U.S. Wins Gold at 42nd Olympiad

This year, the United States managed to win the 42nd Chess Olympiad, the equivalent of the Olympics of chess. The team came into the 11 round tournament seeded second and eventually won on tiebreaks because they beat Ukraine in their head-to-head match.

Captained by IM John Donaldson, the United States Team featured 5 Grandmasters. GM Caruana, GM Nakamura, and GM So played the top 3 boards, and from current October 2016 ratings, they are all top ten players in the world! GM Shankland was also an experienced team member, who participated in the previous tournament, and GM Robson was a young and strong player. Together, the team was undefeated through the tournament with 9 wins and two draws. Below are the pictures of the final standings and the award ceremony.

I'm glad to see that chess in the US is blossoming and attracting more talent. This result is amazing considering that America only placed 14th at the last Olympiad in Tromsø.

New York Times Report
Can You Calculate like an Olympic Gold Medalist?