The top 4 will move on to a quad to fight for the national title. The rest will just play for money.
Round 7 pairings:
| 1 | GM Shulman, Yuri | 4.5 | 2613 | – GM Onischuk, Alexander | 4.5 | 2699 | |
| 2 | GM Christiansen, Larry | 4.0 | 2578 | – GM Nakamura, Hikaru | 4.5 | 2733 | |
| 3 | GM Kamsky, Gata | 4.5 | 2702 | – GM Shabalov, Alexander | 3.5 | 2585 | |
| 4 | GM Kraai, Jesse | 3.5 | 2492 | – GM Stripunsky, Alexander | 3.5 | 2570 | |
| 5 | GM Yermolinsky, Alex | 3.5 | 2528 | – GM Finegold, Benjamin | 3.5 | 2539 | |
| 6 | GM Hess, Robert L | 3.0 | 2590 | – GM Akobian, Varuzhan | 3.5 | 2599 | |
| 7 | IM Krush, Irina | 3.0 | 2455 | – GM Lenderman, Alex | 2.5 | 2598 | |
| 8 | GM Ehlvest, Jaan | 2.5 | 2591 | – GM Bhat, Vinay S | 2.5 | 2547 | |
| 9 | GM Kaidanov, Gregory | 2.5 | 2577 | – GM Robson, Ray | 2.5 | 2569 | |
| 10 | GM Khachiyan, Melikset | 2.0 | 2539 | – GM Benjamin, Joel | 2.5 | 2565 | |
| 11 | GM Kudrin, Sergey | 1.5 | 2571 | – GM Gurevich, Dmitry | 1.5 | 2488 | |
| 12 | IM Shankland, Samuel | 1.5 | 2507 | – IM Altounian, Levon | 1.5 | 2454 |
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
This sucks. The 2 friends (Onischuk and Shulman) have to face each other.
Curiously, all of the leaders are mathematically assured of being in at least a playoff for 4th, except one. That one will highly probably be eliminated if he loses. Logic puzzle: which of the four leaders is he?
Unfortunately the new format encourages draws on the top boards to qualify for the final four.
Well you know whenever Maurice Ashley gets involved things get goofy and screwed up – look at the fate of the HB Global….
Answer: If Nakamura loses, and Shulman/Onischuk/Kamsky all draw, then the rankings would be
Shulman 5.5
Onischuk 5.5
Christiansen 5.0
Kamsky 5.0
with no room for Nakamura at 4.5
If any of the Shulman/Onischuk/Kamsky lose, there would still only be at most 3 players at 5.5 or 5.0 so there would be a playoff for the 4th spot.
okay but there won’t be any playoff – there is a tie-break system in place – so try to figure that out!