Arjun India's First To Claim Freestyle Friday
GM Arjun Erigaisi won Freestyle Friday outright over a field of 307 players on February 28, doing so with a win over erstwhile leader GM Shant Sargsyan in the final round. GM Hikaru Nakamura ended up taking second place from Sargsyan on tiebreaks, with a come-from-behind victory in the last round over GM Magnus Carlsen.
Sargsyan pulled into the sole lead in the ninth round by defeating GM Vugar Rasulov in a fairly smooth game with little drama, albeit with one of the more amusing castling moves in Freestyle: a king transversing half the board while the rook remains stationary.
In the 10th round, Sargsyan won again to continue his lead, while the five-way tie behind him thinned out in no small part to Arjun delivering a fatal blow to Carlsen's hopes at becoming Freestyle Friday's first repeat winner. To do so, Arjun had to overcome one of Black's toughest starting positions in all of Freestyle, one in which the e-pawns start the game undefended. And the tactics got messy fast.
Round 11 saw Carlsen and Nakamura face off in the rare situation for that matchup of being unusually low stakes, with both players eliminated from first-place contention. The game was still worthwhile for a couple of reasons: one, both players still had a chance at second place, and two... it's Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura! Ultimately, Nakamura overcame a slow to start to win on time in a better, albeit not yet crushing, position.
Most eyes were on the Sargsyan-Arjun matchup for first place, however. (Nakamura on eight points could still catch Sargsyan on nine with a win and a Sargsyan loss, but the latter result would then put Arjun on 9.5 points.) Like Sargsyan back in round nine, Arjun was never in trouble, and gradually built an insurmountable position.
GM Benjamin Bok still had a chance to tie Arjun, but he could not beat GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Instead, after the Arjun-Nakamura-Sargsyan top three, GM Minh Le won the final top-four prize and IM Anastasia Bodnaruk won the women's prize. GMs Fabiano Caruana and Levy Rozman were other notable top-20 finishers.
February 28 Freestyle Friday | Final Standings (Top 25)
| Rank | Seed | Fed | Title | Username | Name | Rating | Score | Tiebreak |
| 1 | 19 | GM | @GHANDEEVAM2003 | Arjun Erigaisi | 2633 | 9.5 | 71 | |
| 2 | 2 | GM | @Hikaru | Hikaru Nakamura | 2883 | 9 | 76.5 | |
| 3 | 7 | GM | @Sargsyan_Shant | Shant Sargsyan | 2737 | 9 | 72 | |
| 4 | 11 | GM | @wonderfultime | Tuan Minh Le | 2641 | 8.5 | 75.5 | |
| 5 | 25 | GM | @GMBenjaminBok | Benjamin Bok | 2584 | 8.5 | 75 | |
| 6 | 4 | GM | @nihalsarin | Nihal Sarin | 2830 | 8.5 | 73 | |
| 7 | 22 | GM | @ChristopherYoo | Christopher Woojin Yoo | 2595 | 8.5 | 71.5 | |
| 8 | 6 | GM | @LyonBeast | Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | 2752 | 8.5 | 71 | |
| 9 | 14 | GM | @vugarrasulov | Vugar Rasulov | 2618 | 8.5 | 70.5 | |
| 10 | 9 | GM | @FabianoCaruana | Fabiano Caruana | 2647 | 8 | 71 | |
| 11 | 35 | GM | @moro182 | Luca Moroni Jr | 2440 | 8 | 70 | |
| 12 | 13 | GM | @dropstoneDP | David Paravyan | 2603 | 8 | 68 | |
| 13 | 87 | FM | @puz2010 | Semyon Puzyrevsky | 2060 | 8 | 64 | |
| 14 | 17 | GM | @rasmussvane | Rasmus Svane | 2564 | 8 | 60.5 | |
| 15 | 74 | IM | @GothamChess | Levy Rozman | 2117 | 8 | 60 | |
| 16 | 57 | IM | @mbojan | Bojan Maksimović | 2258 | 8 | 60 | |
| 17 | 193 | FM | @SahibSinghKnight | Sahib Singh | 1708 | 8 | 48.5 | |
| 18 | 1 | GM | @MagnusCarlsen | Magnus Carlsen | 2888 | 7.5 | 80.5 | |
| 19 | 100 | GM | @ValentinDragnev | Valentin Dragnev | 1994 | 7.5 | 71 | |
| 20 | 5 | GM | @mishanick | Aleksei Sarana | 2753 | 7.5 | 69.5 | |
| 52 | 113 | IM | @Vesper2018 | Anastasia Bodnaruk | 1870 | 6.5 | 63.5 |
Prizes: Arjun $400, Nakamura $250, Sargsyan $150, Le $100, Bodnaruk $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.
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.
