The Rediff Interview / K Sasikiran

'My main aim is to gain some
Elo points'

Krishnan Sasikiran, the number two chess player in India after Vishwanathan Anand, has just participated in a special camp organised by Anand himself during his visit to Chennai. Sasikiran along with R B Ramesh, S S Ganguly, Abhijit Kunte, Sandipan Chanda and Koneru Humpy were the promising youngsters who were invited by the former world champion. Only Pendyala Harikrishna could not attend due to illness.

Sasikiran, who has an Elo rating of 2633, has had quite a successful year, winning most of the tournaments he played, though those in the Czech Republic, England and Germany, where he was seeded first, were not as fruitful.

Shobha Warrier caught up with the 21-year-old Grandmaster, who is now training hard for the World Cup, to be held in Hyderabad in October.

You have just attended the camp organised by Anand in Chennai. What was it all about?

About two months back, Anand had written mails to all of us from Spain that he would be organising a camp when he comes here [Chennai] next. All of us were quite excited about working with Anand. Except for Harikrishna, who was not well, all of us attended it.

The last time when Anand was here, about 7-8 months ago, I had an opportunity to work with him on a one-to-one basis. We worked on some specific positions for a few days, and analysed them. That was when I really saw him calculate positions. He was so fast; much, much faster than all of us. Playing chess at such a fast pace comes so naturally to him.

Did he make any comment on your game?

No, we didn't specifically discuss my game. We were discussing mainly about openings, and he did say that my opening was good in a particular game! I was naturally thrilled to hear those appreciative remarks from Anand, who all of us admire so much.

Coming back to the recently-concluded camp, how beneficial was it?

The truth is, working with Anand itself is a unique and rewarding experience because he is way ahead of all of us. I cannot describe in words how unique the experience is because you have to work and experience it! He is world class, and that class can be seen in all his moves.

It was in an apartment in Adyar that we met for four days. We worked for four hours daily. In the camp, we analysed some of the games that Anand played against [Ruslan] Ponomariov. While analysing the games, we also got a lot of new ideas.

Will he organise such camps again?

He said we would be working together in future too! When I first worked with him also, he had told me that we would be working more.

You were the top-ranked player at the Czech Republic and England, but you didn’t win either of the tournaments. Are you disappointed with the results?

I will not say I am very disappointed. I made some calculations without thinking far beyond. That, I don't think will create any problems in future because I can consciously change my approach. That is why I am positive that I can do better in future. I would say there also was a slight lack of confidence.

Why lack of confidence?

I was not sure about myself before I started for the Czech Republic because we had been playing continuously for quite some time. Naturally, I was a bit tired. So, I was not confident in the beginning itself. If I had sat at home and worked for 15 days before the tournament, I would have felt confident, but there was not much time between tournaments.

You finished only 10th there. What was your frame of mind when you reached England?

In fact, I started off quite confidently in England. Then, in the sixth round, I lost to Turner of England. But I won both the eighth and ninth games. I beat GM Peter Wells of England, and it was a tie for the second place with eight points, 0.5 points below R B Ramesh, the champion, along with the defending champion GM Joseph Gallagher of Switzerland.

How did you manage to win the last games quite convincingly?

While you are playing a tournament, if some of the routines that you have been following do not help you, you have to change them. That is what I did.

Once I realised that I was not resting much, and preparing more, I decided to change the pattern. Normally, I work for about 3-4 hours during a tournament, but in England I decided to reduce the working hours. Instead of preparing, I took rest, read books and listened to music. And it paid dividends.

What kind of books do you read? And, music?

I listen to Tamil film music. Books? I was reading the Mahabharata there, and not fiction!

Yes, relaxation helped me recover well after the defeat but I should have been more careful and not lost the points earlier at all. Then, I would have won because I was only half a point behind the champion.

From England, you went to Germany, didn’t you?

It was a different kind of a Rapid tournament, called Fischer Random in Germany. Bobby Fischer, a former world chess champion, proposed a variant of Orthodox Chess, wherein the initial setup of pieces is chosen randomly. Fischer thereby joined the ranks of other former world champions, such as Capablanca, who proposed changes to the rules of chess -- none of which were ever implemented. Fischer Random Chess is somewhat similar to the older Shuffle Chess, or Prechess (or other related variants), yet has a unique style of its own.

Fischer Random Chess is played with an Orthodox Chess set but employs a randomly generated array. Each new set-up is determined by a computer program (or manual procedure) which assigns starting squares according to the following guidelines:

White Pawns are placed on their Orthodox home squares.
All remaining white pieces are placed on the first rank.
The white King is placed somewhere between the two white Rooks.
The white Bishops are placed on opposite-coloured squares.
The black pieces are placed equal-and-opposite the white pieces.)
I was playing such a tournament for the first time.

All the pieces are shuffled in Fischer Random, and there are no opening games. You straight away play the game. I began well but as the tournament progressed, I didn’t do well. It was more for fun that I went to Germany from England. All the other Indian players came back to India from England while I proceeded to Germany.

Now, what are you preparing for?

Before the World Chess, which will start in October in Hyderabad, I am not going to play any other tournament. So, it is only the World Chess that is in front of me. First, it will be a round-robin, and then knock-out. Many top world players are coming to Hyderabad. So, my main aim is to gain some Elo points.

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