Titled Tuesday: Nakamura Back To Winning Ways
GM Hikaru Nakamura returned as the winner of Titled Tuesday on February 2. The American grandmaster was the only player to score 10/11 and finished ahead of GMs Jeffery Xiong, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.
This week's Titled Tuesday tournament had a total of 811 participants, the highest number in six months. It was an 11-round Swiss with a 3+1 time control.
The live broadcast of the tournament.
As in recent weeks, Nakamura suffered an early loss in the tournament—this time in the third round. However, in this edition it was the only flaw in an otherwise perfect event. He finished with eight straight wins, and the victims included GMs Matthias Bluebaum, Eric Hansen, Vachier-Lagrave, and Dmitry Andreikin.
The game with Hansen was spectacular, as the Canadian grandmaster and Chessbrah streamer threw everything but the kitchen sink toward his opponent. By the way, could it be that this game is theoretically relevant for the 3...g6 Ruy Lopez?
A long and tough battle was Nakamura's game with Vachier-Lagrave, who played shortly after a disastrous Tata Steel Chess Tournament. The Frenchman, who lost three times with his Najdorf in Wijk aan Zee, chose the Caro-Kann for this game. His mistake came only deep in the endgame:
Like last week, Xiong finished in a tie for second place. In the final round, the 20-year-old grandmaster from Texas defeated the 18-year-old Dutch IM Liam Vrolijk, who has been doing well in Titled Tuesdays lately. Last week, and also on November 24, Vrolijk finished in 10th place.
This week the Dutchman came in 14th, but he could have shared second. Xiong ended up having the strongest nerves:
Feb. 2 Titled Tuesday | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Score | SB |
| 1 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 10 | 75 | |
| 2 | 10 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 9.5 | 69.5 | |
| 3 | 26 | GM | @ChessWarrior7197 | Nodirbek Abdusattorov | 9.5 | 68.25 | |
| 4 | 2 | GM | @LyonBeast | Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | 9.5 | 65 | |
| 5 | 18 | GM | @Chopper1905 | Mustafa Yilmaz | 9 | 59 | |
| 5 | 17 | IM | @renatoterrylujan | Renato Terry | 9 | 59 | |
| 7 | 25 | GM | @Sanan_Sjugirov | Sanan Sjugirov | 9 | 55.5 | |
| 8 | 15 | GM | @Man-Chuk | Manuel Petrosyan | 9 | 54.75 | |
| 9 | 20 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 9 | 54.5 | |
| 9 | 34 | GM | @erichansen | Eric Hansen | 9 | 54.5 | |
| 11 | 72 | GM | @Fandorine | Maksim Chigaev | 9 | 53.5 | |
| 12 | 9 | GM | @EvgenyT | Evgeny Tomashevsky | 9 | 51.5 | |
| 13 | 42 | GM | @Smirnov_Pavel | Pavel Smirnov | 8.5 | 54.25 | |
| 14 | 63 | IM | @LiamVrolijk | Liam Vrolijk | 8.5 | 52.75 | |
| 15 | 36 | GM | @Beca95 | Aleksandar Indjic | 8.5 | 51.75 | |
| 16 | 37 | GM | @Paralinch | Daniil Lintchevski | 8.5 | 50.25 | |
| 16 | 32 | IM | @Rud_Makarian | Rudik Makarian | 8.5 | 50.25 | |
| 18 | 69 | GM | @bocah_sakit | Novendra Priasmoro | 8.5 | 48.75 | |
| 19 | 62 | GM | @Sam_ChessMood | Samvel Ter-Sahakyan | 8.5 | 47.75 | |
| 20 | 14 | GM | @Annawel | Jules Moussard | 8.5 | 46.25 |
(Full final standings here.)
Nakamura won $750 for first place, Xiong $400 for second, Abdusattorov $150 for third, and MVL $100 for fourth. The $100 prize for the best female player went to GM Alexandra Kosteniuk (@ChessQueen), who scored 8/11.
Titled Tuesday is Chess.com's weekly tournament for titled players. It starts each Tuesday at 10 a.m. Pacific time (19:00 Central Europe).
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
Peter's first book The Chess Revolution is out now!
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