Pragg Turning Everything Around
By Cameron W. · Thu, 29 Oct 2026
Praggnanandhaa goes from last to first on day two of the champions showdown, beating Nakamura twice and leaving him at the bottom.
Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu began day two in last place. He ended it in first, with four wins, a draw and a loss in his six games, while Hikaru Nakamura, who started the day on top, slid all the way to fourth.
A day that belonged to Praggnanandhaa
The turnaround came mostly at Nakamura's expense. In their first game, Praggnanandhaa won an endgame a pawn down after Nakamura blundered from a winning position. Nakamura summed it up afterward by saying he was completely winning and lost his mind. The second game, an endgame from a Rossolimo Sicilian, was simply outplayed. Nakamura finished the day with four draws and two losses, both to the same man.
Praggnanandhaa also beat Fabiano Caruana, who collapsed in a time scramble, and drew their second game to close the day. Against Javokhir Sindarov he won the first game, a heavy-piece endgame in which Sindarov missed the only path. Sindarov answered in the second with a King's Indian Defense and a win with Black, so that mini-match ended level. Praggnanandhaa later said he had been lucky and that it carried through the day, which is a modest way to describe four wins.
Caruana's best, Sindarov's worst
The day's most one-sided game came between two other players. Caruana beat Sindarov with Black, using a free outpost on d5, and Sindarov called it the worst game of his life. For Sindarov, who had gone unbeaten on day one and sits less than four weeks from his match with Gukesh, it was a bruising reminder that rapid chess does not forgive an off day. Caruana scored 50 percent on the day, and he noted that draws are becoming less and less valuable, a fair summary of how the format's multipliers work.
The standings, and a note on the math
Chess.com's report gives Sindarov and Caruana 8.5 points each and Nakamura 8, with Praggnanandhaa in front by a margin the article states as 1.5 points. That figure does not fit the records the article reports. Adding Praggnanandhaa's 2 points from day one to his day-two total of 9 (four wins at two points, plus one draw) gives 11, which would make the lead 2.5 points. The article does not give his total, so the figure here is a tally from the reported records.
What day three does
It all hinges on tripling. Play resumes today at 1 p.m. ET (18:00 CET), with rounds seven through nine, and every win is worth three points. A single win by a player on 8.5 would carry him past an 11, and two would do far more than that. The prize fund stands at $425,000. Praggnanandhaa has earned $9,000 in win bonuses so far, and the Champion's Jackpot, built from drawn games and awarded to the winner, now holds $19,000.
He has a cushion, but not much of one. Sindarov and Caruana have the numbers to catch him, and Nakamura, who has already shown what a good day looks like, needs only one big afternoon of his own.
