GM Ediz Gurel added an eighth Bullet Brawl title to his ever-growing trophy cabinet on Saturday after piecing together a performance that saw him take out the two-hour titled arena by a margin of 12 points. The Turkish phenom suffered only minor hiccups on his way to winning the $400 first prize and left a host of esteemed brawlers in his wake.
GM Haik Martirosyan, FM Dincer Tasdogen, and GM Andrew Tang collected the $250, $150, and $100 prizes for second through fourth, while WFM Veronika Shubenkova narrowly beat out FM Anastasia Avramidou to win the $100 best women’s prize.
The next edition of Bullet Brawl will commence on Saturday, Dec. 20, at 12 p.m. ET/18:00 CET.
Standings
| Rank | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score |
| 1 | GM | gurelediz | Ediz Gürel | 3259 | 162 | |
| 2 | GM | Micki-taryan | Haik Martirosyan | 3207 | 147 | |
| 3 | FM | yavrukurt40 | Dincer Tasdogen | 3190 | 143 | |
| 4 | GM | penguingm1 | Andrew Tang | 3179 | 142 | |
| 5 | GM | hansen | Eric Hansen | 3117 | 130 | |
| 6 | GM | Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 3174 | 127 | |
| 7 | GM | wonderfultime | Tuan Minh Le | 3127 | 126 | |
| 8 | FM | Bryanl106 | Bryan Enming Lin | 3045 | 123 | |
| 9 | FM | Turboplombir | Sergey Sklokin | 3074 | 122 | |
| 10 | IM | jacky72 | Mihnea Costachi | 2903 | 117 | |
| 11 | GM | mitrabhaa | Mitrabha Guha | 3153 | 117 | |
| 12 | GM | Zhigalko_Sergei | Sergei Zhigalko | 3095 | 112 | |
| 13 | IM | Kacparov | Kacper Drozdowski | 3039 | 112 | |
| 14 | IM | johnathan113 | Johnathan Bakalchuk | 2941 | 110 | |
| 15 | GM | rasmussvane | Rasmus Svane | 2927 | 106 | |
| 16 | FM | TrimitziosP7 | Petros Trimitzios | 2903 | 104 | |
| 17 | IM | Boundless_Strike | Shamil Arslanov | 2894 | 104 | |
| 18 | FM | TheRabbit19 | Andrei Negrean | 2829 | 101 | |
| 19 | FM | Rud_2008 | Rudolf Pashikyan | 2865 | 100 | |
| 20 | IM | M1711 | Mads Vestby-Ellingsen | 2782 | 98 |
(Full final standings here.)
156 titled players locked horns on Saturday for two hours of pacey, hack n’ slash chess. More than 10 participants possessed bullet ratings over 3000, and four former winners joined the fray: GMs Tang, Oleksandr Bortnyk, Tuan Minh Le, and Gurel.
Despite the illustriousness of the field, no one could hold a candle to Gurel. For the fourth time in six weeks, he finished on top of the leaderboard with another score over 160.
Too good. Too fast.
Ediz Gurel claims his THIRD #BulletBrawl Arena win in the past month 🇹🇷👏 pic.twitter.com/Lh2Mrmxjvo
— Chess.com (@chesscom) December 13, 2025
Popular streamer and constituent of Chessbrah, GM Eric Hansen, also played and impressively, finished fifth place. A remarkable queen sacrifice was a memorable moment for Hansen, along with a victory over GM Magnus Carlsen.
In the first game of the arena, a showdown between the would-be first and second place-getters transpired, and it was Martirosyan who came out on top after he cleverly flagged Gurel in a rook vs. rook and two pawns ending.
Gurel would have his revenge at the end of a 10-game unbeaten streak when Martirosyan missed a middlegame combination, leaving him saddled with exploitable weaknesses.
Over the course of the next 30 minutes, Gurel stamped his authority on the arena, and only fell on three occasions to Hansen, Tang, and GM Guha Mitrabha. Against Israeli IM Alon Mindlin, Gurel paid tribute to GM Alexander Alekhine by triple stacking his pieces on the h-file.
Although it wasn’t strictly “Alekhine’s gun,” due to the queen being wedged between the rooks, the battery prompted Mindlin to lay down his sword.
Several games later, Gurel added to his highlight reel by showing off another famous tactical concept, zwischenzug, while playing IM Kacper Drozdowski.
Boasting a firm lead, Gurel quashed any chances of a Martirosyan comeback after winning a pawn against the Armenian and carefully constructed a path to promotion for his passed b-pawn.
With this being his eighth career win and sixth in 2025, Gurel is bolting towards the top three spots on the all-time leaderboard.
| Player | All-Time Wins | 2025 Wins | 2024 Wins | 2023 Wins |
| GM Hikaru Nakamura | 49 | 15 | 19 | 15 |
| GM Daniel Naroditsky | 32 | 8 | 14 | 10 |
| GM Andrew Tang | 14 | 10 | 4 | 0 |
| GM Oleksandr Bortnyk | 13 | 3 | 7 | 3 |
| GM Ediz Gurel | 8 | 6 | 2 | 0 |
| GM Jose Martinez | 4 | 0 | 1 | 3 |
| GM Nihal Sarin | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| GM Sam Sevian | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| GM Yagiz Erdogmus | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| GM Alireza Firouzja | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| GM Tuan Minh Le | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| IM Yoseph Taher | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| IM Reza Mahdavi | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| GM Jeffery Xiong | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| GM Javokhir Sindarov | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
One thing that could stifle Gurel’s Bullet Brawl progress for the remainder of the year is his confirmed participation in the 2025 World Rapid and Blitz Chess Championships.
Based on his recent form, it is anticipated that Gurel will shake up both of these events despite him being seeded outside of the top 100 (Gurel rarely plays FIDE-rated rapid and blitz tournaments and thus, his ratings in these time controls lag behind his classical rating).
How to review games?
The games from this week’s Bullet Brawl can be found here.
Bullet Brawl is an exciting arena featuring Chess.com’s top bullet specialists. It takes place weekly on Saturdays. The format is a two-hour arena with a 1+0 time control; the prize fund is $1,000. Like Titled Tuesday and Arena Kings, Bullet Brawl often features top GMs, including Hikaru Nakamura, Andrew Tang, Tuan Minh Le, and many more!
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