Sam Shankland wins American Continental Championship

by Carlos Alberto Colodro
6/3/2025 – Sam Shankland won the 2025 American Continental Chess Championship in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, after finishing in a seven-way tie for first place and prevailing on the Buchholz tiebreak criterion. The event, held from 23 to 31 May, awarded four places for the 2025 FIDE World Cup. José Eduardo Martínez and Alexandr Fier joined Shankland on the podium, while José Gabriel Cardoso secured the final qualification spot. | Photo: FIDE Americas

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Shankland, Martínez and Fier on the podium

The 2025 American Continental Chess Championship concluded on 31 May in Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil, with Sam Shankland of the United States taking first place on tiebreaks after a tightly contested event. Shankland emerged as the champion from a seven-way tie for first, edging out his rivals on the Buchholz system to secure the title.

Held from 23 to 31 May, the championship featured an 11-round Swiss tournament played with classical time controls. A total of 218 players from 17 countries participated, including 21 grandmasters. The tournament offered a prestigious continental title and awarded four qualification spots for the FIDE World Cup, set to take place in October.

Heading into the final round, Shankland, the tournament's top seed, was tied in the lead on 8/10 with José Eduardo Martínez (Peru), Alexandr Fier (Brazil) and Luis Paulo Supi (Brazil). They were closely followed by eight players on 7½ points, making for a tense and competitive finish. With the top boards ending in draws, wins by Cristóbal Henríquez (Chile), Santiago Ávila (Colombia) and José Gabriel Cardoso (Colombia) allowed them to join the leading group with 8½ points in the tournament table.

Tiebreaks determined the final standings. Shankland claimed gold, followed by Martínez and Fier taking silver and bronze respectively. José Gabriel Cardoso secured the final qualification spot for the World Cup, narrowly ahead of Cristóbal Henríquez on the first tiebreak criterion.

Shankland shared the following post on X referring to his round-four win over GM Robert Hungaski - in which he used a closeted-psychopath approach as per his own words!

Shankland 1-0 Filgueiras (round six)

Shankland, Sam26661–0Filgueiras, Nathan Felipe2370
18th American Continental-ch 2025
Foz do Iguacu27.05.2025[CC]
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nge7 The Cozio Defence in the Ruy Lopez is not the most popular continuation. Filgueiras, a 22-year-old IM from Brazil, apparently wanted to avoid entering deep theoretical lines against his excellently prepared opponent. 4.0-0 Ng6 The most popular continuation here is 4...g6 5.c3 Bg7 6.d4 exd4 7.cxd4 d5 8.exd5 Also playable is the more positional 8.e5 0-0 9.h3 8...Nxd5 9.Re1+ Be6 10.Bg5 Qd6 5.d4
Shankland goes for the direct break in the centre. More often seen is 5.c3 a6 6.Ba4 d5 7.exd5 Qxd5 8.d4 as played, for example, in Areshchenko v. Aravindh (0-1) in the Bundesliga last year. 5...exd4 6.Nxd4 Bc5 7.Nf5 Again the most direct approach. Surely Shankland, the top seed of the event, did not want to allow simplifications with 7.Be3 Nxd4 8.Bxd4 Bxd4 9.Qxd4 Qg5 10.Qd5 7...0-0 8.Be3 Bxe3 9.Nxe3 d6 10.Nc3 By this point, Shankland had more than 90 minutes left on his clock (i.e. more time than what he started with), while Filgueiras was down to 73 minutes. Despite knowing beforehand which line would appear on the board, the young Brazilian was still out-prepared by his higher-rated opponent. Nge7 An imprecision. Curiously, ...Nge7 is played for a second time in the game - on move 3, it signalled the character of the position, and now, it gives White an edge. Stronger is 10...Nce7 and e.g. 11.f4 c6 12.Bc4 b5 13.Bb3 Kh8 11.f4 f5 12.Qh5 Be6 13.Rae1 a6 14.Bd3 Qd7 Better is to interpose 14...Nb4 which would provoke 15.Be2 Kh8 16.a3 Nbc6 17.Bd3 Qd7 gaining a tempo compared to what happened in the game (employed to place the king on h8). 15.exf5 Nxf5 16.g4
Shankland goes for the throat. Engines show the more precise 16.Ned5 Rae8 17.g4 and now Black should not play (as in the game) g6 Correct is 17...Nh6 18.h3 which is also clearly better for White. 18.Qg5 Nfd4 If the white knight stayed on d3, here it would have been captured. 19.Nf6+ 16...g6 17.Qg5 Nxe3 18.Rxe3 Bxg4 19.Nd5 Still one of the knights reaches d5! Kg7 20.Ne7 Shankland plays the attack very accurately. Rf7 Not the strongest defensive idea. Better is 20...Bh5 though Black is still in deep trouble after the forcing 21.Nxc6 Qxc6 22.Re7+ Rf7 23.Rxf7+ Kxf7 24.f5 Qc5+ 25.Rf2 21.Nxg6
Black's position falls apart. 21...hxg6 22.Bxg6 The most precise. 22.Qxg6+ is also winning: Kf8 23.Qh6+ Rg7 24.f5 Be2+ 25.Rg3 and Black is busted. 22...Kf8 23.Rg3 Be6 24.Qh6+ Rg7 25.f5 Bc4 26.f6 Bxf1 27.Bh5
A precise execution by the top seed and eventual champion!
1–0

American Continental Chess Championship 2025

The playing hall

Final standings

Rk. Name Pts.  TB1 
1 Shankland, Sam 8,5 76,5
2 Martinez Alcantara, Jose 8,5 76
3 Fier, Alexandr 8,5 75
4 Cardoso Cardoso, Jose Gabriel 8,5 74,5
5 Henriquez Villagra, Cristobal 8,5 72,5
6 Supi, Luis Paulo 8,5 71,5
7 Avila Pavas, Santiago 8,5 70,5
8 Bachmann, Axel 8 75
9 Rojas Salas, Steven 8 74,5
10 Oparin, Grigoriy 8 73,5
11 Jacobson, Brandon 8 71,5
12 Villanueva, Mario 8 70,5
13 Hardaway, Brewington 8 68
14 Quesada Perez, Luis Ernesto 7,5 75,5
15 Hong, Andrew 7,5 74
16 Schnaider, Ilan 7,5 72
17 Di Berardino, Diego Rafael 7,5 70
18 Shabalov, Alexander 7,5 69,5
19 Lima, Darcy 7,5 69
20 Mareco, Sandro 7,5 68,5
21 Liascovich, Lucas 7,5 67,5
22 Ticona Rocabado, Licael 7,5 67,5
23 Panjwani, Raja 7,5 65
24 Hungaski, Robert 7 71
25 Coro, Lucas 7 70,5

...224 players

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Carlos Colodro is a Hispanic Philologist from Bolivia. He works as a freelance translator and writer since 2012. A lot of his work is done in chess-related texts, as the game is one of his biggest interests, along with literature and music.
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