29th Chess Olympiad — Novi Sad 1990

◈An era ending

The 29th Olympiad gathered 108 teams from 106 nations for a fourteen-round Swiss on four boards, alongside a 65-team women's event. It was the last Olympic appearance of the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, and a unified East Germany — within two years all three would have dissolved. The politics of the moment reached the board directly: the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were barred from competing, keeping players such as Jaan Ehlvest, Lembit Oll, Alexei Shirov, and Mikhail Tal out of the field.

Standings were decided on cumulative game points across the Swiss, with the Buchholz system and then match points breaking ties. Of the 3,020 games played the archive preserves 2,991, the balance being forfeits or games absent from the Mega2024 source.

◈Sixth gold in a row

Even shorn of its two world champions the Soviet Union proved too deep, finishing on 39 points for a sixth straight team gold. The chase was fierce and close: the United States and England both reached 35½, the Americans taking silver on the higher Buchholz and England bronze. Czechoslovakia was a further point back on 34½, with Yugoslavia's "A" team and China sharing fifth on 33.

The individual honours spread widely across the smaller nations — board golds went to players from Paraguay, Andorra, India, Austria, and Mexico — while Robert Hübner of West Germany posted the event's best performance rating at 2734.

◈The Polgárs and a perfect score

As at Thessaloniki, Hungary beat the Soviet Union to win the women's gold, this time with all three Polgár sisters winning their respective boards. The most astonishing individual result belonged to a Soviet reserve, Ketevan Arakhamia, whose perfect 12/12 came with a scarcely believable performance rating of 2935.