The 46th Chess Olympiad starts tomorrow in Samarkand, Uzbekistan! The event will be held from 15-27 September at the International Expo, part of the Silk Road Samarkand tourist center.
Nearly 400 teams will compete in the tournament, with 208 teams in the Open section, and 191 teams in the Women’s event. The numbers break the previous participation record of 380 teams set in Budapest in 2024. Teams are made up of four players + one reserve player in both sections. The events will be played in 11 rounds, swiss system, with the time control of 90 minutes for 40 moves, plus 30 minutes until the end of the game, with 30-second increment for each move starting from move one.
The top seeded teams in the Open section are: United States of America (Rating average of players 275)3, India (Rating average of players 2735), Uzbekistan (Rating average of players 2720), China (Rating average of players 2707), and Germany (Rating average of players 2677).
Rating favourites in the Women’s competition are: India (Rating average of players 2466), Georgia (Rating average of players 2451), Kazakhstan (Rating average of players 2438), China (Rating average of players 2429) and United States of America (Rating average of players 2415).
Among the rating favourites, India arrives to Samarkand as the defending Open and Women’s champions after their historic double gold triumph in Budapest.
Starting list of teams and team compositions can be found here.
The Opening ceremony of the event took place this evening, and the games are starting tomorrow at 15:00 (local time). The pairings of the first round and the results will be available here.
Detailed information, tournament schedule and link to live games can be found on the official website.
