World No. 1 Magnus Carlsen reflects on D Gukesh's gameplay at the 2025 Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour, shedding light on the dynamics of their high-stakes encounter and the challenges of top-level chess.

World champion D Gukesh exited the Freestyle Grand Slam Chess after his second quarterfinal loss to Fabiano Caruana in Hamburg. Gukesh, needing a win,

D Gukesh resigned in 40 moves in Game 1 of his quarter-final meeting with Fabiano Caruana despite playing with white pieces, the defeat extending his winless run at the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour event in Weissenhaus as a result.

Classical World Champion, India’s D. Gukesh lost the second leg of the quarterfinal match against USA’s Fabiano Caruana in the 2025 Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam tour in Hamburg, Germany on Monday.

World Champion D Gukesh qualified for the knockout stage in the first event of the Freestyle Grand Slam Tour, despite losing to the world’s highest-rated player, Magnus Carlsen of Norway, in the ninth and final round of the qualifiers.

Fabiano Caruana said that the reason why he picked D Gukesh as his quarter-final opponent for the Weissenhaus leg of the 2025 Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour was due to the latter’s experience of playing ‘high stakes games’.

While Gukesh is out of the quarterfinal, his time in Weissenhaus still continues, as he will battle for the fifth to eighth ranking spots, playing the loser of the Hikaru Nakamura vs Jakovhir Sindarov quarterfinal tie.