Indian Grandmaster D Gukesh enjoyed a strong start at the Clutch Chess Champions Showdown 2025, held at the Saint Louis Chess Club. The young star leads the standings after Day 1 with four out of six possible points in the prestigious rapid tournament.
World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen is close behind with 3.5 points, followed by Hikaru Nakamura with 3 and Fabiano Caruana with 1.5. The event features four of the world’s best players competing in three round-robins, where each player faces the others with both colours over three days.
Gukesh enjoys bright start at Saint Louis
The tournament uses a unique scoring system, with different points awarded for wins on each day. A victory on Day 1 is worth one point, while wins on Day 2 and Day 3 are worth two and three points respectively.
Gukesh lost his first game of the day to Carlsen but bounced back brilliantly. He defeated Nakamura with the black pieces and went on to win consecutive games against Fabiano Caruana to claim the top spot.
Reflecting on his strong start, Gukesh said, “It was pretty good. It started with a loss, but I am still happy with that game. It was so funny, I had a good position against Magnus (for a draw)…It was unbelievable, but I am still quite happy; it’s just that I missed Bc5. The next game was a plain game.
“Then against Naka (Nakamura), pretty much all games were quite nice except for the last game. I was down on time and worse, but Fabi (Fabiano) just played F5 and gave me chances.”
The 19-year-old also shared his thoughts on the tournament’s unique format. “It’s like a sort of border of blitz and rapid, it seems fun. When you play well, it’s always fun. In general, it’s fun to play some rapid after a few classical. Always fun to play against top players,” Gukesh told the Saint Louis Chess Club’s YouTube channel.
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Meanwhile, Carlsen had a mixed day. He lost to Nakamura and drew three games, admitting that he wasn’t feeling his best. “I’m feeling like really not good at all, so I will say that I scored like about two more points than I should have probably today, and I am happy with that… my level of play was extremely poor.”
