U.S. Chess Championship.

Fabi has won the last 2 years & is in it again. The games start in 22 minutes (round 1). If Hans can win this he'd need a score of about 8 of 11 & it would put him in the top 10 on the fide rankings. He's #16 right now. I'm picking 1 of these 2 players to win: Fabi, Wesley.

Can Fabi threepeat? Stay tuned.

Players this year:

Fabiano Caruana,

Wesley So,

Hans Niemann,

Levon Aronian

Awonder Liang,

Samuel Sevian,

Ray Robson,

Grigoriy Oparin,

Sam Shankland,

Abhimanyu Mishra,

Andy Woodward,

Dariusz Swiercz

Average fide rating is 2684.

I just found out that Fabi has won the last 3 years! Can he win the 4th title in a row? Bobby Fischer is the last to win 4 in a row.

Fabi has 4 titles & Wesley has 3. I'm thinking Aronian might be past his prime, otherwise I'd pick him as the favorite. I know he recently won the Vegas classic freestyle but I think these 11 games are more grueling.

Found what i was looking for. Nevermind.

Hans is on the edge of losing to Oparin in round 2. So is Fabi against Woodward.

Both Fabi & Hans fought back & drew their games.

Ahem..... Hans is up to #13 now in the world rankings after wins the last 2 games. Hans, Wesley, & Fabi are tied for 1st with 3.5 out of 5. Levon is in 4th with 3 points.