U.S. Champion Caruana Dominates Titled Tuesday

GMs Fabiano Caruana and Vladimir Fedoseev were the winners of Titled Tuesday on November 15, both doing so outright without needing tiebreaks. Caruana reached the coveted 10.5/11 score in the early tournament, only drawing in round five. Fedoseev won late with 10/11 after placing fourth early. GM Alireza Firouzja also finished in the top five in both events.

Early Tournament

Caruana has placed in Titled Tuesday several times this year but finally obtained his first victory with a crushing performance against the typically strong Titled Tuesday competition: His last four victories came against GM Jose Martinez, Fedoseev, GM Hikaru Nakamura, and Firouzja. His only draw came vs. GM Kirill Alekseenko.

The last player with a perfect score was actually Martinez. He hit 7/7 before running into Caruana, who took the sole tournament with the win in an opening that once was extremely common among top grandmasters but is now seen relatively rarely: the Zaitsev Variation of the Ruy Lopez.

Caruana then defeated Fedoseev in round nine, taking a full-point lead, which is rarely seen so early in Titled Tuesday. No fewer than nine players were tied for second, and one of them was the always hellishly tough Nakamura, who had the first move to boot. Caruana outlasted him too.

Oftentimes, that would be it, with a short draw to come in round 11. But now Caruana had to face Firouzja, who could create a tie at the top of the leaderboard with a win. No draw, then, and indeed, Caruana completed his masterclass with a quick dismantling of Firouzja’s Modern Defense/King’s Indian Defense.

Second place actually ended up going to GM Bogdan Daniel Deac with a 9.5/11 score after he defeated Martinez in the final round.

November 15 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)

Number	Rk	Fed	Title	Username	Name	Rating	Score	SB
1	12		GM	@FabianoCaruana	Fabiano Caruana	3087	10.5	72.5
2	9		GM	@BogdanDeac	Bogdan Daniel Deac	3035	9.5	54.75
3	15		GM	@mishanick	Alexey Sarana	3029	9	56.25
4	8		GM	@Bigfish1995	Vladimir Fedoseev	3064	9	47.5
5	2		GM	@Firouzja2003	Alireza Firouzja	3144	8.5	58
6	31		GM	@shimastream	Aleksandr Shimanov	2925	8.5	53.5
7	22		GM	@Msb2	Matthias Bluebaum	2982	8.5	53
8	33		GM	@VerdeNotte	Gawain Jones	2932	8.5	52
9	209		IM	@KubaGepard	Jakob Pajeken	2612	8.5	48.75
10	25		IM	@MITerryble	Renato Terry	2968	8.5	48.5
11	17		GM	@exoticprincess	Baadur Jobava	3023	8.5	47
12	5		GM	@Duhless	Daniil Dubov	3038	8.5	46.5
13	11		GM	@Jospem	Jose Martinez	3028	8	51.75
14	45		GM	@DrVelja	Velimir Ivic	2869	8	47.75
15	85		GM	@GM_Crest	Sergey Shipov	2799	8	47
16	10		GM	@dropstoneDP	David Paravyan	3035	8	45.5
17	182		FM	@M_One1126	Mekhriddin Sharifov	2633	8	45.25
18	61		GM	@Sam_ChessMood	Samvel Ter-Sahakyan	2873	8	45
19	37		GM	@jcibarra	José Carlos Ibarra Jerez	2925	8	44
20	139		IM	@Flawless_Fighter	Polina Shuvalova	2620	8	43

(Full final standings here.)

Caruana won $1,000 for his commanding victory while Deac won $750 in second. GM Alexey Sarana came in third place for a $350 prize with his tiebreak advantage over Fedoseev, who won $200 for fourth place. The $100 prizes went to Firouzja in fifth place and IM Polina Shuvalova, who won the women’s prize with an 8/11 score to finish 20th overall.

Late Tournament

Not satisfied with fourth place, Fedoseev stormed to a win in the late tournament. He too had to get through Nakamura, who finished in third only losing to the top two finishers, Fedoseev and GM Jeffery Xiong. You basically have to beat Nakamura twice, in the head-to-head matchup and by outperforming him against the rest of the field.

Fedoseev did both, claiming victory in their sixth-round game with the Caro-Kann Defense.

It was actually Xiong who led the tournament with a round remaining. He defeated Fedoseev in the eighth round and then toppled Firouzja in the 10th cycle of games.

Like Caruana, Xiong now had a chance to reach 10.5 points, but the stakes were a little higher. Indeed, he was defeated by GM Dmitry Andreikin, opening the door for Fedoseev. With a 22-move win over GM Aryan Tari, Fedoseev stepped through.

Meanwhile, Nakamura secured third place with a win over IM Renato Terry.

November 15 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)

Number Rk Fed Title Username Name Rating Score SB

1 6 GM @Bigfish1995 Vladimir Fedoseev 3064 10 75.5

2 14 GM @jefferyx Jeffery Xiong 3057 9.5 66.75

3 1 GM @Hikaru Hikaru Nakamura 3197 9 63.5

4 15
GM @FairChess_on_YouTube Dmitry Andreikin 3021 9 58.25

5 2 GM @Firouzja2003 Alireza Firouzja 3144 9 54

6 23 GM @vi_pranav Pranav V 2980 9 51.5

7 20 GM @Fandorine Maksim Chigaev 2971 8.5 52.75

8 16 GM @rasmussvane Rasmus Svane 2996 8.5 48.75

9 29 GM @AryanTari Aryan Tari 2976 8.5 45.75

10 27 GM @daro94 Dariusz Swiercz 2951 8.5 43.25

11 10 GM @mishanick Alexey Sarana 3029 8 52

12 35 GM @jcibarra José Carlos Ibarra Jerez 2925 8 49.5

13 70 FM @bascheyaro Roman Yanchenko 2822 8 48.75

14 18 GM @Msb2 Matthias Bluebaum 2982 8 47

15 4 GM @BogdanDeac Bogdan Daniel Deac 3035 8 46

15 11 GM @exoticprincess Baadur Jobava 3023 8 46

17 21 IM @MITerryble Renato Terry 2968 8 43.5

17 73 GM @OldweakGM Ronen Har-Zvi 2865 8 43.5

19 55
GM @alexrustemov Alexander Rustemov 2818 8 38

20 60 IM @mbojan Bojan Maksimović 2839 8 35

35 76 GM @daika91 Zhongyi Tan 2762 7 36

(Full final standings here.)

Fedoseev won the $1,000 first-place prize, giving him $1,200 for the day. Xiong took $750 for second place while Nakamura won $350 in third. Andreikin earned $200 in fourth place and Firouzja took home another $100 fifth-place prize, giving him $200 for the day. GM Tan Zhongyi scored 7/11 to win the $100 women’s prize.

Titled Tuesday is a Chess.com tournament held for titled players every week. There are two 11-round Swiss tournaments played each Tuesday, starting at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time/17:00 Central European and 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time/23:00 Central European.