GM Wesley So held onto his full-point lead in round nine of the 2026 U.S. Chess Championship by fending off defending champion GM Fabiano Caruana. There were five draws and just one decisive game, where GM Grigoriy Oparin defeated GM Sam Shankland to join Caruana in shared second place. The rest of the standings haven't changed.

Rookie WIM Rachael Li leads the 2026 U.S. Women's Chess Championship by a full point after receiving a gift win against IM Nazi Paikidze in the form of a late endgame blunder. All six games were decisive among the ladies with wins by IM Tatev Abrahamyan, IM Carissa Yip, FM Megan Paragua, WGM Jennifer Yu, and GM Irina Krush against IM Rose Atwell, IM Anna Sargsyan, IM Anna Zatonskih, WGM Thalia Cervantes, and IM Alice Lee. That leaves Li on seven points—Krush and Lee on six.

The penultimate round 10 is on Tuesday, October 20, starting at 1 p.m. ET / 19:00 CEST / 10:30 p.m. IST.

Standings After Round 9: Open

Open: So Weathers Caruana's Prep, Oparin Inches Up

Round 9 Results: Open

Nearly all six games were drawn in the open tournament, but it wasn't for a lack of fighting spirit. For tournament leader So, getting through Caruana was a critical mission accomplished on the way to potentially earning his fourth national title in the U.S. Round nine was a must-win game for Caruana, and when So sank into a 20-minute think on move six (in what's called the Dubov Gambit in the Italian Opening), Caruana's chances looked promising. 

"After he played b4, I literally wanted to resign, because I didn't expect this move at all!" said So, but he figured everything out over the board on his own. The star move was  11...a6, a novelty and a move Caruana thought would be hard for a human to find.

So is optimally positioned to win the tournament, but he still has to make it through two 2700-GMs: Hans Niemann and Sam Sevian. 

Oparin won the one decisive game against Shankland, and it came on the heels of a missed win in the previous round, against GM Levon Aronian. Missing that was "pretty tilting," he said, but Oparin gathered his strength over the rest day and returned to win. Shankland played the King's Indian Defense, but the queens came off, and we were in an endgame.

White won the exchange, but even then the win eventually slipped out of his hands. In the theoretically drawn rook and pawn vs. bishop and pawn endgame, Oparin ultimately squeezed water from stone. GM Rafael Leitao shares his knowledge with us about the Game of the Day below. (It will be added soon.)

With all draws, the status quo remains: So must get through two rounds without losing, while Caruana and Oparin must also win their games. All eyes will be on Niemann (on 3.5/9) as the second-to-last line of defense against the tournament leader.

Round 10 Pairings | Open

Women: Li Clinches IM Norm With 2 Rounds To Spare

Round 9 Results: Women

There was not a draw to be seen, heard, or witnessed in round nine of the women's championship. The most important of those six games was, of course, Li's unlikely win in the knight endgame.

Though she's in stellar form, Li is not yet at the finish line—even if she has already scored her first IM norm with two rounds to spare. She said, "It's surprising and I guess I'm definitely proud I've gotten this far, but there are still two more rounds. So it's too early to say, I feel."

It's surprising and I guess I'm definitely proud I've gotten this far.

—Rachael Li

Li pressed Paikidze for a long time, but the latter escaped into a pawn-down yet drawn knight endgame. But the game had a final twist when Pakidze played 79...Nb3??, the decisive mistake, letting the pawn run one square too many. It was a runaway train.

Just behind Li are two players on six points, Krush and Lee—after Krush beat Lee in their round-nine matchup. It's a remarkable feat of resilience by the grandmaster, who hung her queen and lost in round one and then lost against Yu in the round just before this one. About the second loss, she said, "I didn't think it was tragic... I just took it like sometimes you play worse than your opponent and you lose...  I'm not putting this sort of pressure on myself where I have to get a certain result in this event." 

Sometimes you play worse than your opponent and you lose.

—Irina Krush

The eight-time champion achieved an early opening advantage in the Reti Opening, and in the conversion stage she was proud of finding 25.Rb8!, a rare case where it's good to trade the two rooks for a queen. She pointed out the knight gets to c6 and then White dominates the position—well, that's what happened in the game.

Yu scored her second consecutive victory against Cervantes, who had been a half-point away from tournament lead. 22...Rd3!? was a very flashy, though not necessary, way to win the queen and put away the game. 

Abrahamyan beat Atwell, but they're both on 3.5 points out of nine. She told GM Maurice Ashley that although the tournament isn't going so well, the number-one priority is to preserve enough rating to qualify for the next American Cup. "I just feel so burned out by chess," she said. "I just need a break. If I get a fighting position, I can still fight, but I am ready for the tournament to be over, definitely."

Yip, the defending champion, is also struggling. Even with her win in this round, she is tied in last with Sargsyan and Paikidze.

"This is probably like my worst tournament maybe ever," she told Ashley. Nevertheless, she's still a fighter, and she fought back from a losing position to turn the knife on Sargsyan, who definitely missed the counter 36...e4!.

Thirteen-year-old Paragua slid into clear fifth with a win over Zatonskih. In time trouble, she accurately calculated the winning 34...Rxd4, foreseeing the queen sacrifice she'd play five moves later. Watch out for this one!

It's a good first showing for the New York-based debutant, who is projected to gain 42 points so far, but it could have even been better. She missed several chances in previous games, but she said, "At the end of the day, it's just a game... i'm just trying to do my best for the next two rounds."

In her last two rounds, Li will play Atwell and Zatonskih, two players who lost in this tournament and are in the bottom half of the standings. But one loss is all it takes to shake up the standings as we march into the last two rounds.

Round 10 Pairings | Women