🏆 DOUBLE GOLD FOR DRAGON CHILLING! 🐉 FIDE World Team Rapid & Blitz 2026 Wraps Up in Hong Kong! 🇭🇰
What a fantastic and gila week of chess at the Queen Elizabeth Stadium in Hong Kong! Personally I never followed The FIDE World Team Rapid & Blitz Championships. But the 2026 edition that has officially come to a close was exciting, and it delivered all the drama, upsets, and nail-biting finishes! 🔥 Ok let's see how this massive €500,000 event ended .
⏱️ The Rapid Championship: A Nail-Biting 3-Way Tie! The Rapid event ended in absolute sheer drama! Three absolute powerhouse teams— Dragon Chilling , defending champions Team MGD1 , and Hexamind Chess Team —all finished tied at the top with 18 matchpoints .
It all came down to the Olympiad Sonneborn-Berger tiebreaks, and Dragon Chilling snatched the Gold medal and the €110,000 first prize! 🥇💸 . Their captain, GM Ni Hua, praised former World Champion GM Ding Liren, who broke a six-game drawing streak with a clutch 20-move victory in the final round to secure a 5-1 match win against Interstellar Club . Team MGD1 took Silver, and Hexamind settled for Bronze .
Major shocker of the Rapid: Pre-tournament favorites WR Chess completely collapsed, finishing in 17th place . Even crazier? World No. 1 GM Magnus Carlsen suffered an unbelievable four-game losing streak over the board (losing to GM Arjun Erigaisi, GM Shant Sargsyan, GM Javokhir Sindarov, and GM Aydin Suleymanli) . You don't see that every day! 😱
The second half
⚡ The Blitz Championship: The Dragons Rise Again!
The Chinese super-squad—featuring Ding Liren, Wei Yi, Yu Yangyi, Lu Shanglei, Ju Wenjun, Lei Tingjie, and their incredible recreational player Wang Zihao—claimed the Double Gold! 🐉🥇🥇 .
The Chinese super-squad—featuring Ding Liren, Wei Yi, Yu Yangyi, Lu Shanglei, Ju Wenjun, Lei Tingjie, and their incredible recreational player Wang Zihao—claimed the Double Gold! 🐉🥇🥇 .
In the Blitz knockouts, they faced off against Endgame.AI (led by Hans Niemann and Leinier Dominguez) in the finals and absolutely crushed them with back-to-back 5-1 match victories to take home the €75,000 blitz first prize .
Endgame.AI took a well-deserved Silver, while Uzbekistan claimed Bronze after completely dominating Hexamind in their tiebreak match . A huge shoutout to Uzbekistan's GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov, whose blistering performance pushed his live blitz rating past 2800! 📈🔥 .
Endgame.AI took a well-deserved Silver, while Uzbekistan claimed Bronze after completely dominating Hexamind in their tiebreak match . A huge shoutout to Uzbekistan's GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov, whose blistering performance pushed his live blitz rating past 2800! 📈🔥 .
🇲🇾 How Did Our Malaysia Chess Hub Perform?
🇲🇾 Of course, we have to talk about our homegrown heroes flying the Jalur Gemilang !
Malaysia Chess Hub finished the grueling 12-round Rapid event in 36th place with 11 Matchpoints .
🇲🇾 Of course, we have to talk about our homegrown heroes flying the Jalur Gemilang !
Malaysia Chess Hub finished the grueling 12-round Rapid event in 36th place with 11 Matchpoints .
A massive round of applause for our Board 1, GM Yeoh Li Tian , who played like an absolute beast!
🦁 Yeoh Li Tian maintained a stellar 2544 performance rating the first 8 rounds of the event and was a rock for the team. Out of 12 rounds, he remained undefeated in 10 of them, only dropping games to IM Sandeep Sethuraman (Blue Bulldogs) and IM Ruben Domingo Nunez (C.A. Silla).
Alongside him, FM Kavin Mohan, IM Tan Jun Ying, IM Mas Hafizulhelmi, WFM Ainul Mardhiah, and young CM Chow Yi Chen showed incredible fighting spirit. They faced some incredibly tough pairings, including a brutal Round 1 matchup against the 2506-rated super-team Chessnut Nova and a tough bout against Mongolia-Aldar (who finished 16th overall) .
Syabas to the Malaysia Chess Hub squad for showing the world that Malaysia can stand our ground on the global stage! 💪♟️
Also not forgetting Chess Hub for sponsoring ouir team to Hong Kong. Chess Hub also played a prominent role in funding and organising the Masters tournament that brought Yeoh Li Tian 3rd and final GM norm.
Overall, an unforgettable event in Hong Kong! And the coverage from FIDE was stellar as I watched hours of commentated games live. Also kudos to GM David Howell and GM Evgenij Miroshnichenko. They were so visibly tired at day five, at one point, they forgot the team names that were supposed to be in the final knockout for the blitz event. What was your favorite moment of the championships? Let me know in the comments below! 👇🇲🇾
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