Shankland receiving a gold medal at 2014 Tromsø Olympiad
June 13-22, 2021
Prague Masters
Shankland won the Prague Masters with 5.5/7 and a performance rating over 2900, the best result in the tournament’s history.
January 10-26, 2019
Tata Steel Masters
Shankland finished with 6.5/13 at the Tata Steel Masters, sharing 7th place in the strongest tournament in the world. He drew his first ever game with the current World Champion Magnus Carlsen, and he defeated former World Champion Vladimir Kramnik in the final round. He reached a peak rating of 2731 and #22 in the World.
Shankland facing Magnus Carlsen at the 2019 Tata Steel Masters
June 1-11, 2018
2018 American Continental Champion
Shankland won the American Continental, his third tournament in a row, and broke into the World’s top 25 for the first time.
May 8-20, 2018
Capablanca Memorial
Shankland won the 2018 Capablanca Memorial, the only American ever to win the tournament.
Shankland was awarded the Samford Fellowship, a $84,000 scholarship given out once a year to the strongest American player under the age of 25 to fund their training and improvement.
January 29, 2013
Pan American Team Championship
Shankland made his debut for the US National Team, scoring 3.5/4 and leading the team to a first place finish.
Shankland defeated Peter Leko (#17 in the world at the time) in the first round of his first World Cup appearance before falling to Abhijeet Gupta in round 2
Sam played in his first chess tournament when he was 10, a very late age by today’s standards. He did not begin playing seriously until he was 11.
First Chess Class
Sam took his first chess class at 9 years old. He received his early chess instruction from the Berkeley Chess School, an outstanding program which has been teaching chess to children in the Bay Area for the past 30 years.
