4 hours ago
6
India’s world No 12, Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, won the Grand Chess Tour finals in St Louis on Thursday night when he defeated the US world No 2, Fabiano Caruana, in a mix of classical, rapid and blitz games by 15-13. It was the 21-year-old’s second major success of the summer following Norway Chess at Oslo and it earned him a record $200,000 first prize, up from $150,000 in 2025.
Earlier, Wesley So, the US world No 6, won the prestigious Sinquefield Cup and over $100,000 for the second year in succession, despite a run of nine mostly colourless draws.
The former Filipino, 32, chose his approach so as to maximise his chances of another huge payday in the Tour finals. He said: “I’m not proud of the early draws, but they were part of a bigger strategy, and it worked.” However, there was a sting in the tail as So finished third of four in the Tour finals.
Praggnanandhaa’s 27-move win over France’s Maxime Vachier-Lagrave was the fastest victory of the Sinquefield Cup, with its subtle 27…Bb6! forcing resignation.
In the Tour semi-finals Praggnanandhaa defeated Germany’s Vincent Keymer even more easily than the 19-9 score suggests, while Caruana beat So 18-12, grinding him to defeat by superior positional skills
The two-day final, Caruana v Praggnanandhaa, was a clash of generations, age 34 v age 21. Caruana won the first classical game, exploiting a blunder at move 28, but Praggnanandhaa controlled the second until he erred in a bishops of opposite colours ending, allowing Caruana to survive in a marathon 95 moves.
Classical games counted six points as against four for rapid and two for blitz, but the young Indian proved faster and more inventive in the quicker formats. He won both rapid games to take an 11-9 overall lead, then held on in blitz for a 15-13 winning margin.
So beat Keymer 16-12 in the third place match.
The Sinquefield Cup, launched by Rex Sinquefield in 2013, has included some memorable moments. Caruana’s 7/7 start in 2014 and his world record tournament performance rating of 3098 was the absolute highlight, but there was also a controversial triple tie in 2018, Ding Liren’s victory for China in 2019, in which he beat the then world champion, Magnus Carlsen, in a speed tie-break, and the notorious 2022 event with Carlsen v Hans Niemann and its cheating allegations.
The $250,000 Cairns Cup for elite women is the female equivalent of the Sinquefield Cup and is named after Sinquefield’s wife Dr Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield. It was won by China’s Tan Zhongyi, who had previously triumphed in 2024 and looked a transformed player from her heavy 6.5-2.5 defeat by Ju Wenjun in the 2025 world women’s championship match.
Alice Lee, who finished second in the Cairns Cup with 6/9, half a point behind the winner, is the rising star of US women’s chess. The 16-year-old achieved her first GM norm at open level, the fifth youngest female in chess history to do so after Kateryna Lagno, Hou Yifan, Judit Polgar, and Humpy Koneru. Only 44 women have ever earned the full grandmaster title, while 300-400 have gained the separate women’s grandmaster award, which is 200 rating points lower.
The St Louis-organised Grand Chess Tour, with additional events in Poland, Croatia and Romania, will soon be directly challenged by the new Fide-approved Total World Championship, also including classical, rapid and blitz events, which will start with a pilot in Budapest from 10-21 November 2026, followed by a full Tour in 2027.
Besides Carlsen, the confirmed entries so far for Budapest, which will feature 24 players, include Caruana, So, Praggnanandhaa, Niemann, and Ian Nepomniachtchi.
The Fide event will have the advantages of Carlsen’s participation and its official World Championship name, but St Louis will benefit from the city’s reputation and from Sinquefield’s iconic status as a global chess sponsor.
Meanwhile, the Tech Mahindra Global Chess League, the six-team franchise competition based on cricket’s Indian Premier League, which was staged in London in 2024, will be back in India at Bengaluru from 3-13 September, finishing just two days before the 400-team Open and Women’s Olympiads begin in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
Carlsen is announced as a participant in the Global League, but not in the Olympiad, a detail which may go down badly in Norway, whose team without its talisman is seeded a lowly 21st.
after newsletter promotion
Henry Adams, an Oxford PPE student, won last week’s Kingston Invitation unbeaten with 7.5/9, ahead of a GM and three IMs for a breakthrough in his chess career. Earlier, he was best known for his result at Cambridge 2023 where, rated a modest Fide 1968, he drew in the first round with GM Michael Adams, at that time a massive 2757. However, later in that same tournament, Henry also drew with his other namesake George Adams, rated a modest 1494…
Friday is the exact 90th anniversary of the final round of Nottingham 1936, the strongest chess tournament ever played on English soil, in which five past, present and future world champions took part.
It was far stronger than the first international tournament at London 1851, which had its own Staunton Centenary in 1951, and its venue in Nottingham University went on to stage the British Championships of 1946 and 1954.
My suggestion is that the English Chess Federation should start planning for a Nottingham Centenary Tournament in 2036. Such a proposal would be better made in the early 2030s, but somebody else would need to make it then.
I confess to a personal interest: In my long ago chess youth I played, met, or had correspondence with 12 of the 15 players at Nottingham 1936, missing out on only Emanuel Lasker, José Capablanca and Alexander Alekhine. A major international centenary tournament in Nottingham 2036 would be fitting.
The European Senior Team championships began on Thursday in Hersonissos, Crete. England’s 50+ first team are top seeded, with GMs Stuart Conquest, John Emms, Danny Gormally, Mark Hebden and IM Graeme Buckley, while England’s 65+ first team, led by GMs John Nunn and Tony Kosten supported by a trio of strong IMs, are the No 2 seeds to Slovenia.
England are already assured of one gold medal, since England 50+ women, seeded a very respectable seventh overall and led by IM Susan Lalic and WIM Natasha Regan, are the only entrants in their category.
4039: 1…Nb4+! 2 Qxd8 Nc4+ 3 Ke1 Nc2 mate. Not 1…Nc4+? 2 Kc2 Qe2+?? 3 Qxe2.
