Both Ulibin and Federov have five points from six outings.

The Indian hopefuls GM Dibyendu Barua and GM norm holder K Sasikiran came back into reckoning after yesterday's debacle with thumping victories over Dinesh Kumar Sharma and L Chiong (Phillipines) respectively. Both Barua and Sasikiran are on four points.

Sashikiran played the classical variation to counter Chiong's kings Indian defence with white pieces. With thematic piece play, Sasikiran broke-through the queenside and obtained the upper hand. In mutual time trouble, Sasikiran could not keep up the momentum and sacrificed his queen for two pieces. However, Chiong fell short of required quota of 40 moves in two hours, and was declared lost on time.

Barua playeda street-smart game to overcome the challenge of IM norm holder Sharma. In the Guilco Viano, Sharma (black) tried to open the centre with D5 early in the opening that proved fatal. Barua maneuvered his queen well to initiate a king side attack and won a pawn after which it was a matter of routine technique for the Grandmaster.

The top board witnessed a premeditated draw between GMs Wojtkeiwicz (Poland) and Ulibin and so did board three between GMs Yevgeny Gleizlrov (4.5 pts, Russia) and Dorian Rogozenko (Romania). Apart from these, the rest of the games provided ample entertainment.