38th Chess Olympiad

Schacholympiade), organized by FIDE and comprising an open[1] and a women's tournament, as well as several other events designed to promote the game of chess, took place from 12 to 25 November 2008 in Dresden, Germany.

Despite being seeded only eighth, they won nine out of eleven matches, drew against fourth-placed Ukraine and lost only (1½-2½) to runners-up Israel, captained by Boris Gelfand.

The United States, led by Gata Kamsky, took the bronze medals on a better tie break score than Vasyl Ivanchuk and the rest of the Ukrainian team after defeating Ukraine (3½-½) in the last round.

Kramnik, having recently lost a world championship match, performed well below his rating, as did the rest of the team, except alternate Dmitry Yakovenko who won the reserve board.

The two teams didn't meet during the tournament, but when the Ukrainians only drew their penultimate match against Serbia while the Georgians defeated former champions China (2½–1½), the gold was Georgia's to lose.

In the last round they record a win (3–1) against the Serbian, who thus came to play a crucial role in the fight for the title, despite finishing in seventh place themselves.

The United States clinched the bronze medals on tie breaks, just ahead of Russia (with newly crowned World Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk) and Poland.

Accordingly, there was no overall prize, although reborn ex-champion Chiburdanidze on the top board had the best performance of all players at the tournament: The Nona Gaprindashvili Trophy is awarded to the nation that has the highest total number of match points in the open and women's divisions combined.