Carlsen Wins Final Clash To Take Tuesday From Nakamura
GM Tuan Minh Le won the early edition of Titled Tuesday on May 7 with a score of 9.5/11, while the rest of Tuesday's highlights belonged to GM Magnus Carlsen. Carlsen first played a4/a5 on move one and Ra3/Ra6 on move two in all 11 games of the early tournament—good enough for 8.5 points and 14th place—and then won the late tournament in come-from-behind fashion after winning in the final round against GM Hikaru Nakamura. It ended up being the rare 9.5-point victory that did not require tiebreaks.
Early Tournament
Le looked good to best the field of 717 for most of the early event, starting with 6/6 to build a sole lead with 8.5 points through nine rounds. Unfortunately for Le, disaster struck in the 10th round, where he spent a long time successfully defending a pawn-down endgame until he hung a second pawn to GM Nihal Sarin with 65...Rd4.
With that, Nihal took the sole lead in the tournament, leaving Le in a pack of four players half a point behind. But Nihal would settle for a 20-move draw with Black in the 11th round against GM Bogdan-Daniel Deac, which allowed Le and GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda to catch up.
Duda did so against GM Alireza Firouzja, but his tiebreaks only put him in third place. It was Le, after using his beloved London System to launch a successful checkmating attack against GM Thomas Beerdsen, who reclaimed his first-place position.
As far as we know, the "Meadow Hay Mistake" variation of the Ware Opening is not a beloved opening of Carlsen's, but the guy does love his memes. He won seven games with just one loss despite picking an opening even worse than the Bongcloud—the computer evaluation between 1.a4 e5 2.Ra3 and 1.e4 e5 2.Ke2 is closer than you might expect, but at least in the Bongcloud, White can often expect Black to reciprocate with 2...Ke7. Of course, Carlsen's opponents were under no obligation to take the free exchange either, and some opponents didn't even give themselves the chance.
Magnus is having a bit of fun in Titled Tuesday 🤠pic.twitter.com/vqlI4X8AIf
— Chess.com (@chesscom) May 7, 2024
Carlsen's shenanigans didn't end up affecting the prizes, except perhaps in some tiebreak calculations, as none of his opponents finished in the top 40. And if Magnus could score 8.5 points hanging a rook on move two, how many points could he score playing normally? That question would be answered in the later tournament.
May 7 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | Tiebreak 1 |
| 1 | 10 | GM | @wonderfultime | Tuan Minh Le | 3126 | 9.5 | 76 | |
| 2 | 4 | GM | @nihalsarin | Nihal Sarin | 3159 | 9.5 | 74.5 | |
| 3 | 9 | GM | @Polish_fighter3000 | Jan-Krzysztof Duda | 3126 | 9.5 | 67.5 | |
| 4 | 11 | GM | @BogdanDeac | Bogdan Daniel Deac | 3120 | 9 | 78 | |
| 5 | 13 | GM | @DanielNaroditsky | Daniel Naroditsky | 3076 | 9 | 70 | |
| 6 | 26 | GM | @OparinGrigoriy | Grigoriy Oparin | 2998 | 9 | 69.5 | |
| 7 | 36 | GM | @DrVelja | Velimir Ivic | 2986 | 9 | 68.5 | |
| 8 | 21 | GM | @Msb2 | Matthias Bluebaum | 3046 | 9 | 68 | |
| 9 | 27 | GM | @DominguezOnYoutube | Leinier Dominguez Perez | 2993 | 9 | 67.5 | |
| 10 | 52 | GM | @Genghis_K | Federico Perez Ponsa | 2961 | 9 | 67 | |
| 11 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3216 | 8.5 | 79.5 | |
| 12 | 7 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 3118 | 8.5 | 75.5 | |
| 13 | 47 | GM | @kleinebeer98 | Thomas Beerdsen | 2964 | 8.5 | 73.5 | |
| 14 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3207 | 8.5 | 67.5 | |
| 15 | 15 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 3059 | 8.5 | 66.5 | |
| 16 | 28 | GM | @vugarrasulov | Vugar Rasulov | 2991 | 8.5 | 65.5 | |
| 17 | 17 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 3042 | 8.5 | 65.5 | |
| 18 | 23 | GM | @Baku_Boulevard | Rauf Mamedov | 3018 | 8.5 | 61.5 | |
| 19 | 3 | GM | @Firouzja2003 | Alireza Firouzja | 3188 | 8 | 75.5 | |
| 20 | 44 | GM | @Nitzan_Steinberg | Nitzan Steinberg | 2947 | 8 | 72.5 | |
| 59 | 337 | IM | @Fh2411 | Le Thao Nguyen Pham | 2573 | 7.5 | 57.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Le won $1,000 for first place, while Nihal and Duda settled for $750 and $350, respectively. Deac's nine points tied six other players for fourth place, but his massive tiebreak edge earned him $200. The $100 prizes went to GM Daniel Naroditsky in fifth place and women's leader IM Le Thao Nguyen Pham.
Late Tournament
A group of 524 players tried their luck at the day's second tournament, but its course was dominated by Carlsen and Nakamura. However, neither of them was the last perfect player after Nakamura was held to a draw in round three by GM Krikor Mekhitarian, while GM Leinier Dominguez defeated Carlsen in round six.
Instead, it was Dominguez, GM Oleksandr Bortnyk, and GM Alexey Sarana who ran out to 6/6 starts, but that state of affairs quickly subsided after Dominguez and Bortnyk drew each other in round seven while Nakamura beat Sarana.
Then, out of four players on 6.5/7 points, only Nakamura won in round eight, but his draw in the ninth round reintroduced a multiway tie for first with two rounds to go. After round 10 saw Nakamura yet again be the only player in the group to win, he seemed poised to claim his 11th Titled Tuesday of the year.
However, five players were right behind him, and the opponent he ran into, needing a win to guarantee first place, was Carlsen. Under the eye of Game Review, it wasn't necessarily the cleanest game. They played a traditional opening, the Berlin Defense, but didn't go down the usual drawing lines. Carlsen soon had a large advantage and even missed a mate-in-one before Nakamura worked things back into a drawn rook endgame.
White to play. If you find the right move you’re better than Magnus and Hikaru 🤣 pic.twitter.com/rm5srcD51e
— Benjamin Bok (@GMBenjaminBok) May 7, 2024
Carlsen continued to claw forward and was eventually up two pawns, but it was the known theoretical draw of f- and h-pawn. Two pawns are still two pawns, though, and Carlsen would find a win once Nakamura gave him the opportunity.
As it turned out, it was now also Carlsen's turn to be the only player in a group on the same score to win their game. Firouzja and GM Matthias Bluebaum drew their game against each other, while GMs Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Luca Moroni Jr. lost theirs (against different opponents, of course).
As a result, Carlsen won outright while Nakamura settled for third place, as Sarana beat Moroni and ended up with the better tiebreaks over Nakamura despite losing their one-on-one matchup.
May 7 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | Tiebreak 1 |
| 1 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3217 | 9.5 | 66.5 | |
| 2 | 13 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 3068 | 9 | 80 | |
| 3 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3222 | 9 | 73.5 | |
| 4 | 18 | GM | @h4parah5 | Jaime Santos Latasa | 3035 | 9 | 70.5 | |
| 5 | 3 | GM | @Firouzja2003 | Alireza Firouzja | 3194 | 9 | 69.5 | |
| 6 | 23 | GM | @ChristopherYoo | Christopher Woojin Yoo | 3005 | 9 | 68 | |
| 7 | 40 | FM | @Iball95 | Igor L. Vakhlamov | 2923 | 9 | 64.5 | |
| 8 | 5 | GM | @BogdanDeac | Bogdan Daniel Deac | 3126 | 9 | 63 | |
| 9 | 14 | GM | @GM_dmitrij | Dmitrij Kollars | 3052 | 9 | 63 | |
| 10 | 11 | GM | @Msb2 | Matthias Bluebaum | 3055 | 9 | 58.5 | |
| 11 | 56 | GM | @moro182 | Luca Moroni Jr | 2916 | 8.5 | 76.5 | |
| 12 | 8 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 3079 | 8.5 | 75 | |
| 13 | 50 | GM | @ContrVersia | Valery Kazakouski | 2922 | 8.5 | 69 | |
| 14 | 37 | GM | @baki83 | Etienne Bacrot | 2945 | 8.5 | 67.5 | |
| 15 | 57 | GM | @AlexeiShirov | Alexei Shirov | 2916 | 8.5 | 66 | |
| 16 | 26 | GM | @ChessLover0108 | Mahammad Muradli | 2971 | 8.5 | 65 | |
| 17 | 32 | GM | @Durarbayli | Vasif Durarbayli | 2954 | 8.5 | 61.5 | |
| 18 | 64 | GM | @ChessWarrior7197 | Nodirbek Abdusattorov | 3138 | 8.5 | 54 | |
| 19 | 22 | GM | @DominguezOnYoutube | Leinier Dominguez Perez | 3017 | 8 | 78.5 | |
| 20 | 16 | GM | @Sanan_Sjugirov | Sanan Sjugirov | 3021 | 8 | 74 | |
| 56 | 120 | IM | @Meri-Arabidze | Meri Arabidze | 2728 | 7 | 62.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Carlsen won $1,000 for his efforts, Sarana earned $750, and Nakamura $350. Fourth place and $200 ended up going to GM Jaime Santos Latasa, while Firouzja finished fifth for $100. IM Meri Arabidze won the $100 women's prize.
Titled Cup Standings
Nakamura lost a slight bit of ground to Duda and Sarana in the Titled Cup standings, but nothing of major concern to him.
The women's standings continue to be the site of most interest, as GM Aleksandra Goryachkina now leads second-place IM Karina Ambartsumova by 4.5 points. GM Alexandra Kosteniuk is only 5.5 points back of Goryachkina as well after jumping ahead of Arabidze into third place. Kosteniuk has played in only 19 tournaments so far, giving her one more chance to gain a full tournament's worth of points instead of merely improving on past scores.
GM Denis Lazavik, GM Gata Kamsky, and WCM Veronika Shubenkova continue to hold safe leads in the juniors, seniors, and girls sections.
Open
| # | Username | Score | Player |
| 1 | @Hikaru | 192.0 | GM Hikaru Nakamura |
| 2 | @Polish_fighter3000 | 182.0 | GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda |
| 3 | @mishanick | 180.5 | GM Alexey Sarana |
| 4 | @Jospem | 177.0 | GM Jose Martinez |
| 5 | @jefferyx | 174.5 | GM Jeffery Xiong |
Women
| # | Username | Score | Player |
| 1 | @Goryachkina | 134.5 | GM Aleksandra Goryachkina |
| 2 | @karinachess1 | 130.0 | IM Karina Ambartsumova |
| 3 | @ChessQueen | 129.0 | GM Alexandra Kosteniuk |
| 4 | @Meri-Arabidze | 122.0 | IM Meri Arabidze |
| 5 | @Sanyura | 115.0 | IM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya |
| 4 | @Meri-Arabidze | 122.0 | IM Meri Arabidze |
Other Category Leaders
Juniors: GM Denis Lazavik (171.5 points)
Seniors: GM Gata Kamsky (164.0 points)
Girls: WCM Veronika Shubenkova (99.0 points)
The Titled Cup fantasy game Chess Prophet continues as well. Current standings can be found here. (Login required.)
Titled Tuesday is Chess.com's weekly tournament for titled players, with two tournaments held each Tuesday. The first tournament begins at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time/17:00 Central European/20:30 Indian Standard Time, and the second at 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time/23:00 Central European/2:30 Indian Standard Time (next day).
Nathaniel Green is a staff writer for Chess.com who writes articles, player biographies, Titled Tuesday reports, video scripts, and more. He has been playing chess for about 30 years and resides near Washington, DC, USA.
