koneru Humpy and Kateryna Lagno vs Harika Dronavalli — …

Carlsen Falls to Firouzja as Triveni Continental Kings beat Alpine SG Pipers

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World number one Magnus Carlsen ran out of time and lost to Alireza Firouzja, as reigning champions Triveni Continental Kings secured a decisive 17-4 victory over Alpine SG Pipers in Season 2 of the Global Chess League on Friday. The match initially seemed balanced, with computer evaluations showing equality across the boards halfway through the time control. Richard Rapport struck first for the Pipers, launching a powerful attack against Teimour Radjabov, giving his team an early lead. Soon after, former women’s world champions Hou Yifan and Alexandra Kosteniuk agreed to a draw, pushing Pipers to a 4-1 advantage. However, the momentum shifted when Carlsen, despite finding a weakness in Firouzja’s position, was defeated by the clock. Firouzja’s time advantage became critical, leading to Carlsen’s rare time loss and handing Triveni the lead. R. Pragnanandhaa’s defeat to Wei Yi further strengthened Triveni’s dominance, and the Pipers ultimately crumbled on the remaining boards, resulting in a crushing defeat. Source link