"I want to win the World Championship" - At 6 years & 9 months, Rajasthan's youngest ever FIDE ranking holder Advik Sharma aims for the stars
Young chess prodigies in India have been on the rise, and the latest addition to that is a calm, composed Advik Sharma, who recently became the youngest chess player from Rajasthan to get an international FIDE rating at the tender age of 6 years and 9 months.
Speaking exclusively to Sportskeeda, the young Advik credited his mother, Anjali Sharma, for his interest in chess. After a discussion with his father, Dr. Giriraj Sharma, a neonatologist by profession, Advik was enrolled in an academy, where his passion and interest converted into a career.
"My mother used to play chess. So she taught me chess. When I started playing well, my mother got me into an academy. I am very happy (to get an FIDE ranking). (On idols) Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand. I want to win the World Championship," Advik Sharma revealed.
Advik caught the eye of his coach, Ankesh Vashishtha, an internationally-rated chess player himself, and was soon separated from the others and trained personally by Vashishtha, who saw immense potential in him. Vashishtha has coached Advik personally since December 2022. From there on began Advik's journey as he has gone on to play multiple national, international and Grandmaster tournaments.
Sportskeeda caught up with Vashishtha, who enumerated the difficulties of training a prodigious child. He reckons the biggest drawback of chess is that it's an individual game, which can cause the child to lose motivation in case of losses.
"It is definitely tough work. Because in most of the games, the child is already very interested. He is very passionate. Then he doesn't have to be pushed too much. But in chess, sometimes because it's a kind of lonely game and you have to focus on yourself a lot of time, and you have to do hard work at home like with no one. You have to do everything yourself. Sometimes like puzzles, like games," Vashishta said.
He further added that there are multiple distractions in a child's life that need to be tackled.
"The ups and downs happen a lot in chess. So maintaining the motivation becomes a challenge," Vashishtha added. "Especially when a child starts at such an early age at a young age, it is a big challenge because there can be a lot of distractions. For example, the child will like to play cricket. Then he might enjoy reading books. Sometimes he enjoys going to school. Then he doesn't want to miss school."
Ankesh Vashishtha has some unique techniques to teach Advik and believes that children respond better to playing. He thus tries to train the six-year-old in ways where he can learn while playing. To boost his motivation, Advik is often seen playing smaller tournaments which can boost his confidence.
"You can motivate them by small rewards. Enrolling in and winning smaller tournaments at a district level," Ankesh Vashishtha said. "For training, you need to make it such that the child enjoys it. Children like to play more so it's important to teach them while playing. That balance needs to be maintained."
"It's very challenging for a child to achieve this kind of rating and title" - Advik Sharma's coach Ankesh Vashishtha on his feat
Recapping the year-and-a-half journey of teaching Advik personally, Ankesh Vashishtha lauded the youngster's qualities which laid a solid foundation.
"So the basic foundation of this was that he was sincere," Vashishtha said. "And apart from this, apart from sincerity, he's calm. He listens to everything. So on the basis of that, I thought that yes, we can take this to the long term. And then by making these things a strength, then a lot of work was done on them. The best thing is that he's always ready to work hard. We had back-to-back travel but he never gave up."
Vashishtha also specified the reason why Advik's achievement deserves recognition, carefully explaining what the process is to achieve a FIDE rating.
"If we talk about professionally, you get a FIDE rating only when you win or draw an international rated chess player from a FIDE rated player," Vashishtha explained. "So the simple thing is that if a 6-year-old child is playing against any rated player, it's difficult, because most opponents are very experienced players. It's very challenging for a child to achieve this kind of rating and title."