Woodward Beats Caruana to Join So in the Lead

Photo: Vysotsky / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Let us start with a puzzle from the game. It is White to move, in the position below. Black's queen has been running around near White's king, and while it was busy, Black left something behind. Woodward found the winning move here. Can you find it? The answer is in the article.

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White to move, after 45...Qh6. Look at the knight on d7. What is guarding it?

Analyze this position in the full game

Andy Woodward 1-0 Fabiano Caruana, 2026 U.S. Championship, Saint Louis, Round 5, 14 October 2026.

The round in one line

Round 5 brought four decisive games in the Open section. Woodward beat the defending champion Caruana, Jeffery Xiong beat Levon Aronian, Ray Robson beat Hans Niemann in 82 moves, and Abhimanyu Mishra beat Sam Sevian in 107 moves. Wesley So drew with Grigoriy Oparin, and Awonder Liang drew with Sam Shankland. Woodward is now on 3.5 points, sharing the lead with So. In Round 4, Niemann's queen sacrifice beat Mishra.

An early queen check, then pressure

The game opened 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 Bb4. This is the Ragozin Defense, a branch of the Queen's Gambit Declined where Black pins the knight on c3 before White can settle the center. Woodward checked at once with 5.Qa4+. Caruana answered 5...Nc6, and two moves later the white queen stepped back with 7.Qc2. The check was a question, and it pulled Black's knight to c6.

The first big moment came on move 25. Woodward played 25.Rd6, putting his rook on the sixth rank, deep in Black's half of the board. From d6 the rook attacks two black pawns at once, on b6 and on e6. A rook on the sixth rank is hard to chase away and keeps the defenders busy. Our Stockfish 17.1 run at depth 22 gives White an edge here of about one pawn.

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After 25.Rd6. The rook on the sixth rank attacks the pawns on b6 and e6.

Analyze this position in the full game

Three moves later Black traded rooks with 28...Rxd6, and after 29.exd6 White had a passed pawn on d6. A passed pawn is a pawn with no enemy pawn in front of it on its own file or the files next to it, so only pieces can stop it. Black blocked it with 29...Nd7. That knight stayed on d7 for the rest of the game, standing guard in front of the pawn.

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After 29...Nd7. The passed pawn on d6 keeps Black's knight stuck on d7, blocking it.

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The breakthrough

On move 41 Woodward opened a second front with 41.f5. The pawn attacked Black's queen on g6, and the queen had to move. It went to h6.

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After 41.f5. The pawn attacks the black queen on g6.

Analyze this position in the full game

Our engine's top choice in the new position was 42.Bd2, moving the bishop from c3 to d2, where it attacks the queen on h6 again. That is exactly what Woodward played. Our engine now rated White more than three pawns better.

Caruana did what strong players do when their position is bad: he looked for counterplay. His queen kept moving, 42...Qh3, 43...Qh6, 44...Qc1 and 45...Qh6, looking for a way into White's king. It looks scary. But each of those moves was a queen move, not a defending move, and something on Black's side was left without a guard.

The piece that was left behind

Here is the puzzle position again, White to move. The knight on d7 is attacked by the white queen on e6. Black's king on f8 is not next to d7, the black queen on h6 does not see it, and no black pawn protects it.

Woodward played 46.Qxd7. The queen takes the knight, and Black cannot take back: no black piece can reach d7. White is now a whole knight ahead. Caruana answered with a long series of checks: 46...Qh1+ 47.Kf2 Qh2+ 48.Ke3 Qg1+ 49.Ke2 Qg2+ 50.Kd1 Qf3+ 51.Kd2.

Watch White's king on that walk: f2, e3, e2, d1, d2. It walks across the board, away from the kingside where Black's queen was checking, and the game ended there, 1-0, after 51.Kd2. Our engine rates the final position as close to five pawns better for White, a knight up with the attack still going.

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The final position, after 51.Kd2. White is a knight up and the d-pawn is still on d6.

Analyze this position in the full game

Was 46.Qxd7 the best move? Our Stockfish 17.1 run at depth 24 rates 46.Qe7+ and 46.Qxd7 exactly the same. The check forces the black king to g8, and in our engine's line the queen takes on d7 two moves later anyway. Woodward went straight for the knight.

What you can steal from this game

First, check for undefended pieces every move, especially when your opponent starts attacking. A desperate attack can look frightening, but the attacker is often leaving things behind. Before you react to a threat, ask: did that last move stop guarding something? Here it was a whole knight.

Second, a rook on the sixth rank is worth more than it looks. 25.Rd6 did not win anything right away, but it attacked two pawns and led to the passed pawn that froze Black's knight. Do not leave your rooks at home. Put them where they bother your opponent.

Third, learn the king walk. When you are ahead in material and the checks start, do not panic. Walk your king away from the checking queen, one calm step at a time. Woodward's king took five steps, and the game ended with White still a knight up.

The rest of Round 5

Jeffery Xiong beat Levon Aronian in 40 moves and reached 3 points. Ray Robson beat Hans Niemann in 82 moves and climbed to 2 points. Abhimanyu Mishra beat Sam Sevian in 107 moves and reached 2.5 points.

Wesley So drew with Grigoriy Oparin in 27 moves, and Awonder Liang drew with Sam Shankland in 39 moves. So stays on 3.5, sharing the lead with Woodward.

Standings after Round 5

Woodward 3.5, So 3.5, Caruana 3, Liang 3, Xiong 3, Shankland 2.5, Oparin 2.5, Mishra 2.5, Aronian 2, Robson 2, Niemann 2, Sevian 0.5.

Update: in Round 7, So beat Ray Robson in a 92-move bishop ending to take the sole lead.