A 10-year-old chess prodigy from northwest London has beaten a chess grandmaster, becoming the youngest person to earn the woman international master title.
Earlier this month, Bodhana Sivanandan, from Harrow, became the youngest female player to defeat a chess grandmaster at the 2025 British Chess Championship.
The International Chess Federation shared on their X account that Bodhana "pulled off the win against 60-year-old Grandmaster Peter Wells in the last round of the 2025 British Chess Championships in Liverpool".
"Sivanandan's victory at 10 years, five months and three days beats the 2019 record held by American Carissa Yip (10 years, 11 months and 20 days)," the social media post noted.
In 2024, Bodhana was believed to have become the youngest person ever to represent England internationally in any sport after being selected for the England Women's Team at the Chess Olympiad in Hungary.
Previously, her father Siva, informed the BBC that he had no idea where his daughter got her talent from, as neither he nor his wife – both engineering graduates – are any good at chess.
Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain, and the rank is held for life.
Bodhana's new title, woman international master, is the second-highest-ranking title given exclusively to women, second only to woman grandmaster.
She confessed that chess makes her feel "good" and helps her with "lots of other things like maths, how to calculate".
Bodhana Sivanandan started playing chess during the pandemic lockdown, when she was just five.
