US news

The Spice Cup along with the actors
Over the coming months I will focusing on chess happenings in the USA. Naturally the exploits of their best known players, US Champion Gata Kamsky, and rising world star Hikaru Nakamura will be of particular interest. However, the US chess scene in general intrigues many Europeans as the tournaments there are so different from those of the Old World.

The USA seems to be having a chess revival at the moment spearheaded by Hikaru Nakamura who seems to be going from strength to strength. Gata Kamsky has also found a second wind, with a string of good results including of course his defeat of Veselin Topalov in Kazan.

The USA is officially the ninth strongest nation in the FIDE rankings.

Here are the top twenty active US players.  

# Name Title Rating B-Year
 1  Nakamura, Hikaru  g  2774  1987
 2  Kamsky, Gata  g  2732  1974
 3  Onischuk, Alexander  g  2675  1975
 4  Seirawan, Yasser  g  2635  1960
 5  Shulman, Yuri  g  2627  1975
 6  Akobian, Varuzhan  g  2603  1983
 7  Hess, Robert L  g  2601  1991
 8  Shabalov, Alexander  g  2586  1967
 9  Ehlvest, Jaan  g  2580  1962
 10  Ramirez, Alejandro  g  2579  1988
 11  Christiansen, Larry M  g  2575  1956
 12  Kaidanov, Gregory S  g  2574  1959
 13  Stripunsky, Alexander  g  2568  1970
 14  Goldin, Alexander  g  2561  1964
 15  Becerra Rivero, Julio  g  2555  1973
 16  Benjamin, Joel  g  2553  1964
 17  Ivanov, Alexander  g  2549  1956
 18  Lenderman, Aleksandr  g  2548  1989
 19  Robson, Ray  g  2545  1994
 19  Ibragimov, Ildar  g  2545  1967

Of these Nakamura is considered to be 8th in the World, Kamsky 18th and Onischuk 67th.

As for Women, the US is ranked seventh.

Zatonskih has recently shot up to 7th, Krush is 28th and Goletiani 95th in the world rankings.


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