My short-term goal,” Abhimanyu Mishra had said over phone from Budapest last month, “is to become the world’s youngest Grandmaster [GM].”

On June 30, he reached that goal. The U.S. player of Indian origin has become the youngest GM in history, at 12 years, four months and 25 days. He beat the record of Sergey Karjakin, who had completed his GM title in 2002 at 12 years and seven months.

Abhimanyu scored his third and final norm by defeating India’s Leon Mendonca in the penultimate round of the Vezerkepzo GM tournament at Budapest.

He had reached the Hungarian capital along with his father Hemant a few months ago on a one-way ticket, on a mission to complete the GM title.

Abhimanyu secured a performance rating higher than 2600 over nine rounds, which also constitutes a GM norm. Having stayed in Budapest, he won his first GM norm in the April Vezerkepzo tournament and the second at the May 2021 First Saturday tournament.

Abhimanyu Mishra: Breaking records

Abhimanyu, notably, had earlier broken the record of India’s R Praggnanandhaa to become the youngest ever International Master.

Abhimanyu had won the title when he was just 10 years, 9 months, and 20 days old in 2019, going past Praggnanandhaa who was 10 years, 10 months, and 19 days old when he clinched the International Master title.  

Breaking Karjakin’s record of 19 years:

On August 12, 2002, Sergey Karjakin had secured the Grandmaster Title at the age of 12 years and 7 months, becomes the youngest ever Grandmaster.

With Abhimanyu breaking his record, Karjakin stated that he was a little dejected on the record being broken but accepted that 20 years is a long time for the record not to be broken.

Karjakin wished Abhimanyu the best and assured that it will be a nice start to his big career.