Watch out! Hikaru Nakamura is a teenage record-breaker. Once upon a time, Hikaru tagged along to tournaments with his father, the popular coach and NM Sunil Weeramantry and whiz kid older brother Asuka. Quickly, Hikaru rose to the top, over-shadowing his talented brother. He became the youngest master in American history at 10, and the youngest American GM at 15 (breaking Bobby Fischer’s record).

As a kid, Hikaru was extremely emotionally involved in his results. When he lost, his opponent was very aware that Hikaru was unhappy. This hyper-competitive streak was also a key to Hikaru’s success. Hikaru’s style is aggressive,tricky and relentless.

He once said in an interview “there is no point of taking draws.” He plays for blood, and because of this, he’s a chess sponsor’s dream.

As a young prodigy, Hikaru favored aggressive openings like the Sicilian Najdorf, 1.e4 and the King’s Indian Defense (the same openings which Bobby Fischer was loyal to all his life). In the summer of 2002, Hikaru started to broaden his opening repretoire. He added 1.d4 and 1.c4 to his repretoire. Soon thereafter, he tried new openings for black too, like the Slav defense against 1.d4 and the Scandinavian against 1.e4. In 2005 though, Hikaru’s experimentation went to a radical extreme. Several times, he tried the strange queen foray 1.e4 c5 2. Qh5?!-against strong GMs. One can only imagine that this was a combination of psychological thrust (think you can beat me just cause I bring my queen out early?) and teenage angst. (Look at me!)
His first major international breakthrough was at the 2004 World Championship in Libya. Hikaru advanced through the brutal knockout tournament three rounds, into the sweet sixteen. This was further than anyone could have imagined. Despite his professional level, Hikaru has no official coach, and prefers to keep his ideas to himself.

Soon after his amazing result in Libya, Hikaru became the 2005 U.S Champion. He was only sixteen years old at the time.

Hikaru is easily the best blitz player in America. Minutes after a winning the two week long 2005 U.S Chess Championship, he was playing blitz chess with a top U.S. rival, Gata Kamsky. In 2006, he was at it again with blitz legend Maxim Dlugy. Both times, Hikaru accumulated crowds who were as taken as a rapt audience at the climax of a James Bond movie. In each match, Hikaru won the majority of the games. Hikaru is the highest rated player on the Internet Chess Club, with hundreds of other Grandmasters at his heels. He plays under the nickname, “Smallville”, his favorite T.V show. His specialty is “bullet” games, in which each side has only a minute or two to finish the game. Surprisingly, Hikaru concocts beautiful combinations even with such low time limits.

“Some wonder why I play so much on ICC. Honestly, the reason that I play so much is that I strive for perfection.”