St. Louis Rapid & Blitz: Caruana grabs the lead

by André Schulz
8/13/2025 – Levon Aronian was unable to repeat his strong performance from the previous day on the second day of the rapid chess tournament in Saint Louis. In the sixth round, he lost to Fabiano Caruana in the top match and relinquished the lead. Aronian shares second place with Weskey So going into the third day of action. | Photos: Lennart Ootes
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Caruana beats Aronian in crucial matchup

On the second day of rapid chess, Levon Aronian was unable to repeat his impressive performance from the previous day, when he had scored three wins in three games.

Aronian began with a rather lively encounter against Leinier Dominguez. In the Classical Variation of the French Defence, Aronian, playing black, ended up in a rather unfavourable line, but was fortunate that Dominguez did not continue energetically enough, allowing equality to be restored.

After a mistake, Aronian again found himself in a worse position, but after some imprecise play by his opponent, he nonetheless escaped with a draw.

The next-round draw against Wesley So was far less eventful.

Aronian's pursuer, Fabiano Caruana, also began the day with a draw against Wesley So, but then scored a win against Sam Shankland. With the white pieces, the 2018 World Championship runner-up obtained an overwhelming kingside attack against the Najdorf Variation. Shankland defended for a long time but was ultimately defeated.

In the third round of the day, the sixth overall, Fabiano Caruana faced Levon Aronian. The game, a Queen's Gambit, remained balanced for a long time until Aronian undermined his own efforts with an ill-considered move.

With his victory, Caruana overtook Aronian to take the lead. After two previous draws, Wesley So defeated Grigoriy Oparin in round six and caught up with Aronian (both on 8 points according to the double scoring system).

In fourth place follows Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, a further point behind. Gukesh Dommaraju and Leinier Dominguez occupy fifth and sixth place in the middle of the standings.

On Wednesday, rounds 7 to 9 of the rapid tournament will be played, before the blitz event takes place on Thursday and Friday.

Standings after round 6 (win = 2pts.; draw = 1 pt.)

All games

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André Schulz started working for ChessBase in 1991 and is an editor of ChessBase News.