Hoang Thong Tu: The Grandmaster Who Loves 1.b3
Signature Style
Hoang Thong Tu, known to online rivals as NguyenXi, is a FIDE Grandmaster with a style best described as patient chaos. His favorite first move is 1.b3, the start of the Nimzo-Larsen Attack. It looks quiet, but he has fired it thousands of times and turned it into a signature weapon. With Black, he often answers with the Scandinavian Defense, scoring well in an opening many players underestimate. His profile says Daily chess is his preferred arena, but his online history shows he never really leaves the bullet board.
The Bullet Years
Although NguyenXi appears to prefer Daily chess, his true home is bullet. He has played nearly 40,000 bullet games, collected more than 22,000 wins, and pushed his bullet peak to 2998 (2022-12-05). His bullet rating graph looks less like a chart and more like a mountain range made of adrenaline.
Opening Mix
NguyenXi is not afraid to have fun. In Daily games he has used the Amar Gambit, a deeply unusual opening, and still scored a 68 percent win rate. His Daily record with the Caro-Kann Defense is close to flawless, and his Scandinavian Defense numbers in bullet are strong enough to make opponents think twice before playing mainline theory.
A Rivalry for the Ages
If there is one person who has seen the full NguyenXi experience, it is Davit_Tiraturyan. The pair have faced each other 634 times, and Hoang Thong Tu has won 336 of those battles. With that many games and that kind of record, it is more than chess. It is a long running rivalry with no sign of a ceasefire.
Resilience and Recoveries
Everyone loses in chess, but NguyenXi has turned losing into a survival skill. He once lost 45 games in a row, then kept coming back until he built a 27-game winning streak. His comeback rate is 72.4 percent, and after losing a piece he still wins more than half the time. He rarely resigns early, which means opponents have to finish what they started.