Ding Liren was spotted fiddling with water hyacinth hours after ceding his world championship title to India’s D Gukesh, who became the youngest chess world champion at 18. He had a smile of contentment on his face. After a gruelling couple of weeks of intense chess spread across 14 games, it all came down to one crucial mistake in the dying stages of the final game that cost the Chinese the match and his world title. Surely, Ding must have thought about it. Top athletes have their own way of battling sporting heartbreaks; Ding, too, has his. Spending some me-time with nature is not the only way. He reportedly played a few trippy team games of ‘Bughouse chess’.

The Indian Express reported that Ding was spotted playing the team variant at chess.com. “Bughouse chess is considered to cater to both chess hangovers and heartbreaks, where four players form teams of two and play on two boards,” the report added.

It generally has the same rules as normal but there is one striking difference. “The captured pieces in bughouse are passed to the teammate on the other board, who can avail of them on their own board. Results are clinched by checkmate or timed out,” the report said.

Ding was believed to have played at least 22 games in the Bughouse Chess. Whether he was completely relaxed or extremely hurt cannot be stressed with certainty as players have resorted to playing this format in both scenarios but one thing is for certain Ding wanted to take his mind off the world championship final.

The 32-year-old has coped a lot of criticism for his mistake in the last game. Former world champion Vladimir Kramnik called it “childish” and the “end of chess”. Magnus Carlsen questioned the quality of the final. The Russian Chess Federation chief requested FIDE to investigate whether Ding “deliberately lost” the final. Gukes, the new champion, meanwhile, basked inn the glory of his success.

At the moment, it looks like Ding is not ready to pay too much heed to what is being said about his mistake or the lack of quality in the final. The journey for the former world champion to regain his footing is not easy. He has a tough road to qualify for the Candidates, but as they say, once a champion, always a champion. If some quiet time with nature or a few rounds of Bughouse chess can bring him back on track, then so be it.