Bortnyk Doubles Down On Bullet Brawl, Wins By 34-Point Margin

GM Oleksandr Bortnyk rocketed to a second-straight Bullet Brawl victory and won the $400 first prize after outpacing 140 titled players during Saturday's event. Bortnyk's 65.5/74 gave him a score of 233, 34 points higher than the second-placed IM Reza Mahdavi, and a further six ahead of GM Sam Sevian.

A duel between Georgian IM Maka Purtseladze and FM Anastasia Avramidou for the $100 best women's prize saw the former eclipse her rival's score by two points, while "Macmasterr" posted one of the all-time highest scores in the community event.

The next edition of Bullet Brawl will commence on Saturday, April 26, at noon ET/17:00 CEST.

Standings

A compact field in Saturday's Bullet Brawl made streak-building more difficult than usual, and several of the tournament's regular stars struggled to break away from the pack. GMs Bortnyk, Daniel Naroditsky, and Sevian were the top three seeds, and they were joined at the top by three other players with ratings over 3100: GM Haowen Xue, GM Ediz Gurel, and IM Renato Terry.

However, just three of these players—Bortnyk, Sevian, and Terry—managed to finish in the top 10.  

Like in last week's event, Bortnyk was fueled by an initial loss, and he went on to score 25/27 in the ensuing games. Sevian was one of Bortnyk's victims during this period, and the world number-35 was presented with a lethal cocktail of pace and precision, culminating in a punchy sacrifice.

The bane of Bortnyk's tournament was undoubtedly the 17-year-old Chinese GM Xue, who scored 2/4 against the eventual winner; the second win was a rare trouncing of Bortnyk's Jobava-Rapport London System.

Despite losing just seven games in the two-hour arena, Xue's 46 wins left him well short of Bortnyk's 64 and 18 points short of a podium finish. Bortnyk's opening selection and ability to capitalize on opponents' passive moves helped him rack up the extra wins.

Against French CM Marc Llari, Bortnyk used the Raphael, Spielmann Gambit to sweep aside Llari's Dutch Defense. 

With no challengers in sight, Bortnyk coasted to his second victory of the year and his 12th since the tournament's inception. Equaling his seven-title haul in 2024 will be challenging in 2025; however, Bortnyk has gone to a new level in the past fortnight.

All-Time Leaderboard

Though Bortnyk was unassailable, Mahdavi's performance was a career-best, and the Iranian IM notched numerous scalps. Gurel, who is renowned for his ability to create chaos in worse positions, could do little to stop Mahdavi from cleanly converting after Gurel lost a pawn in the opening.

The other standout performer was Macmasterr, who dominated the community event. Although the anonymous North Macedonian has won many past editions, his 86.5/91, 327-point effort on Saturday was his finest.

A 116-point margin stood between Macmasterr and his longtime rival Sundram Kumar when the arena clock expired—Macmasterr's trademark hack-and-slash h-file assaults were the catalyst for his record-breaking score.

Bullet Brawl is an exciting arena featuring Chess.com's top bullet specialists. It takes place weekly on Saturdays. The format is a two-hour arena with a 1+0 time control; the prize fund is $1,000. Like Titled Tuesday and Arena Kings, Bullet Brawl often features top GMs, including Hikaru Nakamura, Daniel Naroditsky, Andrew Tang, Tuan Minh Le, and many more!

Previous coverage:

• • Announcing Chess.com Community Bullet Brawl Tournaments
  • Introducing Bullet Brawls And New Arena Options