Saint Louis: Fireworks in round five

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After the fourth round of the US Championship in St. Louis Fabiano Caruana led the field by half a point but in round five he had to concede a draw against Alexander Shabalov, which allowed Wesley So to catch up to Caruana.

So played a textbook attacking game against Varuzhan Akobian and quickly smashed Black's position in a Rubinstein French.

Hikaru Nakamura ppeared to be well recovered from his loss against Fabiano Caruana and played a fine game against Sam Shankland. The game started as a Caro-Kann but then entered French structures, in which Nakamura showed powerful chess and demolished Black's position with the typical f4-f5 break.

The 15-year old Jefferey Xiong, the youngest player in the field, started with four draws but in round five scored his first win - and against elo-heavyweight Gata Kamsky to boot. The young talent profited from a blackout of his opponent. Kamsky, who was playing with Black, opted for Alekhine's Defense and sacrificed a piece early on. This investment gave him lots of compensation and a long-term attack. However, Xiong defended stubbornly and in the end Kamsky fell victim to a blunder.

Kamsky played courageously but was not rewarded (Photo: Austin Fuller)

Results of round five

Br.	Tit	Name	ELO	Ergebnis	Titel	Name	ELO
1	GM	Alexander Shabalov	2520	½ - ½	GM	Fabiano Caruana	2794
2	GM	Wesley So	2773	1 - 0	GM	Varuzhan Akobian	2610
3	GM	Ray Robson	2663	½ - ½	GM	Aleksandr Lenderman	2623
4	GM	Hikaru Nakamura	2790	1 - 0	GM	Samuel L Shankland	2648
5	GM	Jeffery Xiong	2588	1 - 0	GM	Gata Kamsky	2667
6	GM	Alexander Onischuk	2664	1 - 0	IM	Akshat Chandra	2501

Alexander Onischuk won against Akshat Chandra (Photo: Spectrum Studios)

Alexander Shabalov drew against Caruana (Photo: Lennart Ootes)

Games of rounds 1 to 5

Standings after five rounds

Women's Tournament

The Women's tournament (Photo: Austin Fuller)

Tatev Abrahamyan has a lot of fans (Photo: Lennart Ootes)

Irina Krush and... (Photo: Spectrum Studios)

... Anna Zatonskih drew (Photo: Lennart Ootes)

In the women's tournament Irina Krush played against Anna Zatonskih - and these two players have been dominating the US Women's Championship for the last ten years. But after they drew a long game Nazi Paikidze took the sole lead. She won against Jennifer Yu and is the only player with 4.0/5.

Results of round five

Br.	Tit	Name	ELO	Ergebnis	Titel	Name	ELO
1	GM	Irina Krush	2458	½ - ½	IM	Anna Zatonskih	2469
2	IM	Nazi Paikidze	2346	1 - 0	WFM	Jennifer R Yu	2102
3	WGM	Katerina Nemcova	2367	½ - ½	WGM	Tatev Abrahamyan	2324
4		Carissa Yip	2109	0 - 1	WIM	Agata Bykovtsev	2176
5	WGM	Sabina Francesca Foisor	2258	½ - ½	WIM	Ashritha Eswaran	2149
6	FM	Alisa Melekhina	2205	0 - 1	FM	Akshita Gorti	2242