U.S. Championship, Round 11 (Final Round)

Caruana wins his third consecutive U.S. Championship

You wouldn’t know it to look at the final standings, but coming into the last round four players had a chance to win the 2024 U.S. Championship. Fabiano Caruana had a half point lead over Awonder Liang and a full point lead over Sam Sevian and Hans Niemann, who were paired with each other. Sevian and Niemann drew, while Liang lost what had long been a winning advantage to Leinier Dominguez. And ultimately, those results didn’t matter for the race for first, as Caruana defeated Sam Shankland to take clear first. (Thankfully, for Liang’s sanity.)

Caruana’s margin was a point and a half thanks to his score of 7/11 [really 8/12, making him an even more deserved winner], with half of the original field of 12 players tying for second. (A Lake Wobegon tournament of sorts. Not all the kids were above average, but most were - 7 of 11.) This was Caruana’s third consecutive U.S. Championship win and his fourth overall, and as an added bonus he went back over 2800 and is back to #2 on the rating list. 2024 has been a very good year for him overall, with only one real blemish: his failure to defeat Ian Nepomniachtchi in the final round of the Candidates to force a playoff with Gukesh.

It was a good but not spectacular event for the many players who took second: Liang and Dominguez, Sevian and Niemann, plus Ray Robson (who had a bye in the last round) and Levon Aronian (who defeated Gregoriy Oparin with the black pieces).

Wesley So drew with Abhimanyu Mishra to finish in eighth place; the draw was his 10th in the tournament. Officially, he drew all his games, but in fact he, like Caruana, defeated Christopher Yoo before the latter was kicked out of the event. Shankland was another point back with 4, then Oparin at 3.5 and Mishra with 2.5. (The last round games, with my annotations, are here.)

In the women’s section Carissa Yip had already clinched clear first, and ended the tournament on a non-losing note (she had lost the last two rounds) by drawing with Alice Lee. Lee entered the last round tied for second, and finished third after Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova defeated Tatev Abrahamyan. Irina Krush’s performance was surprising - she finished tied for 5th-7th place with a 50% score. There are a lot of strong and ambitious youngsters who aren’t going away and aren’t afraid of her, so she’ll have to raise her game. I hope she will.

Another big event, the European Club Cup, is ongoing, so I’ll be reporting on that tournament next. There will be more, too, so stay tuned.