IMAGE: Defending champion R Vaishali surges to top. Photograph: FIDE/X
Defending champion and Grandmaster R Vaishali jumped into sole lead in the women’s section as she notched her third straight victory with a win against Olga Bedelka of Austria in the third round of the FIDE Grand Swiss in Samarkand, Uzbekistan) on Saturday.
On a day when Vantika Agrawal found the going tough and went down to Yuxin Song of China, D Harika was held to a draw by Guo Qi of China. Both Vantika and Harika are on 1.5 points apiece while Vaishali enjoys a half point lead over her nearest rivals.
In the open section, world champion D Gukesh punished some audacious play by Spaniard Daniil Yuffa and moved to 2.5 points out of a possible three.
Playing black, Gukesh opted for the Ragozin defense and was pleasantly surprised in the middle game as Yuffa went berserk with his attack.
Winning a piece, Gukesh had to find some defensive moves but white did not have any serious compensation anyway. The Indian ace won an easy game in the end.
Important and Indian results round 3 (Indians unless specified): Alireza Firouzja (Fra, 2) Parham Maghsoodloo (Iri, 2); Arjun Erigaisi (1.5) Anton Demchenko (Slo, 2); Boris Gelfand (Isr, 1.5) R Praggnanandhaa (1.5); Daniil Yuffa (Esp, 1.5) lost to D Gukesh (2.5); Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzb, 1.5) Abhimanyu Puranik (1.5); Leon Luke Mendonca (2) drew with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra, 2); Vidit Santosh Gujrathi (2) drew with Alexandr Predke (Srb, 2); Nihal Sarin (1.5) Yuriy Kuzubov (Ukr, 1.5); Aryan Chopra (1.5) drew with Amin Tabatabaei (Iri, 1.5); Raunak Sadhwani (1) lost to Andy Woodward (Usa, 2); Nils Grandelius (Swe, 1) lost to Aditya Mittal (2); Dmitrij Kollars (Ger, 1) V Pranav (1); S L Narayanan (1.5) drew with Theodorou Nikolas (Gre, 1); Jakhongir Vakhidov (Uzb, 1) playing P Harikrishna (0.5); Divya Deshmukh (0.5) playing Murali Karthikeyan (0).
Women: R Vaishali (3) beat Olga Bedelka (Aut, 2); Yuxin Song (Chn, 2.5) beat Vantika Agrawal (1.5); Guo Qi (Chn, 1.5) drew with D Harika (1.5).
