USA Delegation Wins Three Medals and Much More at 2024 FIDE World Cadet Championships

Editor's note: This article will be updated shortly with annotated games from the event.

Three USA players made podium finishes at the 2024 FIDE World Cadet Chess Championships, held from November 15 through 26 in Montesilvano, Italy. Zooming out a bit, roughly a quarter of the players representing the American delegation finished in the top 10 of their respective section, with eight more players finishing in the top 10 (including tiebreaks) and two more finishing tied for ninth, but outside the top 10 on tiebreaks.

Overall, 46 American players — the largest of any delegation — took the trip to Montesilvano, Italy to compete across the three Open (U-12, U-10, U-8) and three Girls (U-12, U-10, U-8) sections of the 11-round Swiss System event.

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

The three medalists were WCM Abigal Zhu (silver, Girls U-8), Stella Xin (bronze, Girls U-8), and Aimee Yang (silver, Girls U-10).

Four more players finished just off the podium: CM Chenxuan Ling finished fourth on tiebreaks in the Open U-10, while Aiden Li finished in fourth, a half-point off the podium, in the Open U-8. Sam Luger and FM Patrick Liu tied for fourth in the Open U-12, finishing sixth and seventh, respectively, on tiebreaks. More details below.

Girls U-8

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

Two of the three medalists came from the Girls U-8 section, where WCM Abigal Zhou and Stella Xin tied for second with 8½/11 scores. Zhou took silver on tiebreaks, with Xin taking gold and also earning the WCM title for her podium finish.

American players comprised literally half of the top 10 in this section, with Allyson Yu and Elizabeth Xia finishing tied for fourth (fifth and sixth, respectively, on tiebreaks) with 8/11 scores and Sarah Nguyen (7½/11) finishing tied for seventh (eighth on tiebreaks).

Zhou and Yu were also two of the biggest winners on the ratings list, with Zhou gaining 70 points to go along with her silver medal and Yu gaining 66 points for her fifth-place finish.

Girls U-10

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

The third medal came from WCM Aimee Yang in the Girls U-10, where she finished in clear second with a 9/11 score. Her only loss was to WCM Alanna Berikkyzy, the eventual gold medalist from Kazakhstan, who finished only a half-point ahead of Yang.

Girls U-12

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

In the Girls U-12, the highest-placing American was Sophie Li, who tied for 11th with a 7/11 score. But the stories don’t stop at the top of the standings! Three more players were among the top of the “ratings gain” list, led by Alice Chovanec (1694), who gained 79 points for her 6/11 score. Tianmu Wang (1640) gained 63 points for the same score, and Candice Liang (1551) earned 68 points for her 5½/11 score. It’s fair to say some of the USA players in this section were a bit underrated!

Open U-8

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

Aiden Li had the inside track on a podium finish for most of the Open U-8 event, jumping out to a 6/6 score before ceding a draw to eventual silver medalist Swain Sattwik (India) to “fall” to 6½/7. After two more wins, Li entered the final two rounds with an 8½/9 score and a full-point lead over eventual bronze medalist Zimjing Guo (China). But a head-to-head loss in round 10 to Guo shook up the standings, and another loss in the final round to gold medalist Reddy Adulla Divith saw Li finish in fourth place with 8½/11, a half-point behind each of the three podium finishers.

Open U-10

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

In the Open U-10, CM Chenxuan Ling finished in a tie for third with 8½/11, but he ended up in fourth on tiebreaks behind bronze medalist Quang Anh Nguyen (Vietnam). Ling also jumped out to a hot 5/6 start before a seventh-round defeat to silver medalist Marc Llari (France) saw him playing catch-up. But, with a hot 3½/4 finish, Ling rebounded excellently, and the 1967-rated player earned 64 FIDE rating points for his bounce-back.

Linxi Zhou tied for fifth with an 8/11 score, while Joshua Xia and Lev Shangin each tied for ninth with 7½/11 scores, although they finished outside the top 10 (14th and 18th, respectively) on tiebreaks. Ling (1967) also gained 64 FIDE points for his performance. Frank Zhongtian Cao (1793), who finished with a 7/11 score, also had an impressive gain of 53 points.

Open U-12

Photo courtesy of Elle Yang

In the Open U-12, Sam Luger and FM Patrick Liu tied for fourth with 8/11 scores, finishing sixth and seventh (respectively) on tiebreaks. This section also saw the only American player in any of the six sections who gained over 100 FIDE rating points for his performance. Congratulations to Vyas Miransh (1705) whose 6/11 score saw him gain 120 points!

The results from each section are available on Chess-Results.com. Games from the top boards of each section can be replayed on Lichess.