Australian chess grandmaster (born 2000)
Temur Kuybokarov (Uzbek: Temur Qo’yboqarov; previously Temur Igonin; born July 22, 2000) is an Uzbekistani-Australian chess player. He was awarded the title of Grandmaster by FIDE in 2019.[1] He qualified as a grandmaster at age 18 - the first from Western Australia - and then in 2020 became Australian chess champion. Born in Tashkent,[2] he represented Uzbekistan until transferring to Australia in 2018.
Chess career
Kuybokarov was taught chess at the age of five by his mother and first coach, Tatyana Igonina.[citation needed]
At the 2010 Asian Youth Championships, held in Beijing, China, he finished in a tie for first place in the U10 section, taking the bronze medal on tiebreak score.[3] At the age of 11, Kyubokarov (then Igonin) defeated World Champion Viswanathan Anand in a simultaneous exhibition, a feat which received worldwide attention.[4][5]
In 2016, he moved with his family to Australia,[6] where he lives in Perth, Western Australia. In December of the same year, Kuybokarov won the 8th Penang Open.[7][8] He transferred his national federation from Uzbekistan to Australia in 2018.[9] He won the 2017 and 2019 Australian Open Championship.[10][11][12]
Kuybokarov achieved the norms required for the title of grandmaster in the following events: Australian Open 2017; Aeroflot Open 2017; and Gold Coast Open 2018. He also scored the fourth norm at the 2018 Abu Dhabi Masters.[13]
In January 2019 Kuybokarov was named one of Western Australia's 50 Rising Stars.[6] In December Kuybokarov won the 2019 Australasian Masters GM norm tournament in Melbourne with a score of 8½/9 points.[14] The next month Kuybokarov won the Australian Championship in Sydney,[15] the first West Australian player in the 135-year history of the event to win the title.[16]
In November 2021 Kuybokarov scored 5.5/11 in the FIDE Grand Swiss in Riga, Latvia and won the Mersin Open in Turkey with 7.5/9.
In February 2022 Kuybokarov won the Perth Open for the first time.
References