Dresden Chess Olympiad:Final Standings

The Chess Olympiad took place in Dresden Germany from November12th-25th 2008. Armenia once again showed its power in Men's chess by retaining its title from the last Olympiad. Here are the top-placing teams in the Men's event:

Rg. Team
1 Armenia ARM
2 Israel ISR
3 United States of America USA
4 Ukraine UKR
5 Russia RUS
6 Azerbaijan AZE
7 China CHN
8 Hungary HUN
9 Vietnam VIE
10 Spain ESP 11
11 Georgia GEO

Well at least one team from the Western World, was near the top at the end: the USA team although none of the players on the Mens' team were born in the US: Kamsky,Nakamra,Onischuk,Shulman,and Akopian were all born outside the US. The Canadian Men's Chess Olympiad team finished in 27th place (after tie-breaks).With a better tie-break the Men's team could have finished as high as 18th place.Here are some statistics relating to the Men's Olympiad team for this Olympiad:

27. Canada
Bo. Name Rtg Pts. Games Rp
1 GM Bluvshtein Mark 2557 5 9 2429
2 GM Charbonneau Pas.2499 6 9 2500
3 IM Zugic Igor 2457 7 10 2395
4 IM Roussel-Roozmon Thomas 6 8 2366
2486
5 IM Noritsyn Nikolay 2372 6 8 2413

So, only two members of the team performed at or above their rating for this tournament, Charbonneau performed at an elo of 2500 (his elo entering the event was 2499), and Noritsyn performed at an elo of 2413 (his elo entering this event was 2372).
Here are the players in the Men's Olympiad who had the highest rating performances:

The best players sorted according Rp,Pts,games,%,board (Final Ranking after 11 Rounds)
No. Name Rtg Team Rp Pts.Games % Board played.
1 GM Sargissian Gabriel 2642 Armenia 2869 9.0 11 81.8 3
2 GM Leko Peter 2747 Hungary 2834 7.5 10 75.0 1
3 GM Gelfand Boris 2719 Israel 2833 7,5 10 75.0 1
4 GM Topalov Veselin 2791 Bulgaria 2821 6.5 8 81.3 1
5 GM Akopian Vladimir 2679 Armenia 2813 8.0 11 72.7 2
6 GM Vallejo Pons F. 2664 Spain 2807 9.0 11 81.8 2
7 GM Movsesian Sergei 2732 Slovakia 2794 7.0 9 77.8 1
8 GM Jakovenko Dmitry 2737 Russia 2794 7.0 9 77.8 5
9 GM Blagojevic Dragisa 2522 Montenegro 2792 8.0 9 88.9 4
10 GM Delchev Aleksander 2632 Bulgaria 2788 8.0 9 88.9 4

In the Women's event,the team from the Republic of Georgia won the event (winning on a tie-break over the Ukraine):

Final Ranking after 11 Rounds
1 Georgia
2 Ukraine
3 United States of America
4 Russia
5 Poland
6 Armenia
7 Serbia
8 China
9 Israel
10 Belarus
11 Romania
12 Italy

Again as in the Men's event, all of the players representing the United States in the Women's Chess Olympiad were born outside of the USA. The Canadian Women's Olympiad team finished in 65th place (the team's ranking entering the event was 53rd.) With a better tie-break the Canadian Women's team could have finished as high as 63rd place. Here are some statistics relating to the Women's team and their performance at the Dresden, Olympiad:

65. Canada
Bo. Name Rg Points Games Rp
1 WIM Khoudgarian Natalia 2149 3.5 9 2049
2 WFM Yuan Yuanling 2157 6.5 10 2180
3 WFM Kagramanov Dina 2118 5.5 9 2018
4 WFM Smith Hazel 2057 3.5 8 1833
5 Barron Irina 2071 5.0 8 1928

The above statistics indicate that all of the members of the Canadian Women's team underperformed in the Dresden Olympiad (Rp refers to the Rating performance of a player in a tournament, which is based upon the number of wins,losses and draws the player has, as well as the rating of the opponents a player plays in an event).

Here are the best performances in the Women's Chess Olympiad:

No. Name Rtg Team Rp Pts. Games % Board played.
1 GM Chiburdanidze Maia 2489 Georgia 2715 7.5 9 83.3 1
2 WIM Majdan Joanna 2284 Poland 2621 9.5 11 86.4 4
3 IM Fierro Baquero M. 2361 Ecuador 2613 7.5 8 93.8 1
4 IM Kosintseva Nadezhda 2468 Russia 2591 8.5 10 85.0 3
5 IM Zatonskih Anna 2440 USA 2571 8.0 10 80.0 2
6 IM Khukhashvili S. 2409 Georgia 2564 6.0 7 85.7 5
7 WGM Hou Yifan 2578 China 2563 7.5 11 68.2 1
8 IM Socko Monika 2434 Poland 2563 6.5 10 65.2 1
9 WGM Zhukova Natalia 2488 Ukraine 2553 7.0 10 70.0 2
10 IM Mkrtchian Lilit 2443 Armenia 2549 8.0 11 72.7 2

Chess is definitely one of the most difficult games to become good at, and these ratings show how talented and hard-working the top players in the World are. To score 8 points in 11 games (as Lilith Mkrtchian did for example in this event and "only" finish in 10th place among all players shows how difficult it is to get a high rating in chess).

These statistics were taken from: http://chessresults.com