What is going on with D Gukesh? It’s a question that has vexed the world of chess over the past 11 months. Since becoming the world champion in Singapore in December last year, the teenager from Chennai has suffered some bruising defeats in 2025. The closest he came to winning an individual title was at the Tata Steel Chess tournament in Wijk aan Zee, which was Gukesh’s first event after winning the world championship at the age of 18. Just a fortnight ago, the 19-year-old also had shown signs of resurgence at the European Club Cup (ECC) in Rhodes, Greece, where, playing for Romanian club SuperChess, the Indian had claimed an individual gold for Board 1 while dragging the team to the title. But an ouster in the third round at the hands of Frederik Svane at the FIDE World Cup on Saturday will again increase the focus on Gukesh’s form.
A day before Gukesh was eliminated, his longtime coach Grzegorz Gajewski, who helped him become world champion, spoke to The Indian Express about his results and how much we should read into it.
Excerpts:
Gukesh seems to be playing a lot more this year. And there seems to be an effort to play in as many formats—rapid, blitz, Freestyle—as possible rather than just focussing on classical chess…
I don’t believe he’s playing so much more. Earlier too, he was playing a lot and he was playing many open tournaments. Obviously, open tournaments are not as attractive for him as they used to be. That partially explains the shift. Second, he is getting invites from everywhere. Like the Grand Chess Tour, which is a very attractive tour. Part of the Grand Chess Tour is the rapid and blitz section. There’s no way around that. Yes, we are trying to improve in all possible formats. This is not a shift; it’s just catching up. The ability to play when low on time is part of the classical game as well. So by improving his rapid and blitz skills, I believe we can also improve the classical as well. Of course, classical chess remains the priority.
The constant travel that Gukesh has done, how is he dealing with the fatigue and jet lag that comes with it?
It’s part of the job. Sometimes it’s tough when you have to travel to the USA and back. There’s a lot of jet lag. But he’s young, he’s strong. He takes care of his routines. He’s very responsible when it comes to getting a good sleep. We know that this is kind of essential to be fresh and have a lot of energy for the game.
How would you sum up Gukesh’s 2025? He came close to the title at Wijk aan Zee. But it seems like every time he loses a tournament, people speak like it’s the end of the world…
It’s very typical for anyone who has been working their whole life to achieve something and then they finally achieve it. It puts you in a difficult situation because you have to come up with new objectives, new ways to motivate yourself. It’s kind of a transitional period for Gukesh. We should not forget he’s very young and the competition is very strong. It’s not like by winning the title, he got the monopoly on winning all the games he plays. It’s a very competitive sport and all the others are working very hard to beat him. There were some ups, there were some downs. Mentally and physically and just sports-wise, I think we’re kind of getting back on the track. And hopefully the ECC was the first sign of Gukesh coming back to his best form.
You spoke about this being a transitional year. Are there new things that he’s looking forward to learning this year?
There are some elements that he needs to work on. He’s well known for his aggressive style of chess. The grinding part of his style is not that common. But we have already seen an example of that two days back (in the second round of the World Cup). We don’t mean to change his style, just add new elements to it. Because in modern chess, you don’t always control what kind of position you’re going to get. Of course, we have to be as flexible as possible.
Gukesh was knocked out of the 2026 FIDE World Cup on Saturday. (Photo Credit: Michal Walusza/FIDE)
We are now seeing that when he’s in India, a lot of kids come and touch his feet and call him sir, even though he’s just 19. How is he adjusting to this stature as world champion away from the board?
I don’t think it’s a problem for him. Obviously there’s a lot of attention and there’s always some pressure coming in with attention. But Gukesh really understands this situation and he handles it reasonably well.
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Do opponents treat him differently?
I think it’s great. Definitely, certain opponents play differently now against him than they used to. I wouldn’t say they make him a target. He gets more respect from them. This makes them play more responsibly. When he was younger and lower rated, chances kept coming at him because higher-rated players were willing to take risks. Now I don’t think there’s a player who is willing to take risks against Gukesh. So sometimes he’s the one who has to take risks. And of course he does that. And sometimes you pay the price.
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