Grandmaster D. Gukesh played like a knight on a mission to beat world No. 1 Magnus Carlsen of Norway, Levon Aronian of Armenia and eventually reigning world champion Ding Liren of China on the first day of the Weissenhaus Chess Challenge that got underway here.

After a rather sedate start that cost him a full point in the opener against Alireza Firouza of France, Gukesh was in full swing and ended the day with three points in all out of a possible four and is in joint second place in the rapid section behind Vincent Keymer of Germany who notched up 3.5 points.

Nodirbek Abdusattarov also matched Gukesh on points after remaining unbeaten on the opening day while the trio of biggies — Carlsen, Firouza and Fabiano Caruana of the United States — were in the joint fourth spot with two points apiece in the $200,000 prize-money tournament.

Levon Aronian of the United States, with a lone draw, was sole seventh while Ding Liren was at the bottom after losing all four games.

The rapid format has been designed to pick up the pairings for the knockout stage between the same eight players.

With inputs from PTI