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Grandmaster Krishnan Sasikiran became the second Indian ever after Viswanathan Anand to join the 2700 ELO rating club in the FIDE ranking list announced January 1, 2007.
Sasikiran gained a whopping 25 points in October-December 2006 with the major chunk coming from the recently concluded Asian Games where the Chennai-based player helped his team win the gold medal with a huge margin.
The sharp escalation helped Sasikiran also move to his career-best 21st ranking in the world. In the previous list, Sasikiran was ranked 31st.
The world rankings also saw some major changes at the top with Russian Vladimir Kramnik expectedly jumping to the third spot on 2766 points ahead of Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan and Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine.
Veselin Topalov remained atop despite his dismal show in the last few months. From 2813 in October, Topalov now stands at 2783 which means a decline of 30 points coming in just two events, the reunification world championship match against Kramnik and a forgettable Essent 2006 tournament.
Anand remained at No 2 on 2779 points without playing a single rated game since the last list.
The Indian stalwart, however, has a busy season coming up in 2007 when he starts with the Wijk Aan Zee Super Grandmasters tournament and later goes back to Linares and the Melody Amber blindfold and rapid tournament. (Agencies)
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