Born in
Camaná, he learned how to play chess at the age of five. In 1980 he won the
World Infant Cup in
Mazatlàn, Mexico. In 1984 Granda won the
Pan American Junior Chess Championship in
Lima. By the age of 19, he had obtained the title of Grandmaster by the
FIDE, the World Chess Federation, after surpassing the chess rating of 2500. He finished 1st with
Bent Larsen at
Mar del Plata 1993. He is a five-time
chess champion of Peru, winning in 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, and 2002. Granda won the 4th
American Continental Championship at
Cali 2007 on
tie-break between the five first-place finishers at 8/11. This victory qualified him for the
Chess World Cup 2007 where he lost his first round match to
Arkadij Naiditsch ½–1½. In 2008 he won the 2nd Iberoamerican Championship in
Linares, Spain by defeating in the final
Eduardo Iturrizaga 2½-1½. In December 2009, he tied for 1st–4th with
Georg Meier,
Viktor Láznička and
Kiril Georgiev in the 19th Magistral
Pamplona Tournament. In 2010, he won the 5th Torneo Abierto in
Guadalajara. In 2011 he tied for 2nd–7th with
Aleksander Delchev,
Ivan Šarić,
Pablo Almagro Llamas,
Maxim Turov and
Mihail Marin the 31st Villa de
Benasque Open. In the
Chess World Cup 2013 in
Tromsø, Norway, Granda reached round four, after knocking out
Hrant Melkumyan,
Peter Leko and
Anish Giri. He was however defeated by
Fabiano Caruana with two losses. Julio Granda played for Peru in the
Chess Olympiads of 1986, 1988, 1990, 1992, 1994, 1996, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2010 and 2014. Granda tied for first place with
Samuel Shankland,
Alexander Shabalov,
Rafael Leitao,
Isan Reynaldo Ortiz Suarez and
Alan Pichot at the
9th American Continental Chess Championship in 2014. Thanks to a better tiebreak score he took the gold medal. To earn a spot in the
FIDE World Cup, he played a
rapid playoff with the five other players who finished joint first. He came second with 3/5 and qualified for the
World Cup 2015. Here he knocked out
Alexandr Fier in the first round,
Cristobal Henriquez Villagra in the second, then he lost to
Radoslaw Wojtaszek in the third. In 2017, Granda won the 50+ section of the
World Senior Chess Championship in
Acqui Terme, Italy. ==Notable chess games==