Bodhana in a chess match against Pete Wells - Photo: Reuters
Bodhana Sivanandan was born on 7 March 2015 in Harrow, London, to a Tamil family from Trichy, India. She started playing chess in 2020, during the COVID-19 lockdown, after being given a chess set by chance.
After only about 15 months, Bodhana showed extraordinary talent for his age group, reaching the world number 1 position in blitz for the U8 age group, surpassing his opponents by about 322 points according to the FIDE coefficient.
In 2022, at the European Schools Championship in Rhodes, she won all 24 games, receiving 3 gold medals. Also that year, when she was only 7-8 years old, she won silver medals in the European U8 girls' rapid and blitz events, causing chess journalist Leonard Barden to comment that "this girl will soon be famous in the world".
In 2023 (at the age of 8), at the European Rapid & Blitz Chess Championship in Zagreb, Bodhana competed with famous players and was among the best in the tournament. In the same year, she achieved the title of female grandmaster.
2024 was a turning point in Bodhana’s career. The Indian-born girl became the youngest person ever selected for the British Chess Olympiad in Budapest, breaking all British age records in the sport . She then went on to win the British Junior Chess Championship, thereby qualifying for international master status.
In July 2025, Bodhana once again surprised the world by becoming the youngest person to reach the female grandmaster standard, surpassing the previous record of Hou Yifan.
Shortly afterwards, at the 2025 British Chess Championship in Liverpool, she defeated Peter Wells and became the youngest female player ever to defeat a grandmaster in standard chess at the age of 10 years, 5 months and 3 days, surpassing the old record of Carissa Yip (10 years, 11 months and 20 days).
This event shocked the international chess community.
Source: https://tuoitre.vn/co-be-10-tuoi-danh-bai-dai-kien-tuong-20250817234136546.htm
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