Meet Skye Attieh, 9 years old and playing the Chess Olympiad 2024

Skye Attieh is one of the youngest talented chess players at the upcoming Chess Olympiad 2024. Born in 2015, Skye has been selected for the women’s national team that will represent Lebanon in the chess Olympiad in Budapest.

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At the age of 6, she was ranked first in the world in her age category for a whole year in all 3 time controls: Classical, rapid, and blitz. Last year, she played in the world cadet chess championship; her first experience abroad. Despite minimal professional guidance, she managed to finish 12th (tied with 8th place). A month later, she played in the Asian cadet championship, which is on par with the world championship due to its extreme competitiveness, and tied for 5th place.

Chessdom talked to Skye Attieh and her father Wael Attieh just ten days before the start of the Chess Olympiad. We will follow with interest Skye’s performance at the Olympiad and future competitions. If you want to support the dream of this young talent and the efforts of her father, please consider the ongoing Go Fund me campaign

Hello Skye, are you excited about the upcoming Olympiad in Budapest?

Yes! I am very excited! This is the first time I will see famous chess players! And if I score enough points I can finish the Olympiad with a title. For WCM I need 3,5/7, which is possible.

You ranked first in the world in all 3 time controls: Classical, rapid, and blitz. Which one is your favorite?

Skye Attieh: I like blitz the most!

Now the Olympiad is classical chess. If you could play one player at the Olympiad, who do you wish her to be?

Skye Attieh: I would like to play Bodhana!

[ed.note WFM Bodhana Sivanandan is an English chess player and World Under-8 Champion, also 9 years old and will play for team England]

This August Skye added 73,6 ELO points. What is next?

Wael Attieh: Reaching 2000 rapid in the next few months. However, the tougher challenge is classical because these are a bit rarer in our country. Traveling to nearby countries to take part in classical tournaments is definitely on our list as I’m sure this is what Skye needs in order to elevate her game to the next level.

Did you manage to raise enough funds to support the trip to Hungary?

Wael Attieh: We started a Go Fund Me campaign. We wish to raise enough money not only to cover the expenses of the trip, but more importantly to pay for coaches so that Skye gets the chance to be trained at the highest level. In that respect, we are surely way off as our target is 10.000 US $ to cover all related expenses for the period of a whole year, but we’ve only managed to raise like 700 USD so far.

That is far from the target. Besides the Go Fund Me campaign, does anyone else support Skye?

Wael Attieh: At this moment, unfortunately no one.