Judit Polgár is a Hungarian chess grandmaster. Polgár is, by far, the strongest female chess player in history. In 1991, she achieved the title of Grandmaster at the age of 15 years and 4 months, the youngest person to do so until then. Polgár is ranked 58th in the world FIDE ratings list with an Elo rating of 2693, the only woman on FIDE’s Top 100 Players list, and has been ranked as high as eighth (in 2005). She has won or shared first in the chess tournaments of Hastings 1993, Madrid 1994, León 1996, U.S. Open 1998, Hoogeveen 1999, Siegman 1999, Japfa 2000, and the Najdorf Memorial 2000. Polgár is the only woman to have won a game from a reigning world number one player. 

Viswanathan Anand is an Indian chess Grandmaster and former World Chess Champion. Anand has won the World Chess Championship five times and was the undisputed World Champion from 2007 to 2013. Anand was the FIDE World Rapid Chess Champion in 2003 and is widely considered the strongest rapid player of his generation. Anand became India’s first Grandmaster in 1988. He was also the first recipient of the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award in 1991–92, India’s highest sporting honour. In 2007, he was awarded India’s second-highest civilian award, the Padma Vibhushan, making him the first sports-person to receive the award in Indian history. Anand has won the Chess Oscar six times. Anand is one of six players in history to break the 2800 mark on the FIDE rating list, and, in April 2007 at the age of 37, he became the world number one for the first time.

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