Ramachandran Ramesh

Some Lesser Known Facts About Ramachandran Ramesh

• Ramachandran Ramesh is an Indian Chess grandmaster and a chess coach. He is known to be the mentor of the Chess prodigy R Praggnanandhaa. In December 2023, he was nominated for the Dronacharya Award.

• At the age of twelve, Ramesh took up chess due to his inspiration from Indian chess player Viswanathan Anand‘s success. He attained multiple titles as a professional chess player, including International Master (IM) in 1996 and FIDE Master (FM) in 1995. He also played for the Indian chess team in 1996.

• Ramesh started training younger kids in chess and coaching them to championships in 1998. He claims that his first pupil was Aarthie Ramaswamy. Ramesh was asked by the All India Chess Federation (AICF) to travel with the Indian Junior squad to the Asian Junior Championship in Iran when he was 22 years old. Aarthie, Ramesh’s wife, was a member of the group. After they returned from the tournament, as no official chess coaching or tutoring was available at the time, Aarthie’s parents asked Ramesh to assist Aarthie in practising the game. They played chess together for a year before Aarthie won the World Under 18 championship, which attracted media attention and led to many other young players approaching Ramesh for coaching. After that, he began private sessions with several players at his house. According to him, ninety per cent of the players he initially worked with achieved the title of grandmaster in chess, which further inspired him to begin professionally teaching chess and to become a mentor.

• He has won numerous chess events as a professional, including the Commonwealth Championship in 2007 and the British Championship in 2002. The International Chess Organization FIDE awarded him the title of Grandmaster in 2004. His current world ranking is 1218. ^[5]FIDE

• He gave up his job at Indian Oil Corporation and his playing career in 2008 to open the T. Nagar, Chennai-based chess academy Chess Gurukul. Many Indian international chess champions have since emerged from Chess Gurukul, including R Praggnanandhaa and Bharath Subramaniyam, who became international masters in 2019 at the age of 11 years and 8 months. India won five gold medals at the World Youth 2015, with Chess Gurukul Academy producing all of the champions.

• At the 2013 Anand vs. Carlsen World Chess Championship match, Ramesh gained attention from all around the world with his official commentary.

• His first book, Fundamental Chess: Logical Decision Making, was released in September 2021. He guided how to make decisions based on logic in his book. His second book, Improve Your Chess Calculation: The Ramesh Chess Course – Volume 1, was published in May 2022.

  

• Ramachandran Ramesh is a dog lover.