Naroditsky Wins Clash Of Streamers

Daniel Naroditsky took the $400 first prize in March's final Bullet Brawl on Saturday, winning 73 games en route to a mammoth score of 261. Claiming his fourth title of the year and 14th in Bullet Brawl history, Naroditsky emphatically finished 27 points ahead of Vietnam's GM Tuan Minh Le and 40 points ahead of the third-placed Ukrainian GM Oleksandr Bortnyk.

Winning the best women's prize was Poland's WGM Aleksandra Maltsevskaya whose 15th-placed finish earned her $100, while 77 wins secured "OneManArmmy" first place in the community event.

April's first Bullet Brawl will take place on Saturday, April 6, 2024, at noon ET/18:00 CEST.

Standings

Speed chess wizard, @GmNaroditsky, dominated today's arena to win his 14th #BulletBrawl 🔥 pic.twitter.com/H7Q1I73buz

— Chess.com (@chesscom) March 30, 2024

Content creators dominated the latest iteration of Bullet Brawl. Five of the top-six placing players are Twitch partners or affiliates: Naroditsky, Le, Bortnyk, IM Yoseph Taher, and Chessbrah's Eric Hansen.

Topping the group was Naroditsky, who carved up a Nakamura-less Bullet Brawl by focusing on game volume. The speedster worked his way through 87 games during the two-hour arena and scored 74.5/87, defeating the likes of Hansen, Bortnyk, and GM Harika Dronavalli along the way.

Blitz matches against Chess.com's current number-one in bullet GM Nihal Sarin and 2024 Candidates Tournament hopeful GM Alireza Firouzja earlier in the day were the perfect warmups for the Charlotte-based creator, and it was no surprise to see Naroditsky whip out multiple top-level brilliancies in the subsequent event.

Competing for the top women's prize, Maltsevskaya faced tough opposition but convincingly took the prize ahead of Dronavalli and multi-time winner IM Meri Arabidze after securing 39 wins and two draws. 

A rook sacrifice in the latter stages of the arena against Arabidze allowed Maltsevskaya to stamp her authority on the prize, leaving her Georgian rival's king in tatters. The category has been almost monopolized by Arabidze and IMs Karina Ambartsumova and Polina Shuvalova since its inception, and recent winners have started to rewrite the narrative in style.

With 482 players taking part in Saturday's titled and community arenas, a near-record, Bullet Brawl is the best place to fine-tune your bullet skills against the best of the best. Whether you're titled or untitled, make sure you sign up for next week's event!

Bullet Brawl is an exciting new titled arena that features Chess.com's top bullet specialists and takes place weekly on Saturdays. The format is a two-hour arena with a 1+0 time control; the prize fund is $1,000.

Much like Titled Tuesday and Arena Kings, Bullet Brawl often features top GMs, including Hikaru Nakamura, Daniel Naroditsky, Andrew Tang, Tuan Minh Le, and many more!

Previous coverage:

• • Announcing Chess.com Community Bullet Brawl Tournaments
  • Introducing Bullet Brawls And New Arena Options