You just can’t get involved with chess much earlier than Dmitry has. In the coldness of his childhood city in Northern Siberia, he was only 3(!) years old when he picked up the royal game from his father, a Russian candidate master in his own right. His progress was tantalizing: by age 7 he reached 1st category (about 1800-1900 national rating), and by age 14 he was already an IM. His early successes brought him to the experienced hands of Kasparov’s coach IM Alexander Nikitin.

Having benefited from this relationship, Dmitry still emphasizes on the importance of independent studying in chess as even more important than having a coach. An autodidact who was a perfect ‘A’ student at school and a math and sciences scholar; he combined that success with chess progress, culminating in winning the world championships under age 18. Not surprisingly, he defines his style as a logical, positional one.

Jakovenko has a good fighting spirit, and high-level competition is not foreign to him: Among other events, he was a participant in the 2005 super-final of the Russian championship, finishing with a solid plus score.