More to chess than chess: Being a top pro, the Hou Yifan way

bombay: Perched on the balcony of the iconic royal stag opera domiciliate House hither, Hou Yifan stood alongside her teammates after they checked out of the Global Chess League as champions.

They exchanged laughs, waved at the crowd below and, after taking several shots at it, uncorked a few champagne bottles. The buzz, for those fleeting moments, wasn’t awash with chess.

It was something Hou wasn’t too used to in the company of her five Alpine SG Pipers teammates – three among them Candidates material (R Praggnanandhaa, Fabiano Caruana and Anish Giri) – during the 10-day event.

“My teammates here, I see them discussing chess before the games, after the games, everywhere,” said Hou, laughing.

Is it too much chess?

“Well, to me, yes,” she said. “But to them, absolutely not.”

The second-highest all-time rated female player (only behind legendary Judit Polgar), the Chinese was the youngest women’s world champion at 16, and, at 31, remains the No.1 female player.

Among the best there has ever been in the business. Yet, in a rare sight in professional chess, not too consumed by it.

For instance, two days into the league that had Rapid games begin in the evening, Hou, on her first visit to Mumbai, was eager to see the Gateway of India in the morning. She planned to ask her teammates, but thought they might be resting after some late-night chess indulgence — a commonality in most players — and, because they didn’t have a good start to the tournament, it was “better to keep it a bit more silent”. She took her mother for the sightseeing trip, a short walk from the hotel.

Ask 20-year-old Praggnanandhaa, who has visited a fair few cities as a top chess player, if he has ever made attempts to see places in his free time around or during tournaments, and pat came the reply: “No, no, no… I actually don’t (step out) during tournaments, unless the organisers insist on it. Otherwise, never stepping out of the hotel.”

This isn’t to say what’s right or wrong, but simply how differently Hou, a multiple-time women’s world champion, looks at and treats chess.

“You can stay with chess for 3-4-5 decades. You only play chess, and your life is with chess. Not only on the chess board, but with chess people, chess tournaments. And if you think about a place or a city, you relate to chess,” she said.

“But, to me, this is not the kind of lifestyle I enjoy the most. For me, chess is just one part. Yes, you focus (on tournaments). But when you travel, you see the culture, you talk with people. There are some other things that make life more colourful. And I feel like that has somehow shaped myself as a person. Like, more vivid.”

Hou has carried this “more vivid” philosophy for a few years, even putting her booming chess career on pause for a while to pursue an academic path. She completed her BA in international relations at Peking University in Beijing, was awarded a Rhodes scholarship at Oxford University and became a professor in her mid-twenties.

“I’m the kind of person that doesn’t want to restrict or limit myself to certain things. So I think a Plan B, or a back-up, is important. But I did this not because I felt like you should do this. I simply wanted to follow my heart and experience life in a broader way,” she said.

“I know some other players just take chess as a profession, as a job. So for them, it’s all about, ‘I want to work hard, 13 hours per day’. But to me, that’s not the case.”

It may not be her “job”, but Hou doesn’t call chess a “hobby” either, because “maybe it’s a little bit unprofessional”. She still feels a “really deep connection” with the sport, yet it’s not her “entire life”.

In 2017, Hou decided against defending her women’s world title because she did not agree with the format. The Chinese, thus, said she fully understands Norwegian star Magnus Carlsen stepping away from the World Championship throne, because he wants to “enjoy chess as a sport”. “But a sport that tries to provoke your creativity, tries to create some beauty, and not only, like, follow the machine, the moves. My case was similar.”

‘Divya’s personality a plus’

The 31-year-old, who beat Koneru Humpy to retain her world crown in 2011, felt the next generation of women chess players “didn’t grow up strong enough”, leading to a gap. She, however, sees “some really promising ones” in the younger crop currently.

That includes India’s 20-year-old Women’s World Cup winner Divya Deshmukh. After that historic triumph, Divya battled hard with Hou before losing at the Women’s Speed Chess Championship.

“I think I’ve played her mainly in Blitz,” said Hou of Divya. “She showed a really great performance at the World Cup, and also a couple of other events. She’s very, very good. But, to be honest, I still don’t know that much about her technical skills, chess-wise. It’s important that she has the passion for chess. She won certain tournaments that could boost her confidence, and she also looks like she enjoys playing chess. Her personality is also a plus. Because you need to enjoy what you’re doing.”

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