Bullet Brawl Oct. 25, 2025: Sindarov Fends Off 7 Challengers, Wins First Bullet Brawl Title

GM Javokhir Sindarov collected his first Bullet Brawl title and the event’s $400 first prize after outpacing seven challengers on Saturday. Sindarov posted a score of 159 and eclipsed IM Yoseph Taher, GM Oleksandr Bortnyk, and IM Reza Mahdavi for the top spot.

The second, third, and fourth place finishers will receive $250, $150, and $100 respectively for their efforts, while IM Karina Ambartsumova will receive $100 for being the highest-scoring women’s player.

The next edition of Bullet Brawl will commence on Saturday, Nov. 1, at noon ET/17:00 CEST.

Standings

(Full final standings here.)

An air of sadness hung over this week’s Bullet Brawl as the absence of the recently passed GM Daniel Naroditsky was felt. “Danya” won 32 Bullet Brawls and finished on the podium many times over the last three years.

Along with being one of the kindest, most passionate, and instructive personalities in chess, Naroditsky will be remembered as one of the greatest bullet chess players of all time. GM Alireza Firouzja commented: “I’ll never forget our late night bullet matches over the past 10 years. He was the only person in the world who regularly beat me in those.”

Words can’t describe how heartbreaking the passing of my coach, Daniel Naroditsky, is.

Just a few days before the Grand Swiss tournament in Uzbekistan which took place a little more than a month ago, I asked him to coach and accompany me.

Even though it was a last-minute… pic.twitter.com/fmTVu98WyO

— Alireza Firouzja (@AlirezaFirouzja) October 24, 2025

Naroditsky will be sorely missed, and his games forever cherished. I am honored to have had the pleasure of covering his many victories and annotating his frequently spectacular games.

136 titled players from more than 30 countries participated on Saturday, with each hoping to have their name etched onto the all-time leaderboard with a victory. The arena was an exhibition of intuition, pace, and tactical prowess, and was a dogfight from start to finish.

Sindarov, Taher, Bortnyk, Mahdavi, and GMs David Paravyan, Ediz Gurel, Haik Martirosyan, and Sina Movahed emerged as early frontrunners after breaking away from the pack. However, no one was able to keep up with the world number-24 from Uzbekistan.

Sindarov dished out punishment in the first half of the event, scoring 25.5/28 and winning several of his games in fewer than 25 moves.

Against IM Jonatan Bakalchuk, Sindarov gave up a bishop for a venomous queenside attack, following up with a game-ending rook sacrifice two moves later.

Sindarov then toppled the German GM Dmitrij Kollars with a tactical shot after the latter’s overzealous 22.Na5??. See if you can spot the two-move combination that won Sindarov an exchange below.

Although the second half of Sindarov’s run was less dominant, he still managed to score several key wins against former Bullet Brawl winners including Gurel and Bortnyk. The winner’s 3/3 score against Gurel is particularly impressive, especially considering one of these wins was confirmed in just 21 moves.

As his closest challenger, the Indonesian IM Taher fought valiantly to try and secure his second Bullet Brawl title but fell four points short, largely due to conceding three lengthy draws in the last quarter of the arena.

With this being his first title, Sindarov joins four other one-time winners on the all-time leaderboard, the top of which is still dominated by GM Hikaru Nakamura and Naroditsky.

All-Time Leaderboard