A 15-year-old schoolboy from Edinburgh has become the first Scot ever to win the British Rapidplay Chess Championship, beating England’s top grandmaster in a thrilling final-round decider.
Freddy Waldhausen Gordon delivered a brutal checkmating attack to crush tournament favourite GM Gawain Jones in Peterborough last weekend, finishing on 9.5/11 and taking the £1,500 first prize by half a point.
Final Round Fireworks: Queen and Rooks Storm the Back Rank
With everything on the line, Freddy needed a win against the Yorkshire grandmaster who had started the tournament with eight straight victories.
Jones blundered early and soon lost rook for knight. By move 32 he was down a second exchange. The finish was spectacular: 39.Rxg7+ forced Black to surrender the queen, and 40.Qg8# ended the game.
Freddy became the first Scottish champion in the 37-year history of the event.
More than 200 players competed over 11 rounds in a single weekend, using the fast time control of 15 minutes plus 10-second increments.
From Carlsen Scalp to GM-Level Performance
Freddy’s rise has been meteoric.
In January 2025 he beat world number one Magnus Carlsen in a Titled Tuesday event when the Norwegian flagged in a worse position.
Last month in Graz, Austria, he secured his final IM norm and the title.
At Peterborough he performed at 2613 level, which would have been a grandmaster norm in a classical tournament.
English Kids Get Millions, Scottish Star Gets Nothing
While Freddy celebrated, a bitter funding divide came into sharp focus.
England’s rising stars Shreyas Royal (17), Supratit Banerjee (12), and Bodhana Sivanandan (11) all receive support from Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s £1.5 million talent fund.
Freddy gets zero, because chess funding is devolved to Holyrood and Scottish ministers have refused to help.
Chess Scotland officials have repeatedly hit brick walls trying to secure support for the national team or individual players.
Alex McFarlane, Chess Scotland chair, described the frustration: “I went from leisure to culture to education and back to leisure again. I gave up.”
New Generation Takes Over
The top boards in Peterborough belonged to teenagers and pre-teens.
Final standings (top 10):
- Freddy Waldhausen Gordon (Scotland) – 9.5/11
- Gawain Jones (England) – 9
- Shreyas Royal (England) – 9
- Yichen Han (Netherlands) – 8.5
- Supratit Banerjee (India/England) – 8.5
- Siva Mahadevan (India) – 8.5
Bodhana Sivanandan, the 11-year-old English sensation, scored 8/11 and shared the women’s title with Trisha Kanyamarala and Harriet Hunt.
Supratit Banerjee, who only plays an hour or two on weekday evenings because of homework, won the chess.com world under-13 online title last month and now has an IM norm.
England’s youngest ever GM Shreyas Royal had six games with Black, drew with Jones down to bare kings, and finished with a beautiful queen sacrifice win.
Yet it was the Scottish teenager with no state support who took the crown.
Freddy Waldhausen Gordon has now beaten Magnus Carlsen, earned the IM title, and become British Rapid champion, all before his 16th birthday.
Many are already asking: is he Scotland’s greatest ever talent?
What do you think, is Freddy the best Scottish player we have ever produced? Will Holyrood finally wake up and back him? Drop your thoughts below.
