Edinburgh teenage chess sensation to represent Scotland at Chess Olympiad after winning British Championship

George Heriot’s School pupil Frederick Waldhausen Gordon bagged the 2026 British Rapidplay Champion title back in March, becoming the first Scot to win the competition.

The 15-year-old, from Newington, is currently ranked as the second best chess player in Scotland at all ages and is set to represent his country at the 46th Chess Olympiad in Uzbekistan in September.

He will form part of a six-man team in what will be his fourth major tournament. Six women will also represent the country at the competition.

Frederick said: “I’m looking forward to heading to the Olympiad later this year. I’m pretty close in the rankings to becoming the best player in Scotland, but in chess things can change very quickly.

“I enjoy playing for my country, but I also enjoy every single chess tournament I compete in. It’s an honour to play for Scotland but I just try my best in every tournament and have the best experience I can.”

Since first discovering the board game at the age of just seven, Frederick has gone from strength to strength and first represented the Scotland senior team when he was just 10 years old.

“I got introduced to chess at school when I was seven or eight, some of my friends were playing so I tried it,” he said.

“I enjoyed it and then I learned more about it and starting beating a few players, so I enjoyed it even more.

“I then went to this chess club for kids called Edinburgh Chess Academy (ECA) which I enjoyed, then I started playing online chess. I then started playing junior tournaments where I did pretty well. I moved up to the senior club when I was in Primary 4.

“I think it’s a great game, it’s all the pieces working together. I like all the ideas and strategies behind every move I play, and the attention to detail.”

He now “rarely” competes with players his own age and has lost count of the number of chessmasters he has beaten - something he said is crucial to becoming the best.

“I normally play against adults, it’s very rare that I play against children in tournaments,” he said.

“I’ve beaten quite a few chessmasters, which always feels good. I need to normalise beating these players so I can become as good as them.

“The best way to improve at chess is to play games, particularly against the best players, so beating chessmasters is great.

“I want to see how high I can reach by the time I finish school and make a more educated decision about that I want to do in chess as an adult.

“Chess struggles for funding, for example Chess Scotland doesn’t have the money to send us to the Olympiad so we are crowdfunding to get there. But I do love playing the game.”

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While Frederick is still basking in his recent championship win against one of the world's top 100 players, he has also had to redirect his focus to his National 5 exams.

He said: “It felt great to win. It was something I was very focused on. I really like rapidplay, it’s the best type of chess. There are three types of chess, the other two are classical and blitz, with rapid in the middle in terms of speed. There are more decisive results in rapid play, with less draws.

“I’m not sure what my friends think about me playing chess. But they do ask me about it sometimes. They are not very interested I think.

“I’m currently trying to work hard on my exams and seeing if I have any time left for chess. I normally play online quite a lot, usually every day. I work on my game almost every day to improve my chess playing.”

The 46th Chess Olympiad is due to be held in Uzbekistan from September 15 until September 27.