Raunak Sadhwani (RIGHT) took down Alireza Firouzja in Round 2 while Arjun Erigaisi (LEFT) stayed ahead of Fabiano Caruana in the standings after day 1. (PHOTOS: FIDE via Lennart Ootes)
Day 1 of the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Championship on Wall Street in New York saw some jaw-dropping moments. While Magnus Carlsen was handed a defeat by Denis Lazavik besides being held to draws by Awonder Liang, Gleb Dudin, and Aleksandr Shimanov, there was plenty of action in other games too.
Here’s a highlight reel of Day 1:
Raunak Sadhwani stuns Alireza Firouzja
On Day 1 of the FIDE Rapid and Blitz Championship, the first significant result for an Indian player came in the second round. Indian grandmaster Raunak Sadhwani took down French-Iranian Alireza Firouzja, who excels in the faster time controls.
Before the start of the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Championship, Carlsen had picked Firouzja as one of the top rivals in the faster time controls.
Playing with black pieces, Sadhwani (with a rating of 2591) took down Firouzja — a player who had over 150 rating points more than the Indian at 2756 — in 44 moves.
Later in the day, Sadhwani also took down China’s Shanglei Lu (rated 2638). After five rounds, Sadhwani is fifth in the standings with four points.
Pranav holds Wesley So to draw
In the first round of the World Rapid Championship at Wall Street in New York, it was the 75th grandmaster of India, Pranav Venkatesh, who got a significant result: he held the much higher-rated Wesley So (rated 2739 in rapid) who is World no 12 in rapid to a draw with white pieces.
Pranav is the 23rd ranked chess player in India itself when it comes to rapid chess with a rating of 2497, which is almost 250 rating points below the American grandmaster who he held to a draw in the first round on Thursday.
Arjun Erigaisi stays ahead of Caruana
Arjun Erigaisi and Fabiano Caruana are in a tight race to secure a spot at the next edition of the Candidates, which is being held to find a challenger to India’s Gukesh. In fact, Arjun is just six points behind the American with just the FIDE World Rapid and Blitz Championship left.
At the end of Day 1, Arjun — who managed to fly out to New York very late after getting his passport stamped at the last minute from the US Embassy — managed to keep his nose ahead of the American after winning four games and drawing one. With four points, Arjun Erigaisi is 12th in the standings.
Caruana, meanwhile, is in 23rd spot with four points, half a point behind the Indian.
Nakamura misses on win checkmate for unluckiest reason
Hikaru Nakamura had to settle for a draw in his round 3 game against Alexander Donchenko despite him being just one move away from delivering a checkmate on the German GM!
Why? Because of the 50-move rule. The rule states that a player can claim a draw if no one moves a pawn or captures a piece for 50 consecutive moves.
With Nakamura one move away from delivering checkmate, Donchenko claimed a draw pointing out that the end game had started on Move 79 and Nakamura’s checkmate would come on the 51st move after that.
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