The difficulty of not losing in Chess Olympiad

Magnus’ loss today reminds us of how difficult it is not to lose a game in Chess Olympiad. In such an important event where one plays for national pride, no serious player will just mail it in. Everyone comes to each game to fight.

Here are the top 3 players in the Men’s (Open) and Women’s Olympiad who played the most games (up to the Dresden Olympiad – Minimum 15 games) without a single loss:

Men’s (Open) Olympiad

Title – Name – Country – Total points scored – Total games played – Wins – Draws – Losses – Percentage

GM Kramnik, Vladimir RUS 32½ points 47 games 18-29-0 69.1%
GM Acs, Peter HUN 13½ points 19 games 8-11-0 71.1%
IM Minić, Dragoljub YUG 14½ points 18 games 11-7-0 80.6%

Women’s Olympiad

GM Polgar, Susan (*) HUN – USA 43½ points 56 games 31-25-0 77.7%
WGM Kushnir, Alla USSR – ISR 23 points 25 games 21-4-0 92.0%
WIM Zvorykina, Kira USSR 17½ points 20 games 15-5-0 87.5%

(*) All games on board 1