There’s a photograph of Savitha Shri and Gukesh from nine years ago. They stand beside each other, small and serious, holding their national Under-11 trophies, nearly half their size. They had swapped trophies – Open and girls’, each clutching the other’s – possibly for the photograph.
The following year, in 2018, both won world titles in their respective age groups, the Under-12 Open and girls’ titles, at the World Cadets Championship in Spain.
They went to the same school in Chennai, travelled to chess tournaments together and sometimes returned home with titles from the same event. Back then, they were simply two kids who happened to be very good at chess, with no idea where the game might take them.
Years later, one is a world champion. The other has just had a breakthrough Olympiad.
Gukesh’s rise was meteoric. He became a grandmaster at 12 years, won the Candidates tournament at 17 and, at 18, became the youngest undisputed world champion in history. Then came the difficult part. The wins became harder to find and a prolonged struggle for form followed.
The Olympiad has usually been a happy place for him. In 2022 and 2024, Gukesh won individual gold medals on the top board. This time, a dip in form saw him moved down to Board 4, lined up against lower-rated opposition. Away from the spotlight and the marquee match-ups, the 20-year-old began finding wins again – and, with them, flashes of his familiar swindling ways, finding resources in difficult positions and turning games around.
Savitha, a 19-year-old international master, went unbeaten with a remarkable 9/10 – eight wins and two draws, to claim individual gold on Board 5. She was easily India’s best performer across both sections. Gukesh won individual silver with 8.5/11, his seven wins and three draws were followed by his only defeat of the tournament in the final round.
Gukesh arrived at the Olympiad searching for the form that carried him to the world title two years ago. For Savitha, it was a stage on which to show how far she had come.
There are parallels, too, in what it took to get them here. Behind both careers are parents who rearranged their own lives around their children’s chess.
Savitha first became interested in the game while watching her older brother Mugesh play. Her father, Baskar, then an electrical technician in Singapore, initially had little idea what competitive chess would demand.
“I bought a chessboard and pieces for ₹500 and thought that might be all the expense chess needed,” Baskar says with a laugh.
It wasn’t. There were tournaments to enter, coaches to pay and journeys to make. Eventually, the arithmetic became impossible. Both his children played chess, but the family could not afford to pursue the game seriously for both.
“There was no way we could afford to have two chess-playing kids who needed to travel for tournaments,” Baskar says, pointing out that Mugesh played at the state level. “I asked my son to set chess aside and focus on academics. Sometimes, I wish I could have afforded to let him pursue chess too. ”
Finding the means to have even one of his children play chess was hard, he says. At times, friends and well-wishers pitched in with funds, and the family had to pawn jewellery to keep Savitha’s chess dreams alive.
Baskar eventually quit his job and, for much of the past decade, has accompanied Savitha to tournaments. “Gukesh’s father and I became good friends since we often travelled to tournaments together. When Gukesh became world champion, we were just as happy.”
At this Olympiad, the two children whose families had travelled those roads together were again delivering for India.
Savitha carried the Indian women’s team to an Olympiad bronze, repeatedly finding ways out of difficult positions. Against Chinese WGM Zhai Mo in Round 10, she blundered a pawn in an equal position and then missed an exchange sacrifice, but still found the wherewithal to turn an inferior position into victory. The result kept India in medal contention heading into the final round. With a medal at stake, Savitha again recovered from a losing position, found equality and secured the draw that helped India take bronze.
Gukesh fashioned a spectacular turnaround against Alexander Donchenko in Round 9, when he flipped an objectively losing position with Black into a match-winning victory. His knights were poorly placed, his king was weak and White appeared in control. But Gukesh generated counterplay, Donchenko’s advantage disappeared and the world champion eventually delivered the decisive point in India’s win over Germany.
There’s a story ChessBase founder Frederic Friedel likes to tell about Gukesh and Savitha.
They were around 12 when he sat them in front of an empty chessboard and asked them to solve a puzzle composed in 1922. The position existed only in their heads: White king on c8, Black king on a7, white pawns on b5 and h2, black pawns on a6 and b7.
It was an old Friedel favourite, one he had used for years to examine how young chess minds worked. He had even tried it on a 23-year-old Garry Kasparov. A young Vincent Keymer once spent an entire lunch wrestling with it; Friedel remembers watching the German teenager’s eyes light up when he solved the two-part puzzle.
Gukesh and Savitha dispatched it soon enough.
“He was incredible. Obviously, a super talent, and she was equally impressive,” Friedel says of Gukesh and Savitha. “I call her Clevergirl.”
Then came the twist. He asked them to move the white king to d8 and start over.
For 25 minutes, Savitha stood in front of an empty board. Her eyes darted across squares that held no pieces, then away, then back again. The position existed entirely in her head. She moved invisible pieces, tested possibilities, discarded them and began again.
“Gukesh solved it, Savitha didn’t, but her ability to focus and work on a chess position was what I noticed.”
He gave them logic puzzles next, including Enders’ weighing problem.
“At those, she was a lot faster than him.”