The U.S. Championship, Round 1

Guess who is tied for the lead?

Only two of the seven games in round 1 of the 2022 U.S. Championship finished with a winner, but it wasn’t from a lack of effort (well, in five of the games, anyway) or a lack of chances. While there's not much to say about the Lenderman-Aronian and Liang-So games (the lower-rated players were apparently content to draw with the white pieces), the other games had plenty of action.

In the game with the highest total rating, Fabiano Caruana was in big trouble against Leinier Dominguez and the latter’s bishop pair, but Dominguez’s errors near the time control (time trouble?) allowed Caruana to escape with a draw. Sam Shankland also had some challenges against Ray Robson, while Jeffery Xiong generally had the better of it against Dariusz Swiercz. Nevertheless, those games also finished peacefully.

The remaining games drew blood. Samuel Sevian had a big advantage out of the opening against Elshan Moradiabadi, but let it slip. Still, he managed to cause his opponent a few final problems, and it was at the last hurdle that Moradiabadi stumbled. Finally, Hans Niemann defeated Christopher Yoo with the black pieces. Niemann played with something less than computer-like perfection, but still seemed to have little trouble outplaying his young opponent.

Here are today’s games (with my notes to five of them), and here are the pairings for round 2:

Aronian (.5) - Dominguez (.5)

Robson (.5) - Caruana (.5)

Swiercz (.5) - Shankland (.5)

Niemann (1) - Xiong (.5)

So (.5) - Yoo (0)

Moradiabadi (0) - Liang (.5)

Lenderman (.5) - Sevian (1)