After 7 weeks of play the 2024 MSO Grand Prix has finished with Maciej Brzeski winning his third Grand Prix Championship title! The Pole used three Premier Gold medals in Chess960, Chess (Arena) and Hex 14×14 towards his score 473.24. James Heppell was the closest challenger – 17 points adrift after Golds in Lines of Action and Headsup Hold’em. The Englishman was joined on the rostrum by compatriot Matt Tucker whose score of 446.4 saw him make the top three by less than two points. Matt took big wins in Ticket To Ride and 7 Wonders. Coincidentally this is the exact same podium as last year despite only 4/21 Premier events remaining completely unchanged from the 2023 schedule!

In the Multiplayer category, France’s Nicolas Wittmann took the title with a hugely impressive score of 478.17. Nicolas won our Imperfect Information GP category last year, but was able to wrap up the Multiplayer discipline with five scores exceeding 92, and two Gold medals in Welcome To and Marco Polo II. Tung Yat Cheng had himself posted a strong 466.09 total, but was unable to retain the title he won in 2023 despite an impressive 9 medals in games with 3+ players. Sang Soo Yun was the only other player to exceed 450 multiplayer points.

Yat Hin Yorkson Cheung successfully defended his Abstract GP title with five events providing a score of at least 90, totalling 474.26. The Hong Kong player achieved an unstoppable 6 Gold medals putting him almost 40 points clear of the nearest challenger – Marino Carpignano. Marino took 1 Gold and 3 Silvers in Abstract games which was enough to place him around 4 points ahead of third place Carman Tang.

Having been runner-up in the Imperfect Information GP category in each of the last two years, this time Matt Tucker takes the top spot by 6 points. Matt’s Gold in Dominion Base on the first day of this year’s Grand Prix proved decisive in the final reckoning. Dani Angelats, who won the in person Imperfect Information category (ahead of Matt) last summer, was in second place on this occasion, after finishing strongly with two medals on the last day of play! Due to the complexities of the Caylus tournament and its impact on the podium positions of the Imperfect Information category the MSO committee has taken the decision to award a shared Bronze to both Tung Yat Cheng and David Pearce in this category.

Maciej Brzeski also tops the Chess GP leaderboard with a phenomenal score of 480.57. All five of his events used had a value greater than 95, as our overall winner landed 6 Chess tournament Gold medals. Santiago Bedoya was the nearest competitor, showing versatility that is demonstrated with his only Gold coming in the Chess Medley. Miroslav Voracek comes home in third place.

Northern Ireland’s Ben Collister made a slow start but came through to win the Poker GP title for the third consecutive year. Ben took Golds in Showtime Hold’em and 8-Game as well as the best consistency to compile a winning score of 472.37. Florin Popa is the category’s runner-up for the second time in a row, also winning 2 Poker tournaments. Michael Seher finished up less than 5 points back from Florin in third.

It is also three in a row for Lithuanian Mantas Janavicius in the Draughts category, with 5 Golds setting an unassailable 467.36 target. Marino Carpignano was 14 points back to take a second category Silver, with 3 Golds and 2 Silvers in Draughts events. Sergey Kuropatov was a further 30 points adrift in third.

Kevin Naishtat wins the Backgammon GP title with the Austrian only competing in 5 tournaments! His score of 410.47 was less than 5 points clear of Florin Popa in second and less than 10 ahead of Delia Popa, who was third. Kevin won the 5pt tournament and took second in the first ever MSO arena tournament for Backgammon (1pt Nackgammon) behind Florin.

33 different nations won a Gold medal at the 2024 MSO Grand Prix, with countries from Europe, Asia, Africa, North & South America all victorious. Hong Kong topped the Nations Medal Table with 21 Golds and 58 medals of all colours, with Great Britain second best with 18 Golds. Poland were the only other nation to exceed 10 Golds, picking up 11.

So with 119 tournaments finished, we have finalised all of the meta event leaderboards in the database. The full final standings can be found here: https://mindsportsolympiad.com/grand-prix-2024-event-medals/.

The whole MSO team would like to say thanks to everyone who played in any of our tournaments in 2024 and helped make it a competitive and global event. Congratulations if you won medal, we will aim to provide details about how to order a physical MSO medal along with our feedback form very soon – stay tuned!

We’ll be back with the 28th Mind Sports Olympiad in London this August, the schedule is planned for announcement in May. Finally, we hope to be back with another Grand Prix event in 2025!