Cuba ranked eleventh in the recently concluded 40th edition of the Istanbul 2012World Chess Olympiad, and led all Latin American nations in, although according to some experts the performance could have been better.
The Caribbean team played better than all the other competitors from this area, and won seven matches, drew one and lost three, to finish with a balance of 15 points out of 22 possible.
Again, Grandmaster Leinier Dominguez carried the burden of the team in the first board, beating among others Latvian GM Alexei Shirov (2706), Indian GM Krishnan Sasikiran (2707) and the Slovenian Luka Lenic (2640). His only loss was to great English GM Michael Adams (2722).
Dominguez, who shows the highest ELO among Cubans (2 725, though a last-minute update raises that figure to 2 734, 20th in the world ranking), achieved an excellent performance of 7.5 points in the 10 rounds he played, for a remarkable rating in the competition of 2786 units, adding 9.3 points to its current ELO, which put him among the sixth the world’s best players in Istanbul.
Cuba’s second best player GM Lázaro Bruzón (2711) also had an impeccable performance, despite giving in his unbeaten record in the second board on the last day of the Olympiad, settled in 11 rounds by the Swiss system .
In total, the player of Las Tunas totaled eight units out of 11 possible, with six wins, four draws and the aforementioned loss to Slovenian Alexander Beliavsky (2609).
Among his greatest achievements in the tournament we can mention his victories against Frenchman Laurent Fressinet (2714) and Hindu Pentala Harikrishna (2685).
The weakness of Cuba was in the lower boards. Neither Yunieski Quesada (2626), nor Yusnel Bacallo (2583), nor Isam Ortiz (2569) contributed with the expected strength, but no one can say that their performances were a disaster.
The Cuban team is able to improve; at least they have more than enough talent and youth on the roster.
The crown in Istanbul went to Armenia, with 19 units, escorted by Russia and Ukraine, second and third in that order, a fact that reaffirmed the historic overwhelming dominance of the former Soviet republics in the sport.
The Armenians, led by GM Levon Aronian (2816), won their third title in World Olympics, after winning in Turin 2006 and Dresden 2008.
Moreover, among the ladies Russia successfully defended the throne conquered two years ago, while Cuba was relegated to a distant nineteenth position.
The Cuban ladies, who landed on Turkish soil preceded by the good omen granted by their fourth position achieved in the previous edition, played below expectations, despite only losing two matches, with five wins and four draws, some of these that tasted like defeat as the harvested over Colombia in the final match of the tournament.
The next edition of the World Olympiads will take place in 2014 in the Norwegian city of Tromso, while for the 2016 edition the appointed venue is the city of Baku, capital of Azerbaijan.
