Duda Rings In New Year With Tournament Victory
The first Titled Tuesday tournaments of 2023 were won by GMs Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Dmitrij Kollars on January 3. Duda won the first event of the year outright with a score of 10/11. Kollars followed with a 9.5/11 performance and won on tiebreaks.
The year also began with the largest Titled Tuesday fields since moving to two tournaments a day last February: 542 players in the early tournament and 447 in the late one were records for each time slot.
Early Tournament
Duda began a perfect 8/8 and never lost a game on his way to victory. In rounds five through eight, he won all four games against players who finished in the top 16 in the standings. After drawing GM Hikaru Nakamura in round nine, Duda retained his half-point lead with a win over GM Vladimir Fedoseev.
The player half a point behind Duda was GM Maksim Chigaev, who stayed in range with a win over GM Jeffery Xiong. Earlier, in round eight, Chigaev scored this win with Black over GM Magnus Carlsen.
In the final round, however, Duda held his ground against Chigaev and secured the tournament victory. Nakamura climbed into second place by flagging Carlsen.
January 3 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score |
| 1 | 6 | GM | @Polish_fighter3000 | Jan-Krzysztof Duda | 3117 | 10 | |
| 2 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3217 | 9.5 | |
| 3 | 28 | GM | @Fandorine | Maksim Chigaev | 2978 | 9.5 | |
| 4 | 46 | GM | @sergiochess83 | Sergey Grigoriants | 2925 | 9 | |
| 5 | 10 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 3033 | 9 | |
| 6 | 20 | GM | @Indianlad | S.L. Narayanan | 2986 | 9 | |
| 7 | 27 | GM | @shimastream | Aleksandr Shimanov | 2967 | 9 | |
| 8 | 12 | GM | @Jospem | Jose Martinez | 3040 | 8.5 | |
| 9 | 29 | GM | @Shield12 | Shamsiddin Vokhidov | 2944 | 8.5 | |
| 10 | 32 | GM | @abhidabhi | Abhimanyu Puranik | 2950 | 8.5 | |
| 11 | 17 | GM | @dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 3009 | 8.5 | |
| 12 | 49 | GM | @ActorXu | Xu Yi | 2912 | 8.5 | |
| 13 | 34 | GM | @DanielDardha2005 | Daniel Dardha | 2951 | 8.5 | |
| 14 | 23 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 2983 | 8.5 | |
| 15 | 44 | IM | @MITerryble | Renato Terry | 2923 | 8.5 | |
| 16 | 14 | GM | @mishanick | Alexey Sarana | 3014 | 8 | |
| 16 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3163 | 8 | |
| 18 | 7 | GM | @Bigfish1995 | Vladimir Fedoseev | 3064 | 8 | |
| 19 | 79 | IM | @PLAYER_2006_M | Mukhiddin Madaminov | 2834 | 8 | |
| 20 | 95 | FM | @JimDiGrease | Ivan Zemlyanskii | 2815 | 8 | |
| 33 | 234 | IM | @Vesper2018 | Anastasia Bodnaruk | 2604 | 7.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Duda won the first $1,000 of the year with his victory. Nakamura took $750 for second place while Chigaev earned $350 for third. GM Sergey Grigoriants won $200 for fourth place, GM Oleksandr Bortnyk $100 for fifth, and IM Anastasia Bodnaruk the $100 women's prize.
Late Tournament
The late tournament was good for German players as not only did Kollars win, but GM Matthias Bluebaum came in second place.
Carlsen's rough day—although "rough" is relative, as he scored 16.5/22 with two top-17 finishes on the day—continued as he lost two more games in the late tournament, the first one of them against Kollars in the sixth round. (He also lost to GM Daniel Dardha after missing a mate-in-two in a queen endgame in round eight.)
Kollars, of course, ran toward victory with that win. After another win in the seventh round to reach a 7/7 score, he drew three times in a row. That allowed GM Aleksandr Lenderman not only to catch up but to take the lead with 9/10.
Kollars, however, defeated Lenderman to reclaim the tournament edge in the final standings.
Bluebaum, meanwhile, checkmated GM Andrew Tang to finish the tournament on a five-game winning streak and glide into second place.
January 3 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score |
| 1 | 13 | GM | @GM_dmitrij | Dmitrij Kollars | 3040 | 9.5 | |
| 2 | 15 | GM | @Msb2 | Matthias Bluebaum | 3016 | 9.5 | |
| 3 | 44 | GM | @Masmos97 | Masoud Mosadeghpour | 2941 | 9.5 | |
| 4 | 16 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 3009 | 9 | |
| 5 | 7 | GM | @Jospem | Jose Martinez | 3051 | 9 | |
| 6 | 30 | GM | @AlexanderL | Aleksandr Lenderman | 2946 | 9 | |
| 7 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3154 | 8.5 | |
| 8 | 24 | GM | @DanielDardha2005 | Daniel Dardha | 2984 | 8.5 | |
| 9 | 17 | GM | @Fandorine | Maksim Chigaev | 2978 | 8.5 | |
| 10 | 37 | GM | @penguingm1 | Andrew Tang | 2935 | 8.5 | |
| 11 | 56 | GM | @Cayse | Martyn Kravtsiv | 2861 | 8.5 | |
| 12 | 38 | GM | @Zkid | Steven Zierk | 2926 | 8.5 | |
| 13 | 20 | GM | @VincentKeymer | Vincent Keymer | 2977 | 8 | |
| 14 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3186 | 8 | |
| 15 | 14 | GM | @exoticprincess | Baadur Jobava | 3019 | 8 | |
| 16 | 34 | GM | @TigrVShlyape | Gata Kamsky | 2909 | 8 | |
| 17 | 78 | IM | @I_am_Javi | Ernesto Javier Fernandez Guillen | 2794 | 8 | |
| 18 | 5 | GM | @BogdanDeac | Bogdan Daniel Deac | 3060 | 8 | |
| 19 | 40 | CM | @stollenmonster | Egor Baskakov | 2894 | 8 | |
| 20 | 41 | GM | @jcibarra | José Carlos Ibarra Jerez | 2875 | 8 | |
| 26 | 88 | IM | @nurgyulsalimova | Nurgyul Salimova | 2745 | 7.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Kollars won the $1,000 first-place prize while Bluebaum took home the $750 for second. GM Masoud Mosadeghpour in third place claimed $350, and Xiong took $200 for fourth place. The $100 prizes went to GM Jose Martinez for fifth place and IM Nurgyul Salimova for the highest women's score.
Titled Tuesday is a Swiss tournament held every week for titled players on Chess.com. Two 11-round tournaments are contested every Tuesday at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time/17:00 Central European and 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time/23:00 Central European.
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.
