On the day Chess.com announced several changes to Titled Tuesday, including the retirement of the late tournament, GMs Minh Le and Alexey Sarana became the last players to split the day’s glory. Le was nearly perfect, scoring 10.5 points with only a draw in round nine spoiling a potential 100% score. Sarana only scored 9.5 points but was also able to win without needing tiebreaks. Both victors won their game against GM Magnus Carlsen, who last week became the final player to accomplish a sweep of both Titled Tuesdays on the same day.
Early Tournament
In the field of 443 players, no one ended up coming close to Le, who won by a full 1.5 points. On his way to winning eight straight games at the start, Le took on Carlsen, who gave him one chance to win in their fifth round encounter. It wasn’t an easy win to find, but Le found it nonetheless.
After defeating GM Alexander Grischuk, who started 7/7, in the eighth round, Le never lost the sole lead of the tournament even after his draw in the ninth.
Le had still not clinched the tournament by the time the final round rolled around, however. With Le on 9.5/10, GM Parham Maghsoodloo—who had held Le to the draw—was on 9/10, and GM Jeffery Xiong on 8.5/10. Le took care of business against Xiong, while GM Dmitry Andreikin moved into third place by defeating Maghsoodloo. They reached an equal rook ending, but Andreikin still had passed pawns on opposite sides of the board, and Maghsoodloo ventured his king too far from one of them.
Also moving ahead of Maghsoodloo, who would still finish fourth, was GM Cristobal Henriquez, reaching his second straight podium after finishing third in last week’s late event. After a seemingly innocuous queen move from Sarana, Henriquez ran him over in the middle of the board.
Sarana, of course, would not end his day on that sour note. In the meantime, the remaining early event prizes went to IM Renato Terry in fifth while WFM Nurai Sovetbekova of Kyrgyzstan took home the women’s prize.
August 26 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Rank | Seed | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | 1st Tiebreak |
| 1 | 15 | GM | @wonderfultime | Tuan Minh Le | 3156 | 10.5 | 75 | |
| 2 | 38 | GM | @HVillagra | Cristobal Henriquez | 3017 | 9 | 75 | |
| 3 | 8 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 3183 | 9 | 73 | |
| 4 | 11 | GM | @Parhamov | Parham Maghsoodloo | 3151 | 9 | 72.5 | |
| 5 | 14 | IM | @MITerryble | Renato Terry | 3101 | 9 | 66.5 | |
| 6 | 33 | GM | @Durarbayli | Vasif Durarbayli | 3041 | 9 | 58.5 | |
| 7 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3342 | 8.5 | 81 | |
| 8 | 5 | GM | @GHANDEEVAM2003 | Arjun Erigaisi | 3199 | 8.5 | 80.5 | |
| 9 | 12 | GM | @Grischuk | Alexander Grischuk | 3135 | 8.5 | 74.5 | |
| 10 | 10 | GM | @jefferyx | Jeffery Xiong | 3156 | 8.5 | 74 | |
| 11 | 41 | GM | @Zhigalko_Sergei | Sergei Zhigalko | 2993 | 8.5 | 73 | |
| 12 | 4 | GM | @lachesisQ | Ian Nepomniachtchi | 3206 | 8.5 | 71.5 | |
| 13 | 26 | FM | @snowlord | Ivan Yeletsky | 3030 | 8.5 | 68 | |
| 14 | 17 | GM | @Msb2 | Matthias Bluebaum | 3055 | 8.5 | 65 | |
| 15 | 6 | GM | @Javokhir_Sindarov05 | Javokhir Sindarov | 3143 | 8 | 73 | |
| 16 | 54 | IM | @Losingexperience | Srihari L | 2918 | 8 | 70.5 | |
| 17 | 13 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 3151 | 8 | 69 | |
| 18 | 18 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 3092 | 8 | 68.5 | |
| 19 | 31 | GM | @sergoy | Sergey Drygalov | 3020 | 8 | 68.5 | |
| 20 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3356 | 8 | 66.5 | |
| 74 | 287 | WFM | @madmax011 | Nurai Sovetbekova | 2524 | 6.5 | 63.5 |
Prizes: Le $1,000, Henriquez $750, Andreikin $350, Maghsoodloo $200, Terry $100, Sovetbekova $100.
Late Tournament
As indicated by the lower score, Sarana’s win was bumpier than Le’s. Sarana actually lost as early as round two, but it would be his only loss as he ended up clearing the field of 307. GM Arjun Erigaisi was the one who it seemed might win the final late tournament as he began on 7/7, but his streak did not survive an encounter with Carlsen in round eight.
The eighth round was also where Sarana, who only made a draw in the seventh, truly began his comeback path. After beating IM Alexander Khlebovich in the eighth and GM Daniel Naroditsky in the ninth, it was Sarana’s turn to play Carlsen in the 10th. Unfortunately, their game turned out to be very anticlimactic as Carlsen simply hung a rook at the end.
By this point, Arjun seemed to have righted his ship, winning in the ninth and 10th rounds to retake the sole lead in the tournament. Against GM Hans Niemann in the 10th round, one of the age-old material imbalance questions—three pawns versus a piece—was decided in favor of the pawns. All six of Arjun’s were connected, including passed pawns on the c- and d-files, where Niemann’s king and extra bishop were powerless to stop them.
All Arjun now needed to do to take the tournament was hold a draw against Sarana, who was the only player within half a point of him. After both players at various points achieved an advantageous position, neither was able to convert, and the game seemed headed for a draw. Sarana, not happy to settle for nine points with weak tiebreaks, kept playing on, and Arjun eventually slipped up.
Fortunately for Arjun, he would only fall one place in the standings, finishing second by achieving the best tiebreaks in the group on nine points. Andreikin, Carlsen, and GM Oleksandr Bortnyk rounded out the top five while IM Meri Arabidze won the women’s prize.
August 19 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Rank | Seed | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | 1st Tiebreak |
| 1 | 10 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 3151 | 9.5 | 65 | |
| 2 | 4 | GM | @GHANDEEVAM2003 | Arjun Erigaisi | 3199 | 9 | 79 | |
| 3 | 5 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 3183 | 9 | 75.5 | |
| 4 | 2 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3342 | 9 | 72 | |
| 5 | 13 | GM | @Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 3092 | 9 | 66.5 | |
| 6 | 9 | GM | @FabianoCaruana | Fabiano Caruana | 3147 | 8.5 | 73 | |
| 7 | 38 | GM | @MarkusRagger | Markus Ragger | 2927 | 8.5 | 71 | |
| 8 | 15 | GM | @Elsa167 | Leon Livaic | 3066 | 8.5 | 71 | |
| 9 | 1 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 3356 | 8.5 | 63.5 | |
| 10 | 48 | CM | @Germanovs_Georgijs | Georgijs Germanovs | 2879 | 8.5 | 62.5 | |
| 11 | 24 | GM | @Vaathi_Coming | Aravindh Chithambaram | 3003 | 8 | 73.5 | |
| 12 | 11 | IM | @MITerryble | Renato Terry | 3101 | 8 | 69.5 | |
| 13 | 29 | GM | @Cayse | Martyn Kravtsiv | 2983 | 8 | 69 | |
| 14 | 26 | NM | @Little_Skib | Ethan Sheehan | 2962 | 8 | 66.5 | |
| 15 | 74 | FM | @averageFM | Matyas Palczert | 2776 | 8 | 62 | |
| 16 | 8 | GM | @HansOnTwitch | Hans Niemann | 3138 | 7.5 | 76.5 | |
| 17 | 27 | GM | @Nitzan_Steinberg | Nitzan Steinberg | 2961 | 7.5 | 69.5 | |
| 18 | 28 | IM | @Alexander_Khlebovich | Alexander Khlebovich | 2951 | 7.5 | 68 | |
| 19 | 39 | GM | @Szparu | Miłosz Szpar | 2903 | 7.5 | 67.5 | |
| 20 | 23 | GM | @jcibarra | José Carlos Ibarra Jerez | 3003 | 7.5 | 66.5 | |
| 44 | 72 | IM | @Meri-Arabidze | Meri Arabidze | 2750 | 6.5 | 69.5 |
Prizes: Sarana $1,000, Arjun $750, Andreikin $350 ($700 daily total), Carlsen $200, Bortnyk $100, Arabidze $100.
Titled Tuesday is Chess.com’s weekly tournament for titled players. It begins at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time/17:00 Central European/20:30 Indian Standard Time.
