Nakamura Wins 3rd Straight Bullet Brawl As Prodigies Clash

GM Hikaru Nakamura's commanding Bullet Brawl run continued after the now-24-time winner picked up his third straight $400 first prize on Saturday. Facing a field of bullet chess titans including GMs Oleksandr Bortnyk, Nihal Sarin, and Daniel Naroditsky, as well as young guns, IM Andy Woodward, GM Christopher Yoo, and FM Faustino Oro, Nakamura notched 76 wins and three draws en route to a score of 281.

Poland's WGM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya finished as the top-scoring women's player with 98 points ahead of FM Anastasia Avramidou (95) and earned $100 for her efforts. Concurrently, North Macedonian "Macmasterr" procured 71 wins in the community arena to take first place by a healthy margin.

The next Bullet Brawl will commence on Saturday, May 18, 2024, at noon ET/18:00 CEST.

Standings

✅ weekly @gmhikaru won #bulletbrawl post pic.twitter.com/2NqO13F7hM

— Chess.com (@chesscom) May 11, 2024

24 titles, nine second-place finishes, and 33 appearances. The keen observer will notice that Nakamura has come either first or second in every single edition of Bullet Brawl he has entered since the tournament's inception in January 2023. Such is his dominance, and the GM is closing in on a 50 percent win rate despite the tournament drawing in more than 100 titled players every week.

On a mission to go unbeaten for an entire event, Nakamura suffered a frustrating loss at the hands of India's eighth-best player Nihal, who snapped his 10-game winning streak. Using the loss as motivation, it took another 39 games for the king of Bullet Brawl to be beaten again, this time by 15-year-old Turkish sensation GM Ediz Gurel. For Nakamura, mating nets and king hunts were the themes of the day, and despite several losses, he had effectively wrapped up the event by the halfway mark.

Popular streamer GM Eric Hansen also covered the event live on the Chessbrah Twitch channel and produced a fun moment when he "finally" beat Nakamura with four seconds left on the clock.

Although Nakamura, Bortnyk, and Nihal performed as expected and secured podium positions, the Texan prodigy Woodward's fourth-placed finish stood out. Playing against fellow Generation Alpha star Oro, Woodward's ability to capitalize on errors came to the fore as he found a timely discovered check.

127 titled players participated in this week's Bullet Brawl, yet only seven unique winners have been crowned in the event's history. Fascinatingly, no junior has finished first. Having secured the highest placement by a junior during Saturday's event, Woodward appears to be the frontrunner to become the first to win Bullet Brawl. One question remains, however: can Woodward find a way to topple the king of Bullet Brawl?

Bullet Brawl is an exciting new titled arena that features Chess.com's top bullet specialists and takes place weekly on Saturdays. The format is a two-hour arena with a 1+0 time control; the prize fund is $1,000.

Much like Titled Tuesday and Arena Kings, Bullet Brawl often features top GMs, including Hikaru Nakamura, Daniel Naroditsky, Andrew Tang, Tuan Minh Le, and many more!

Previous coverage:

• • Announcing Chess.com Community Bullet Brawl Tournaments
  • Introducing Bullet Brawls And New Arena Options