Dubov Goes From Carlsen's Second To Placing Carlsen In Second
GM Daniil Dubov defeated GM Magnus Carlsen, whom he has assisted in multiple world championships, in the final round of the early Titled Tuesday on October 24 and thus overtook and won the event outright with 10 points. Webster University head coach GM Liem Le was the winner late, with 9.5 points to win on a tiebreak score over last week's two-time winner, GM Jose Martinez.
Early Tournament
GM Wesley So, who would ultimately finish fourth, made some early noise when he toyed with an opponent who refused to resign in round two, deftly avoiding stalemate to win with (count 'em up) seven queens.
But of the 571 players in the field, Carlsen was the story early, racing to 9.5 points in the first 10 rounds. It was a lead built with Carlsen trends of both new and old: dubious blitz openings and classic endgame grinds, and he outlasted GMs Grigoriy Oparin and Vugar Rasulov in rounds six and seven to reach a perfect 7/7.
In round 10, however, GM David Paravyan miscalculated and was lost in just 13 moves. Carlsen easily moved to 9.5/10 and was a draw away from securing the tournament.
After building a lead with 1.a4 and 1.h4 in his games with White, Carlsen played the respectable Queen's Indian Defense with Black for his final game. Although he faced a different variation this time, it was the same opening as his now-infamous loss at the Qatar Masters earlier this month.
That turned out to bode poorly. Dubov, who had hung around with eight wins and two draws going into the game, won with surprisingly little difficulty.
Despite their hiccups against Carlsen, Paravyan and Oparin finished in the top five along with So, all of them on nine points. Five other players also scored nine, but their tiebreaks were not as strong.
October 24 Titled Tuesday | Early | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | Tiebreak 1 |
| 1 | 7 | GM | @Duhless | Daniil Dubov | 3109 | 10 | 75 | |
| 2 | 1 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 3266 | 9.5 | 78.5 | |
| 3 | 6 | GM | @dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 3098 | 9 | 77.5 | |
| 4 | 8 | GM | @GMWSO | Wesley So | 3075 | 9 | 72.5 | |
| 5 | 17 | GM | @OparinGrigoriy | Grigoriy Oparin | 2994 | 9 | 71.5 | |
| 6 | 45 | GM | @Elsa167 | Leon Livaic | 2895 | 9 | 69.5 | |
| 7 | 3 | GM | @nihalsarin | Nihal Sarin | 3129 | 9 | 68 | |
| 8 | 51 | GM | @kleinebeer98 | Thomas Beerdsen | 2875 | 9 | 65.5 | |
| 9 | 5 | GM | @FairChess_on_YouTube | Dmitry Andreikin | 3096 | 9 | 64.5 | |
| 10 | 140 | FM | @lefonghua | Lefong Hua | 2734 | 9 | 61.5 | |
| 11 | 21 | GM | @GroovyKettle | Robby Kevlishvili | 3003 | 8.5 | 75 | |
| 12 | 35 | FM | @JimDiGrease | Ivan Zemlyanskii | 2885 | 8.5 | 62 | |
| 13 | 24 | GM | @Sanan_Sjugirov | Sanan Sjugirov | 2958 | 8.5 | 59 | |
| 14 | 497 | GM | @hansen | Eric Hansen | 2947 | 8.5 | 49 | |
| 15 | 23 | GM | @Zhigalko_Sergei | Sergei Zhigalko | 2960 | 8 | 81 | |
| 16 | 40 | GM | @abhidabhi | Abhimanyu Puranik | 2906 | 8 | 71 | |
| 17 | 70 | IM | @OhanyanEminChess | Emin Ohanyan | 2854 | 8 | 70 | |
| 18 | 10 | GM | @GHANDEEVAM2003 | Arjun Erigaisi | 3032 | 8 | 69 | |
| 19 | 128 | FM | @NovozhilovSemen | Semen Novozhilov | 2727 | 8 | 68.5 | |
| 20 | 37 | GM | @lilleper1 | Jonas Bjerre | 2892 | 8 | 67.5 | |
| 24 | 219 | IM | @Meri-Arabidze | Meri Arabidze | 2627 | 8 | 64.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Dubov earned the $1,000 grand prize, while Carlsen settled for $750. Paravyan claimed $350, So $200, and Oparin $100, while IM Meri Arabidze finished 24th on a strong 8/11 score to win the $100 women's prize.
Late Tournament
The late field of 401 produced a first-time winner in GM Liem Le, who was the world blitz champion in 2013 and has a history of strong blitz performances. He reached 8.5/9 but could not hold off Martinez in a rather messy game in round 10, and ended up taking a loss one round earlier than Carlsen had.
Losing in round 10 instead of round 11 does have the benefit of giving a player time to recover, if not very much time. But Le did just that. Martinez was held to a draw with Paravyan, and Le caught up in the standings with a win over GM Igor Kovalenko. Le's tiebreak score was solidly ahead of Martinez, so he won the tournament.
Dubov nearly put together another top-five performance with the best tiebreak score in the field, but his draw in the final round kept him half a point out of third place. Paravyan, on the other hand, did score a second straight top-five finish.
October 24 Titled Tuesday | Late | Final Standings (Top 20)
| Number | Rk | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | Tiebreak 1 |
| 1 | 17 | GM | @LiemLe | Liem Le | 3004 | 9.5 | 77 | |
| 2 | 6 | GM | @Jospem | Jose Martinez | 3100 | 9.5 | 72 | |
| 3 | 4 | GM | @dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 3107 | 9 | 74.5 | |
| 4 | 15 | GM | @Zhigalko_Sergei | Sergei Zhigalko | 2967 | 9 | 63 | |
| 5 | 18 | GM | @Krakozia | Denis Khismatullin | 2959 | 9 | 62.5 | |
| 6 | 2 | GM | @Duhless | Daniil Dubov | 3114 | 8.5 | 79 | |
| 7 | 21 | GM | @igorkovalenko | Igor Kovalenko | 2952 | 8.5 | 76.5 | |
| 8 | 1 | GM | @DanielNaroditsky | Daniel Naroditsky | 3191 | 8.5 | 74.5 | |
| 9 | 70 | FM | @Alex_Sahakyan2006 | Alex Sahakyan | 2796 | 8.5 | 71.5 | |
| 10 | 7 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 3052 | 8.5 | 64 | |
| 11 | 19 | GM | @Angry_Twin | Andrey Drygalov | 2963 | 8.5 | 58.5 | |
| 12 | 29 | GM | @sergiochess83 | Sergey Grigoriants | 2885 | 8.5 | 57.5 | |
| 13 | 51 | GM | @eljanov | Pavel Eljanov | 2838 | 8 | 68 | |
| 14 | 24 | FM | @Bauman_Guy | Konstantin Popov | 2918 | 8 | 67 | |
| 15 | 14 | GM | @shimastream | Aleksandr Shimanov | 2972 | 8 | 66.5 | |
| 16 | 68 | NM | @nochewycandy | Isaac Chiu | 2791 | 8 | 65 | |
| 17 | 25 | GM | @MikaelyanArman | Arman Mikaelyan | 2921 | 8 | 64 | |
| 18 | 20 | GM | @Beca95 | Aleksandar Indjic | 2920 | 8 | 61 | |
| 19 | 65 | FM | @Ali_rastbod | Ali Rastbod | 2747 | 8 | 60.5 | |
| 20 | 93 | CM | @Andrei_Skvortsov | Andrei Skvortsov | 2699 | 8 | 60.5 | |
| 54 | 203 | FM | @tteshan | Nadya Toncheva | 2543 | 7 | 53.5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Le won $1,000 for his victory while Martinez won $750 for second place. Paravyan finished third again for another $350, totaling $700. GMs Sergei Zhigalko and Denis Khismatullin finished fourth and fifth to claim $200 and $100, respectively. FM Nadya Toncheva won the $100 women's prize.
Titled Tuesday is Chess.com's weekly tournament for titled players, with two tournaments held each Tuesday. The first tournament begins at 11:00 a.m. Eastern Time/17:00 Central European/20:30 Indian Standard Time, and the second at 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time/23:00 Central European/2:30 Indian Standard Time (next day).
Nathaniel Green is a staff writer for Chess.com who writes articles, player biographies, Titled Tuesday reports, video scripts, and more. He has been playing chess for about 30 years and resides near Washington, DC, USA.
