Double Gold for USA at 2026 FIDE World Senior Team Championship

Both official USA teams won gold medals in the 50+ section of the 2026 World Senior Team Championship. Team USA won gold with a 7½/9 score (six wins, three draws), finishing ahead of Italy on tiebreaks.

Team USA (Photo courtesy FIDE/Georgia Graspa)

Team USA Women was the top-finishing women's team in the section, finishing with a 5/9 score (four wins, two draws, three losses) a half-point ahead of Czech Republic Women and Kazakhstan Women.

Team USA Women (Photo courtesy FIDE/Georgia Graspa)

As reported previously, Team USA decided to run last year’s team back this year, with GMs Jaan Ehlvest, Alexander Shabalov, Gregory Kaidanov, and Igor Novikov on Boards 1-4, respectively, and IM Stuart Rachels as the alternate.

Four players from last year’s bronze-winning USA Women’s team are back this year, including WGM Anjelina Belakovskaia on Board 1 and reigning U.S. Senior Women’s champion WFM Natalia Tsodikova on Board 2. The one new face — WIM Beatriz Marinello — is on Board 3, while WFM Olga Sagalchik is on Board 4 and WFM Ivona Jezierska is the alternate. (Note: "new" is relative, as Marinello played on the 2024 team.)

This was Team USA's fourth consecutive gold medal and Team USA women's third consecutive medal but first gold.

Longtime readers might recall that, when writing on her experience as a part of last year's team, WIM Dr. Alexey Root predicted a gold, writing that, "In 2024, USA Women won silver and in 2025 we won bronze. There are two ways to look at this year’s result. One is that USA Women are trending downward. But that’s not true, as the competition in 2025 was tougher than in 2024. The correct way to look at the result is that we now need only one medal color — gold — to complete our podium collection." While Root was not a part of this year's team, she definitely deserves credit for her foresight!

Headed into the rest day, Team USA was tied with Italy atop the standings, but in Round 6 the Americans managed to pull ahead with a 2½–1½ win over a tough Hungary team while Italy could only manage a draw against the North Macedonian Alkaloid Chess Club team USA had previously beaten. Shabalov's match-clinching display of full-board dominance is below:

But in Round 7, USA drew a Kazakhstan team that Italy had already defeated, allowing Italy to catch up to USA again. In Round 8, Italy had a tough pairing against Iceland and drew its match, while USA defeated England-3 4–0. We'll see some more of these games in future Wednesday Workouts, but for now, here's Novikov showing how to defend a Najdorf against an aggressive early piece sacrifice:

In Round 9, USA took a quick draw against Iceland while Italy eked out a 2½–1½ win over Norway - Oslo Schakselskap to catch USA one last time in the standings. But USA had the better tiebreaks (more individual won games), and so went into the round knowing that a draw in its match would be enough to secure gold.

With only the top five matches displayed on DGT boards each rounds, we were not treated to any live games from the women's team until their 4–0 loss to England-1 in Round 9. Keep an eye out for a separate piece on USA Women's quest for the gold once we collect some games from the champions.