Karjakin Wins Oct. 27 Titled Tuesday
GM Sergey Karjakin won the October 27 Titled Tuesday tournament, his first-ever Titled Tuesday victory. The Russian grandmaster edged out GMs Alireza Firouzja and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov on tiebreak.
The tournament, an 11-round Swiss at a 3+1 time control, had a total of 617 participants. There was a surprising leader after eight rounds: Vietnamese GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son (@crescentmoon2411), who had profited from an overly risky winning attempt by GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov (@ChessWarrior7197) of Uzbekistan.
The live broadcast of the tournament.
For unknown reasons, Firouzja joined only from round two so coming in second place after that was pretty impressive. His win against Kazakhstani GM Rinat Jumabayev (@Jumbo) in round nine was nice:
Karjakin defeated Nguyen in the final round after winning a piece in the middlegame. That was a moment of mutual tactical lapses:
A much better game was Karjakin's win in the penultimate round against Ukrainian GM Oleksandr Bortnyk, an expert of the Alekhine Defense. Black's plan with ...a5 and ...Bb4 didn't really work, and after that Karjakin outplayed his opponent with the precision and clarity GM Bobby Fischer was famous for.
It was funny to see Karjakin spending a few seconds on his 38th move (where rook takes works as well), double-checking the prettiest finish.
October 20 Titled Tuesday | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Score | SB |
| 1 | GM | @SergeyKarjakin | Sergey Karjakin | 9.5 | 67 | |
| 2 | GM | @Firouzja2003 | Alireza Firouzja | 9.5 | 64 | |
| 3 | GM | @Azerichess | Shakhriyar Mammadyarov | 9.5 | 59.75 | |
| 4 | GM | @TigrVShlyape | Gata Kamsky | 9 | 65.75 | |
| 5 | GM | @Sychev_Klementy | Klementy Sychev | 9 | 61.75 | |
| 6 | GM | @ChessWarrior7197 | Nodirbek Abdusattorov | 9 | 61 | |
| 7 | GM | @GOGIEFF | Anton Korobov | 9 | 59 | |
| 8 | GM | @amintabatabaei | Amin Tabatabaei | 9 | 56 | |
| 9 | GM | @RaunakSadhwani2005 | Raunak Sadhwani | 8.5 | 58 | |
| 10 | GM | @exoticprincess | Baadur Jobava | 8.5 | 56 | |
| 11 | GM | @Bigfish1995 | Vladimir Fedoseev | 8.5 | 54.25 | |
| 12 | GM | @vladislavkovalev | Vladislav Kovalev | 8.5 | 52.25 | |
| 12 | GM | @RD4ever | Rustam Khusnutdinov | 8.5 | 52.25 | |
| 14 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 8.5 | 50.75 | |
| 15 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 8.5 | 48.25 | |
| 16 | GM | @crescentmoon2411 | Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son | 8.5 | 47.75 | |
| 17 | GM | @Sibelephant | Vladislav Artemiev | 8.5 | 46.25 | |
| 18 | GM | @GigaQuparadze | Giga Quparadze | 8.5 | 43.25 | |
| 19 | GM | @Jumbo | Rinat Jumabayev | 8 | 53.75 | |
| 20 | GM | @BilodeauA | Kirill Alekseenko | 8 | 51.75 |
Karjakin won the $750 first prize. Firouzja won $400, Mamedyarov $150, and GM Gata Kamsky (@TigrVShlyape) $100 for coming fourth. The $100 prize for the best female player went to GM Alexandra Kosteniuk (@ChessQueen).
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) with a weekly prize fund of $1,600.
