GM Hikaru Nakamura won his sixth Freestyle Friday on August 8, now three more than anyone else after 29 editions of the event. This day’s top three places were all awarded outright, Nakamura on 10 points, GM Magnus Carlsen on 9.5 points, and GM Oleksandr Bortnyk on nine, while IM Almas Rakhmatullaev took fourth place on tiebreaks, and GM Zhu Jiner won the women’s prize in 24th place.
The key game of the tournament was, of course, Nakamura versus Carlsen. Unsurprisingly, both players began a perfect 6/6. Starting from a surprisingly normal position with five pieces on their typical squares, the game eventually became sharp and tactical. Nakamura basically had to win the game twice.
Nakamura’s perfect run stretched all the way through nine rounds before he finally met his match in GM Amin Tabatabaei, one of Titled Tuesday’s victors this week. With that, Carlsen had now worked his way back into a tie for first after having defeated Rakhmatullaev, GM David Paravyan, and GM Sina Movahed in rounds eight through 10. The eighth-round win was probably most impressive—the Paravyan game was a bit of a mess, and the Movahed game was decided by a one-move blunder, but the Rakhmatullaev game was (for lack of a better word) smooth. Rakhmatullaev gave up some material early and, while there were still some superficial weaknesses Carlsen had to shore up, the game was effectively over by move 17.
The final round thus turned out to be crucial. Fortunately for Nakamura, he was able to defeat GM Shamsiddin Vokhidov without terribly much trouble. Vokhidov never really created any issues before going wrong himself around moves 24-27.
Carlsen wasn’t so lucky and found himself locked up in a standstill with Tabatabaei. They repeated on move 67, allowing Nakamura to secure the tournament. Still, with nobody within a point of him to start the round, Carlsen easily held onto second place with the draw.
And Bortnyk, who had lost to Nakamura in round five and Rakhmatullaev in round seven, survived a wild final-round encounter with Movahed to win his fourth straight game and take third place.
August 8 Freestyle Friday | Final Standings (Top 25)
| Rank | Seed | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | 1st Tiebreak |
| 1 | 1 | GM | Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 2871 | 10 | 69 | |
| 2 | 2 | GM | MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 2830 | 9.5 | 73.5 | |
| 3 | 7 | GM | Oleksandr_Bortnyk | Oleksandr Bortnyk | 2681 | 9 | 70.5 | |
| 4 | 19 | IM | AlmasRakhmatullaev | Almas Rakhmatullaev | 2599 | 8.5 | 72 | |
| 5 | 44 | GM | amintabatabaei | Amin Tabatabaei | 2735 | 8.5 | 65.5 | |
| 6 | 27 | IM | Akewjon | Saidakbar Saydaliev | 2514 | 8.5 | 57 | |
| 7 | 11 | GM | Zhigalko_Sergei | Sergei Zhigalko | 2622 | 8 | 68.5 | |
| 8 | 37 | IM | chenxiaoyuer | Ryo Chen | 2456 | 8 | 54.5 | |
| 9 | 3 | GM | Sina-Movahed | Sina Movahed | 2733 | 7.5 | 72 | |
| 10 | 14 | GM | Shield12 | Shamsiddin Vokhidov | 2612 | 7.5 | 66.5 | |
| 11 | 16 | GM | dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 2587 | 7.5 | 65.5 | |
| 12 | 28 | FM | Turboplombir | Sergey Sklokin | 2486 | 7.5 | 63.5 | |
| 13 | 48 | GM | DeviatkinAndrey | Andrey Devyatkin | 2406 | 7.5 | 63.5 | |
| 14 | 51 | FM | SaqoChess_Coach | Sargis Manukyan | 2372 | 7.5 | 62 | |
| 15 | 13 | IM | siciliannaga | Arif Abdul Hafiz | 2602 | 7.5 | 62 | |
| 16 | 31 | FM | Yan_Dyomin2010 | Yan Doymin | 2488 | 7.5 | 61 | |
| 17 | 43 | FM | ChessMaster2011_1 | Jake Shanty | 2421 | 7.5 | 57 | |
| 18 | 33 | GM | Gareth-Bale11 | Mamikon Gharibyan | 2460 | 7.5 | 56.5 | |
| 19 | 115 | CM | F7m_08 | Famil Kishiev | 2215 | 7 | 69.5 | |
| 20 | 30 | FM | ilqar_74 | Rustam Rustamov | 2477 | 7 | 65.5 | |
| 21 | 40 | IM | SahibSinghKnight | Sahib Singh | 2431 | 7 | 62 | |
| 22 | 67 | FM | Orest_Vovk | Orest Vovk | 2281 | 7 | 57 | |
| 23 | 81 | WIM | amylazy | Phuong Hanh Luong | 2250 | 7 | 56.5 | |
| 24 | 52 | GM | jinbojinbo | Jiner Zhu | 2371 | 7 | 56.5 | |
| 25 | 95 | CM | WMirBV | Miroslav Baturin-Vinogradov | 2244 | 7 | 54.5 |
Prizes: Nakamura $400, Carlsen $250, Bortnyk $150, Rakhmatullaev $100, Zhu $100.
Freestyle Friday is Chess.com’s weekly tournament dedicated to Freestyle Chess for titled players. The tournament begins at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time/17:00 Central European/20:30 Indian Standard Time.
