Fabiano Caruana has now a full-point lead at the U.S. Championship, as his closest chaser before round 8, Hans Niemann, was defeated by Ray Robson on Friday. Niemann is now sharing second place with Leinier Dominguez, Wesley So and Abhimanyu Mishra the latter beat Sam Sevian in round 8. Meanwhile, in the U.S. Women’s Championship, Carissa Yip and Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova cannot stop winning, as each obtained a fourth consecutive win on Friday and now have a 2-point lead over their closest chasers. | Photo: Austin Fuller
Round eight brought another round of exciting chess in the 2023 U.S. Championships. We can safely say that it was a round with some of the most topsy-turvy results for the standings.
While two consecutive rounds ended with draws on all six boards in the U.S. Championship, three players got win after win in the U.S. Women’s Championship. Co-leaders Carissa Yip and Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova have each grabbed three full points in a row to remain tied for first, while Alice Lee has in fact collected four back-to-back victories to climb to shared second place. | Photo: Lennart Ootes
After a full-on bloodbath in round five, the players cooled down a bit in the Open section of the 2023 U.S. Championships. With six drawn games, GM Fabiano Caruana remains in the lead with Niemann following closely at his heels, but this doesn’t mean the games were boring.
An exciting round both at the U.S. Championship and the U.S. Women’s Championship finished with 10 (out of 12) decisive results. In the open, Fabiano Caruana grabbed his third consecutive win to remain as the sole leader, while Carissa Yip and Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova also kept their spots at the top of the standings by collecting full points on Tuesday. The highlight of the day, though, was Ray Robson’s 29-move victory over Jeffery Xiong. | Photo: Lennart Ootes