The rest of the day after Game 9 of the World Chess Championship, Gukesh and Grzegorz Gajewski went for a walk on the beach in Singapore. There the Polish instructor and the Indian teenager saw some people trying to bungee jump. That’s when Gajewski had his eureka moment.
“He told me, ‘If you win the world championships, I’ll go bungee jumping.’ “I am personally very afraid of heights. That’s why I said, ‘I will join you too,'” laughed Gukesh at the press conference after becoming the world champion.
Now that the treaty has been made, it must be respected. Come Saturday, both Gukesh and Gajewski will take turns to defy gravity. As Gukesh said: “I am waiting to jump off the bridge.”
Gajewski has become a reliable sherpa for Gukesh since Kishore rose to the top of chess and became world champion. It’s a partnership that dates back to January 2023 when the pair were brought together by Viswanathan Anand, who himself relied on Gajewski as second for many World Championship fights.
At big-ticket events like the World Championships, players have an entire team of seconds. Some are invited to training camps for more specific roles, such as training games. Others help build a repertoire of opening ideas, which players can play on the board in games. Most of Gukesh’s team is together while Gukesh is preparing for the candidates competition in Toronto.
At the World Championships, Gukesh was easily the better prepared fighter on the chess board. In almost every match, he managed to confuse Ding Liren in the early stages – where the impact of seconds is greatest – forcing the now former world champion to burn time on the clock thinking about a response.
Once he became the world champion, Gukesh revealed the name of his second. Besides Gajewski and mind guru Paddy Upton, there were five grandmasters who helped Gukesh: Pentala Harikrishna, Radoslaw Wojtaszek (Poland), Jan-Krzysztof Duda (Poland), Jan Klimkowski (Poland) and Vincent Kemmer (Germany). Anand was the guru, always needed Gukesh on hand for life advice.
Gajewski broke down how the backroom team helped Gukesh plan the chess coup.
The initial ideas for Gukesh’s games came from four members: Harikrishna, Radek (Radoslav Wojtazek), Kemmer and Gajewski. Harikrishna, Radek and Gajewski were on the team even before they were candidates. At that time, Klimkowski was also a member of the team helping the team with analytical work. Kemmer was the last to join.
“With Vincent, we didn’t know what he would really bring to the team. So we were kind of taking a risk. But it paid off because he brought a lot of interesting ideas,” Gajewski told The Indian Express.
Preparing for the Time Problem
Jan-Krzysztof Duda – one of the best blitz players in the world – was brought on board to play a “hundred pair training match” against Gukesh. And to play fast-paced games, so Gukesh can be prepared to think quickly when time is crunched. In essence, Duda and Gukesh have been secretly playing online training games against each other since April.
“He’s a team player! With a capital P. He’s not like most of us who sit there with an engine. He’s like, wake him up in the middle of the night, give him a position, he’ll just play. And he can play for hours.
“This allowed Gukesh to gain some experience in the lines of play. But to improve his playing skills in a very short time, which could be useful during crunch time. We wanted to make sure that when it came to crunch time, Gukesh would not collapse. Although we often Focused on the opening, we didn’t forget about other things and other areas of the game,” Gajewski said.
Between April and the World Championship qualifiers, Team Gukesh held four training camps in Poland and India.
The Polish influence on the team is clearly courtesy of Gajewski, who has assumed the role Peter Hein Nielsen played for Magnus Carlsen – “the middle man who connects the whole team”.
If you thought it was tough to be a challenger for the throne of World Champion, think for a second.
“It basically means for three weeks, you don’t sleep more than six hours. Even though technically you can sleep more than six hours (on certain days), you don’t sleep that long. There’s a lot of pressure, a lot of work to do. You’re alert. Gotta stay,’ Gajewski shrugged.
The complexities of working on the toughest test in sports required the team to work around the clock. The team therefore chose Malaga, Spain, as the base for the rest of the team, while Gajewski joined Gukesh in Singapore.
“When they went to sleep (in Spain), we woke up (in Singapore),” he pointed out.
After all that grinding, Gajewski can now sleep for more than six hours. But the thought of jumping off the bridge on Saturday keeps him awake.
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