May 30, 2025

Norway Chess 2025 Round 3: Caruana Leads As Gukesh Beats Nakamura On 19th Birthday

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GM Fabiano Caruana beat GM Arjun Erigaisi in round three of Norway Chess 2025 to take the sole lead, while World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju, on his 19th birthday, hit back after two losses to defeat GM Hikaru Nakamura. GM Magnus Carlsen had another frustrating day at the office, as he missed winning chances against GM Wei Yi in classical chess and then lost in armageddon.

GM Koneru Humpy has caught GM Anna Muzychuk in the lead of the Women’s Norway Chess 2025. Humpy won the only classical game, against IM Sara Khadem, while Muzychuk survived a bad position in armageddon against GM Lei Tingjie to hold a draw with Black. GM Ju Wenjun defeated GM Vaishali Rameshbabu in a 19-move miniature in their armageddon game.

Round four starts Thursday, May 29, at 11 a.m. ET / 17:00 CEST / 8:30 p.m. IST.

Norway Chess Round 3 Results

For a third day in a row, half of the classical games were decisive, with three points for Caruana, Gukesh, and Humpy.

Open: Gukesh, Caruana Take Down The Leaders

Caruana started with a loss but has now taken the sole lead after co-leaders Arjun and Nakamura both lost in round three. A draw in classical chess was enough for Carlsen to move up to sole second place.

Norway Chess Standings After Round 3

Caruana 3-0 Arjun

This clash was every bit as wild as you’d expect for two such combative players. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

Caruana began this game with the near-novelty 7.h4 in the French Defense.

Arjun barely blinked, however, as he quickly replied 7…f6 and reeled off a long sequence of moves. He soon visited the confessional to confirm what was obvious—he’d looked at all this before.

Arjun’s optimism about his position was what Caruana would later identify as the reason he’d been able to win the game. He commented: “I was kind of mentally preparing for a draw at some point when he knew the opening very well and we reached an equal endgame, but he thought he was slightly better, he told me, and maybe that optimism led him a little bit wrong.”

“He is up a pawn, he does have two connected passed pawns, but my activity and his weak king in the center does give me enough compensation,” said Caruana, who would ultimately go on to win in fine style, with Arjun given no chances at all in the final stages.

That’s our Game of the Day, which GM Rafael Leitao has analyzed below:

The win meant a remarkable turnaround, with Caruana now leading the tournament after two classical wins in a row, despite starting with the most painful of defeats to Nakamura. He’s also back above Arjun as world number-three on the live rating list. How had he been able to shrug off the early defeat? “I’m kind of used to playing really stupidly at times!”

The U.S. star also gave the example of Carlsen starting slowly in 2024, with a loss to GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, before catching fire and winning the event.

Gukesh 3-0 Nakamura

Gukesh hit back in style against Nakamura. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

The player who had had the slowest start in 2025 was Gukesh, who slumped to two defeats that were by the narrowest of margins but also somehow felt inevitable given the handling of the clock. The world champion pointed to that factor as he basked in the relief of hitting back with a win:

I feel quite good! I think my time management was much better today than before. He had some drawing chances, but I guess overall it was a good game.

The other clock situation was that it had turned midnight in India during the game, so that Gukesh and his fans could begin to celebrate the world champion’s 19th birthday.

Gukesh’s birthday covers two rounds in Norway, depending if we’re counting the time in Norway or India. Photo: Michal Walusza/Norway Chess.

Nakamura realized something had gone wrong early on in a Giuoco Piano when 13.b4! appeared on the board. He decided to try and make the best of it, however, by switching to a kingside attack that might exploit Gukesh’s vulnerability after a difficult start.

It would turn out, however, that Gukesh wasn’t vulnerable at all, and though Nakamura came agonizingly close to a draw he admitted to relaxing too soon with 28…Rd8?. When he offered a draw on move 30, he was instead met by 31.h4! and realized, to his horror, that his planned 31…a6? was losing. There was still a chance, but it was a long shot and tough to find when you suddenly realize you’re lost in what you thought was a dead-drawn position.

31…Na4!, that one chance, was a move Nakamura had considered, but he felt he might have failed to work it out even with more time. Instead he played 31…Qd6?, which only made matters worse.

There was no way back and Gukesh wrapped up a win that couldn’t have been more needed.

Here’s Nakamura’s revealing recap of the game:

Nakamura mentions there that the one good thing was that Arjun also losing meant his hopes of qualifying for the Candidates by rating hadn’t been damaged.

Carlsen 1-1.5 Wei

Carlsen has had a frustrating two days, though the classical draws have left him in second place. Photo: Michal Walusza/Norway Chess.

Another curiosity of round three was that although Carlsen lost his match, the one point for a draw in classical chess was enough for him to leapfrog both Nakamura and Arjun into second place. The world number-one had begun to get optimistic when his Chinese opponent burned up 37 minutes on his 20th move.

As against Nakamura the day before, the computer was soon giving Carlsen an advantage of more than a pawn, but once again the edge slipped away, this time almost imperceptibly. Wei admitted, “I was happy that I survived,” but by the end it was Carlsen who needed to force the draw.

That meant that for the second day in a row Carlsen’s match was the only one to go to armageddon in the Open section, and for a second day in a row he lost—a far cry from 2024, where he’d scored 83.33 percent in the sudden-death games.

The armageddon went like a dream for Wei, who got to repeat an opening he’d played against Praggnanandhaa in this year’s Chessable Masters. It was Carlsen who mixed up his moves and ran into the stunning 15…Rxc3!!.

The rook couldn’t be taken due to 16…Qa4!, while after 16.Qxd7 Wei could grab the c2- and g2-pawns before recapturing the queen. 

The position was still playable for Carlsen, but borderline hopeless in a situation where he had to win since a draw was all Wei needed to win the armageddon. We could at least expect a long fight, but instead Carlsen stumbled into a lost position and Wei was merciless.

Carlsen lamented a lack of energy for the armageddon after the game, while you could have powered a small city with Wei’s smile after defeating the world number-one for the first time! 

Wei finds himself in last place, for now, but the field is tightly packed, with a single classical win potentially changing everything.

Carlsen will hope to recover his Midas touch in armageddon. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

Women: Humpy Bounces Back, Catches Muzychuk In Lead

It took no time at all for Humpy to return to the shared lead. She’s had three decisive classical games in three rounds, with two of them going her way.

Norway Chess Women’s Standings After Round 3

Humpy 3-0 Khadem

The seeds of the attack Humpy generated were planted early in the opening stage, a “disaster” for Khadem according to Howell in the commentary. Howell pointed out that, with the tricky move order 6.Qc2, White managed to save a tempo on the regular opening line by playing Bf4 in one move. You can listen to the detailed explanation in the clip below.

After 13…Ng7 14.g4!, Black was unable to execute the regular liquidation plan of …Bf5, and Humpy continued by throwing her pawns forward on the kingside. 37.Re6! was a colorful way of ending the game, though White got so much in return that we can hardly call it a “sacrifice.”

The game wasn’t decided by an attack, but instead by two connected passed pawns in the center.

Humpy has made zero draws. Photo: Michal Walusza/Norway Chess.

Lei 1-1.5 Muzychuk

Muzychuk survived a close call against Lei to stay in the shared lead.

Muzychuk, wearing her Norway Chess sweater, survived a bad/lost position in the armageddon. Photo: Michal Walusza/Norway Chess.

The classical game was over with a 21-move draw, a nearly perfect game by both players. Muzychuk explained that she’d surprised her opponent in the opening (perhaps with the move 12…Ne5, though she didn’t point out where) and neutralized the position comfortably. “But in the armageddon game,” said Muzychuk, “she did pose quite serious problems.”  

Deviating from the first game with 7.d3, this time Lei achieved a queenless middlegame with nagging, increasing pressure. She attained a winning advantage in model fashion, but when it came time to find a knockout blow, she just couldn’t find it. Muzychuk explained “I lost a pawn, but I thought I have some compensation so I just kept on playing… and with the bishop pair, I started to realize I have chances in this game!” Her tenacity paid off.

Ju 1.5-1 Vaishali

The Exchange Variation of the French Defense may not be considered to be the most ambitious path for an opening advantage, but Ju played it in both games—and won a 19-move miniature the second time around.

Ju showed that the Exchange French still has some venom. Photo: Michal Walusza/Norway Chess.

The first game was a nearly perfect draw, though Ju had some pressure with the bishop vs. knight imbalance. She explained in the confession booth that she was aiming for a slight advantage in the endgame, though Vaishali ultimately held it.

Vaishali was the one who deviated with 5…a6 in the second game, but three moves later she fell for Ju’s cunning opening trap with 8.Be2!?, a novelty. The point, as we saw in the game, was that the most natural move was a blunder, and after 8…Bf5?? a3! Vaishali realized she couldn’t take the pawn. She had to retreat, but she never got out of the hole she landed in.

Ju has yet to win a classical game in the tournament and is two points behind the leaders. Asked about the importance of armageddon wins after her game, she said that it’s important to finish the day on a high note because “if you lose maybe in the night it will be a very difficult moment.”

It may be a difficult moment for Vaishali and Sara, on two points in shared last, but we have seen great comebacks in the past. At the 2024 FIDE Women’s Candidates, Vaishali came back from four losses in a row to win her last five games. Of course, the earlier the recovery comes, the better!

NM Anthony Levin contributed to this report.

Round 4 Pairings

There are mouth-watering pairings in round four, the last before the first rest day, including Carlsen-Arjun, Gukesh-Caruana, and Ju-Humpy.

How to watch?

Norway Chess 2025 features Open and Women’s six-player tournaments for equal prize funds of 1,690,000 NOK (~$167,000). It runs May 26 to June 6 in Stavanger, with players facing their opponents twice at classical chess (120 minutes/40 moves, with a 10-second increment from move 41). The winner of a classical game gets three points, the loser, zero; after a draw, the players get one point and fight for another half-point in armageddon (10 minutes for White, seven for Black, who has draw odds). 

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