World No. 2 Wesley So halved the point with Varuzhan Akobian after 45 moves to stay ahead in the 2017 US Open Championships Monday in St. Louis, Missouri.
So (2822 rating) is half-a-point ahead of a 5-man pack composed of last year’s champion Fabian Caruana (2817), Hikaru Nakamura (2793), Yaroslav Zherebukh (2605), Daniel Narorditsky (2646) and Akobian (2645). (NG)