Sergey Karjakin

At the 36th Chess Olympiad in Calvià, he was the youngest member of the gold-medal-winning Ukrainian team.

He also won an individual gold medal thanks to his score of 6½/7 points playing the second reserve board.

Sergey Alexandrovich Karjakin (born 12 January 1990) is a Russian chess grandmaster (formerly representing Ukraine).

A chess prodigy, he previously held the record for the world's youngest ever grandmaster, having qualified for the title at the age of 12 years and 7 months.

Karjakin won the European U10 Chess Championship in 1999 and was the World U12 Chess Champion in 2001.

He won the U10 European championship in 1999 and the U12 world championship in 2001.

Also in 2001, Karjakin tied for first place in the U14 European championship with Borki Predojević and Rauf Mamedov, taking the silver medal on tiebreak.

In January 2002, he was the official second of fellow Ukrainian Ruslan Ponomariov during the final of the FIDE World Championship, though Karjakin had only just turned 12 at the time.

By scoring grandmaster norms at the Aeroflot Open in Moscow, Alushta tournament in May 2002 and Sudak in August 2002, he surpassed Bu Xiangzhi to become the world's youngest grandmaster at the age of 12 years 7 months―a record that lasted for 19 years until 2021, when American player Abhimanyu Mishra achieved the qualifications for the title at the age of 12 years, 4 months, and 25 days.

Both Karjakin and Mishra have faced scrutiny for the methods with which they won their qualification, however; Karjakin's father has been accused of using methods skirting the norms of chess in enabling such an early attainment of the title.

He earned the International Master title at age 11 and was awarded his grandmaster title in 2003.

In 2003, Karjakin won a six-game match against Alexandra Kosteniuk ("Dannemann Classico") in Brissago by a score of 4–2 and tied for second in the Ukrainian championship.

He represented Ukraine at the Chess Olympiad in 2004, winning team and individual gold.

He competed in the 2004 FIDE World Championship in Tripoli, where he lost in the first round to Mikhail Kobalia.

Soon after, Karjakin took part in the Dortmund Sparkassen Chess Meeting.

Here he defeated the reigning world champion, Vladimir Kramnik, in a blitz game.

In October, Karjakin was the only human to win against a computer in the Man vs Machine World Team Championship in Bilbao, Spain, where he was the youngest and lowest-rated player, beating Deep Junior.

In December 2004, Karjakin finished second, behind Boris Gelfand at the Pamplona tournament.

Karjakin entered the world's top 100 in the April 2005 FIDE list, at 64th with an Elo rating of 2635.

He scored 8½/11 points (+7=3−1) to win the Young Stars of the World tournament held in Kirishi, Russia in May.

In July, he tied for third place in the European Individual Championship.

In the following month, he won the Group B of the Corus Chess Tournament in Wijk aan Zee, thus qualifying for the 2006 Group A.

In 2006, Karjakin played for the first time in the Wijk aan Zee Corus A tournament, scoring 7/13 points (4 wins, 6 draws, 3 losses).

In the same year, he took part in the NH Chess Tournament in Amsterdam; it was a match between two teams, "Rising Stars" (made up of Karjakin, Magnus Carlsen, Wang Hao, Daniel Stellwagen, and Jan Smeets) and "Experience" (Alexander Beliavsky, Artur Yusupov, John Nunn, and Ulf Andersson), held with the Scheveningen system.

The former won by 28–22.

He competed in two more Chess Olympiads for Ukraine and won the Corus chess tournament in 2009, before transferring to Russia.

He has since represented Russia five times in the Chess Olympiad, winning individual gold in 2010.

Karjakin won the 2012 World Rapid Chess Championship and the Norway Chess tournament in 2013 and 2014.

He also won team gold with Russia at the World Team Chess Championship in 2013 and 2019.

He competed at the Candidates Tournament 2014, placing second.

He won the Chess World Cup 2015, thus qualifying for the Candidates Tournament 2016.

He won the tournament and earned the right to challenge for the World Chess Championship.

In November 2016, he lost the championship match to Magnus Carlsen in the rapid tiebreaks after drawing 6–6 in the classical games.

He won the 2016 World Blitz Chess Championship.

He participated in the Candidates tournament again in 2018, placing third, and qualified for the 2022 Candidates by finishing second in the Chess World Cup 2021.

Karjakin's public approval of the Russian invasion of Ukraine prompted the Grand Chess Tour to ban him for future events.

He was also banned from playing FIDE-rated events for six months, including the Candidates Tournament 2022.

Following the expiration of his ban, Karjakin has refused to participate in events where he is barred from playing under the Russian flag.

Karjakin learned to play chess when he was five years old.

He joined the A.V. Momot Club in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, and was coached by Vladislav Borovikov, becoming an International Master at age 11 years and 11 months.