EP 297- IM Carissa Yip on her love for the King’s Indian Defense, Why Levon Aronian is her favorite player and the ups and downs of her first Chess Olympiad.

This week we are joined by the 2021 US Women’s Champion and one of the top junior female players in the world, IM Carissa Yip. I talked with Carissa in  early September, at an interesting juncture in her life- she had just concluded her first Chess Olympiad, and was setting out for California, soon to begin her freshman year at Stanford University. This gave Carissa an opportunity to reflect on her past and future in chess and beyond. We discussed the following questions: What went right (and wrong) for Carissa and the US Women’s Olympiad Team? Why does she love the King’s Indian Defense? How did she get to her current chess level, and what would she need to do to advance even more? How does she plan to balance academics and chess? Plus Carissa told some fun stories involving interactions with GM Levon Aronian, GM Magnus Carlsen, GM Garry Kasparov, and others. Timestamps of topics discussed can be found below. Perpetual Chess Link Fest Sign Up- https://benjohnson.substack.com/ 0:01-  Carissa discusses her day-to-day as she was on the verge of beginning life as a Stanford University freshman.  4:30- How did Carissa prepare for the Women’s Chess Olympiad, where the U.S. team finished tied for third place? How was the event?  Mentioned: GM Melih Khachiyan, GM Alejandro Ramirez  14:00- How did she interact with the team? Mentioned: Levon Trolling, Carissa Yip (Note this is a Chess.com not Chessbase India video (as I said). My mistake):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxqiTZBAWFM 18:00- Carissa discusses her critical win over IM Tania Sachdev in the last round  and her love for the King’s Indian defense.  Mentioned: Sachdev-Yip 2022,    22:00- Perpetual Chess is brought to you in part by Chessable.com. You can check out all of their latest offerings here:  https://www.chessable.com/courses/all/new/ 23:00- What parts of her game is Carissa trying to work on?  Mentioned: Carissa’s Ladies Knight podcast appearance, The Giant Chess Puzzle Book 32:00- Patreon mailbag question: Who are Carissa’s favorite players o