Wesley So shared his opinion on Team USA’s chances for a medal at the Chess Olympiad 2026. Wesley explains the difficulty of winning the gold medal. Wesley spoke about it in an interview with Chess24.

Wesley So

Wesley So

World's No. 5

“Winning a gold medal is very hard these days. You need everything to go your way. You need someone to score 9 out of 10 or 10 out of 11. Because if you look at history, every team that won gold or silver, they have one player who scores 9 out of 10.

And we don’t have that, and we also have some players who are not in good form. But I’m hoping we can fight for a medal still.”

Wesley later added in an interview with ChessFam. So notes that his team lowered its goals after the loss to Germany.

Wesley So

Wesley So

America's No. 3

“Before the tournament we wanted to win gold, but after losing to Germany we put our goals slightly. We put our goals a lot less.

I think, even if we get bronze, a team medal would be great.”

The Chess Olympiad 2026 takes place from September 16 to 27 in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. Team USA lost to Team Germany with a score of 1.5-2.5 in Round 5 of the event. USA is in 13th place with 10 points after 6 days of the event.

Credit: Rafal Oleksiewicz / FIDE