Luke McShane

Double gold for India

issue 28 September 2024

The Gaprindashvili Cup, named after the Georgian former women’s world champion Nona Gaprindashvili, is awarded at the biennial Chess Olympiad to the country with the highest total standings between the open and women’s events. In Chennai in 2022, that honour went to India, who won the bronze medals in both sections.

The 45th Chess Olympiad, which concluded last weekend in Budapest, saw Indian teams surpass themselves, winning gold in both events. Their victory in the open section was all but secured with one round to spare, and featured stratospheric individual performances from Dommaraju Gukesh and Arjun Erigaisi (aged 18 and 21 respectively).

Gukesh’s 9/10 score ranks as the second highest tournament performance of all time (behind Caruana’s Sinquefield Cup victory in 2014), while Erigaisi’s 10/11 score (in a slightly weaker field) propels him to third place in the world rankings. Both earned individual gold medals, while in the women’s event Divya Deshmukh (9.5/11)

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