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Carlsen Takes Tuesday Fresh Off Freestyle

Carlsen Takes Tuesday Fresh Off Freestyle

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NathanielGreen
Staff
| 4 | Chess Event Coverage

GMs Magnus Carlsen and Parham Maghsoodloo were your Titled Tuesday winners on February 11. Carlsen won outright on 10.5 points and Maghsoodloo also won outright, with 10 points. It was the first win of 2025 for both of them, although each also won a Titled Tuesday last December. 

Early Tournament

Carlsen is in the middle of the Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam, but still found time to dominate the early Titled Tuesday proceedings.

In a field of 907, he reached a perfect 7/7 score with a win over GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (who would be back). Carlsen made no outright mistakes and reached a two-pawn-up rook ending. Vachier-Lagrave hung on for a little while and even regained material equality, but Carlsen's advantage was never in doubt thanks to his passed pawns.

Carlsen had Black against GM Hikaru Nakamura in his next game, and his 100% score went away with a draw. But that was it for anything less than a win for Carlsen as he took the final three games.

To clinch the tournament, Carlsen played an even better game than against Vachier-Lagrave, almost a perfect one, and won following GM Aleksandar Indjic's not-obvious blunder on move 34. After 13 seconds, Carlsen found the most accurate response, and five moves later he had won the game and the tournament.

Coming in second place was Vachier-Lagrave, who won on time with a slightly better position over GM Jose Martinez in the final round, reaching 9.5 points and finishing ahead of GM Dmitry Andreikin on tiebreaks. A more solid and decisive game from Vachier-Lagrave came the round before when he defeated GM S.L. Narayanan.

Vachier-Lagrave's success was his first after being signed by the Vitality esports team.

For his part, Andreikin had recovered from a loss all the way back in round four to get into third place. After a draw in the 10th round, he won against GM Mateusz Bartel to wrap up his tournament.

Rounding out the prize winners were GM Denis Lazavik in fourth place, GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda in fifth, and GM Alexandra Kosteniuk in 56th, the highest-ranking woman.

February 11 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)

Rank Seed Fed Title Username Name Rating Score Tiebreak
1 2 GM @MagnusCarlsen Magnus Carlsen 3260 10.5 77
2 12 GM @LyonBeast Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 3156 9.5 79
3 16 GM @FairChess_on_YouTube Dmitry Andreikin 3101 9.5 70
4 4 GM @DenLaz Denis Lazavik 3193 9 78
5 11 GM @Polish_fighter3000 Jan-Krzysztof Duda 3133 9 77
6 25 GM @GMBenjaminBok Benjamin Bok 3084 9 77
7 75 GM @Beca95 Aleksandar Indjic 2983 9 76.5
8 5 GM @HansOnTwitch Hans Niemann 3184 9 76
9 7 GM @nihalsarin Nihal Sarin 3150 9 74.5
10 1 GM @Hikaru Hikaru Nakamura 3295 9 73
11 10 GM @NikoTheodorou Nikolas Theodorou 3174 9 72.5
12 20 GM @Msb2 Matthias Bluebaum 3076 9 71
13 15 GM @Oleksandr_Bortnyk Oleksandr Bortnyk 3108 9 70.5
14 23 GM @Annawel Jules Moussard 3072 9 70
15 65 GM @Matibar Mateusz Bartel 3003 8.5 73.5
16 8 GM @mishanick Alexey Sarana 3127 8.5 71.5
17 53 GM @ckgchess Cem Kaan Gokerkan 3005 8.5 71.5
18 36 IM @DonkyDonkyDonkey Eray Kilic 3048 8.5 70.5
19 19 GM @BogdanDeac Bogdan-Daniel Deac 3075 8.5 70
20 32 GM @Indianlad S.L. Narayanan 3056 8.5 69
56 186 GM @ChessQueen Alexandra Kosteniuk 2792 8 54

(Full final standings.)

Prizes: Carlsen $1,000, Vachier-Lagrave $750, Andreikin $350, Lazavik $200, Duda $100, Kosteniuk $100.

The early Titled Tuesdays have been joined by more than 900 players almost all year, but the next Titled Tuesday to hit 1,000 participants will award prizes to the top 30 players.

Late Tournament

You can always recover from a slow start. The top two players (out of 581) by the end of the late tournament, Maghsoodloo and GM Sam Sevian, scored a combined 0.5/2 in the first round. It was Maghsoodloo who lost, but he responded by ripping off 10 straight victories. On the flip side, third-place GM Oleksandr Bortnyk started with a perfect 8/8, then managed just two draws in the final three rounds. Because of the other two's slow starts, none of the three played any of the others in the tournament.

Maghsoodloo finally joined the tournament lead in the 10th round, taking out GM Benjamin Bok.

The tournament then hung on the result of the ensuing game between Maghsoodloo and GM Hans Niemann, the only players with a 9/10 score. Niemann started off with the edge, but Maghsoodloo gradually turned the tide until he was two pawns up in a rook ending. Unlike the earlier game between Carlsen and Vachier-Lagrave, Maghsoodloo kept both pawns until the game ended.

Niemann was able to hold fifth place regardless, but Sevian passed him with a smooth win over GM David Anton.

Another notable performance came from IM Mai Narva, who finished in 17th place, the highest any woman has finished yet this year and winning the $100 prize.

February 11 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)

Rank Seed Fed Title Username Name Rating Score Tiebreak
1 7 GM @Parhamov Parham Maghsoodloo 3128 10 65
2 6 GM @Konavets Sam Sevian 3124 9.5 62.5
3 8 GM @Oleksandr_Bortnyk Oleksandr Bortnyk 3108 9 78.5
4 13 GM @Jospem Jose Martinez 3074 9 73.5
5 1 GM @HansOnTwitch Hans Niemann 3184 9 71
6 12 GM @Msb2 Matthias Bluebaum 3076 9 71
7 30 GM @Matibar Mateusz Bartel 3003 9 66
8 2 GM @NikoTheodorou Nikolas Theodorou 3174 9 65.5
9 24 GM @ChristopherYoo Christopher Woojin Yoo 3030 9 63
10 9 GM @GMBenjaminBok Benjamin Bok 3084 8.5 75
11 31 GM @moro182 Luca Moroni Jr 2979 8.5 71.5
12 59 GM @Byniolus Zbigniew Pakleza 2909 8.5 68
13 10 GM @BogdanDeac Bogdan-Daniel Deac 3075 8.5 67.5
14 15 GM @tptagain David Anton Guijarro 3061 8.5 66.5
15 145 FM @Batko_2010 Gleb Scheglov 2726 8.5 61.5
16 42 IM @tacticthunder Dimitris Alexakis 2954 8 75
17 108 IM @bulletteemo Mai Narva 2740 8 70
18 35 GM @Zhigalko_Sergei Sergei Zhigalko 2973 8 68.5
19 63 IM @Kosak12 Jakub Kosakowski 2909 8 68.5
20 43 GM @GMAkobianSTL Varuzhan Akobian 2935 8 65.5

(Full final standings.)

Prizes: Maghsoodloo $1,000, Sevian $750, Bortnyk $350, Martinez $200, Niemann $100, Narva $100.

Grand Prix Standings

Nakamura regained the top spot in the Titled Tuesday Grand Prix standings, as everyone's worst scores are now going uncounted. Six of the top eight players remain from last week, with Martinez and Niemann replacing GM Jeffery Xiong and IM Kacper Drozdowski.

Rk Username Score Title Name
1 @Hikaru 89.0 GM Hikaru Nakamura
2 @Jospem 87.5 GM Jose Martinez
3 @Msb2 87.0 GM Matthias Bluebaum
4 @OparinGrigoriy 85.0 GM Grigoriy Oparin
5 @HansOnTwitch 85.0 GM Hans Niemann
6 @BogdanDeac 85.0 GM Bogdan-Daniel Deac
7 @tptagain 84.0 GM David Anton
8 @NikoTheodorou 83.5 GM Niko Theodorou

IM Karina Ambartsumova continues to lead in the women's standings. Here too, six of the players return from last week; Kosteniuk and WIM Maria Teresa Jimenez Salas are the new ranking players.

Rk Username Score Title Name
1 @karinachess1 67.0 IM Karina Ambartsumova
2 @anasta10 63.0 FM Anastasia Avramidou
3 @rollercoaster29 60.0 WFM Kalyani Sirin
4 @Flawless_Fighter 58.0 IM Polina Shuvalova
5 @Sanyura 53.5 IM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya
6 @ChessQueen 47.0 GM Alexandra Kosteniuk
7 @teresin05 47.0 WIM Maria Teresa Jimenez Salas
8 @Meri-Arabidze 46.0 IM Meri Arabidze

Seniors (born 1975 or earlier), juniors (born 2009 or later), and girls (born 2005 or later) do not have SCC places on the line, but there will be cash prizes in each of these categories as well. The current leaders are:

Seniors: GM Alex Rustemov (@alexrustemov), 75.5 points

Youth: IM Ilan Schnaider (@IlanSchnaider), 70.0 points

Girls: WFM Kalyani Sirin (@rollercoaster29), 60.0 points

Titled Tuesday

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).

NathanielGreen
Nathaniel Green

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.

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