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| “ | As one of the strongest grandmasters in the world, it's my pleasure to host this channel to share my knowledge and love of chess. | ” |
―Hikaru Nakamura | ||
| “ | Welcome back everyone for todaaaay video! We are going to be taking a look at... |
” |
―Hikaru Nakamura's intro on most of his videos | ||
Christopher Hikaru Nakamura (born: December 9, 1987), known online as GMHikaru, is a Japanese-American Chess Grandmaster, YouTuber and Twitch streamer. A chess prodigy, at age 15 years and 79 days, he became the youngest American to earn the title of Grandmaster.
History[]
Hikaru Nakamura was born in Hirakata, Osaka Prefecture, Japan, to an American mother, Carolyn Merrow Nakamura, a classically trained musician and former public school teacher and a Japanese father, Shuichi Nakamura. Nakamura has an older brother, Asuka. When he was two years old, his family moved to the United States, and, a year later in 1990, his parents divorced. He began playing chess at the age of seven and was coached by his Sri Lankan stepfather, FIDE Master and chess author Sunil Weeramantry. Weeramantry began coaching the Nakamura brothers after noticing Asuka Nakamura winning the National Kindergarten Championship in 1992, which led to him developing a relationship with their mother.
In 2011, Nakamura won the Tata Steel Grandmaster A tournament in Wijk aan Zee. His opponents included world #1 and defending champion Magnus Carlsen, former world champion Viswanathan Anand, world #2 Levon Aronian, and former world champion Vladimir Kramnik,
In 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, chess moved online, with Nakamura playing an important role in popularizing it. He was one of the people that witnessed penguinz0's iconic 6-move win against famed Twitch streamer xQcow in the online chess tournament Pogchamps.
Chess records[]
Nakamura has set several "youngest-ever" records in U.S. chess history, including:
- Youngest to defeat an International Master in a USCF-rated game (10 years, 0 months); later surpassed by Praveen Balakrishnan at 9 years 29 days, and then by Awonder Liang at 8 years 118 days;
- Youngest to defeat a Grandmaster in a USCF-rated game (10 years, 117 days; later surpassed by Fabiano Caruana at 10 years, 61 days); recently surpassed by Awonder Liang at 9 years 112 days;
- Youngest International Master (13 years, 2 months); later surpassed by Ray Robson at 13 years, 1 month, and then by Samuel Sevian at 12 years, 10 months.
Gallery[]
