P. Harikrishna stunned Magnus Carlsen and Jeffery Xiong to share the sixth spot with Levon Aronian after 18 rounds of St. Louis rapid and blitz online chess tournament on Friday.
Despite these successive wins, Harikrishna could not make much progress due to defeats in the first two blitz rounds to Leinier Dominguez Perez and Wesley So, and to Alexander Grischuk and Alireza Firouja in his last two outings of the day.
With nine rounds of blitz games left, Carlsen (18.5 points) nosed ahead of overnight leader So (18) in the title-race.
Standings (after nine rounds each of rapid and blitz games):
1. Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 18.5), 2. Wesley So (USA, 18), 3. Ian Nepomniachtchi (Rus, 15), 4-5. Hikaru Nakamura (USA), Alexander Grischuk (Rus) (14.5 each); 6-7. P. Harikrishna, Levon Aronian (Arm. 12.5 each), 8. Jeffery Xiong (USA, 11.5); 9. Leinier Dominguez Perez (USA, 9.5); 10. Alireza Firouzja (FIDE, 8.5).
