IM Gomez and GM Wesley So lead the Philippines for the Chess Olympiad in Dresden
GM Bong Villamayor, GM Darwin Laylo, GM Jayson Gonzales join team
Report by Chessdom
Following the news of the Philippines national championship, the Olympiad team of the Philippines for Dresden 2008 is already known. The new champion IM Gomez and the young talent GM Wesley So will occupy the first two boards of the competition. They will be joined by the strong performing GM Bong Villamayor.
GMs Darwin Laylo and Jayson Gonzales complete the five-man team. GM Mark Paragua was tied with Laylo and Gonzales with 10 points, but he owned the lowest tie-break score. Thus he could not qualify for the Chess Olympiad. Paragua will lead the other Philippine team in the World Mind Games scheduled in October in Beijing. IMs Chito Garma, Nolte, Julio Sadorra and National Master Leonardo Carlos will join Paragua.
Source: Chessdom.com
Their top 3: Torre, Antonio and Paragua are not on the team? Shocking!
I am shocked.
“The streak ends for Torre”
Oh yeah? We’ll see about that! Set up a betting blog, let’s pour some cash into words? Twenty bucks that Antonio plays.
Is International Master John Paul Gomez the next grand master of the country?
IM Gomez is on top of the world literally right now as he brought home his biggest victory in his very promising career, the National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) qualifying tournament (National Finals).
Gomez, a three- time Philippine Junior champion took control from early stage and hold on with a clear half point victory over the nearest pursuer’ GM wesley So- the country’s top player and currently the world’s youngest grand master.
The pride of Binan Laguna finished with 13.0 points.
The impressive performance of the mechanical engineering student of La Salle earned him his first GM norm.
In order to be the eight Grandmaster of the country, he needs to add two more.
It is easier said than done but, he has one already and he has shown that he has what it takes to do it twice and thric and so forth.
Congrats and good luck to your quest for glory in the olympiad and your future endeavors inside and outside chess.
Compared to previous RP teams in the past that competed in the olympiad, the make up of this year’s team is no better! Instead of moving forward, we took two steps backward. We could have assemble a much better team than this one, not just ready and able to compete among the best in the world but a team capable of beating the best in the world. A team capable of besting other teams that we have previously sent in the olympiad but for some other reasons we have to be happy for just being able to compete and be part of the olympiad.
This year’s olympiad should have been exciting considering the caliber of players that we have instead it is going to be not so exciting for this year’s team will surely not finish no better than 25th place.
No Torre and Antonio in the line up, no chance of braking into the top ten.
$20 bucks says I don’t care.
With GM Torre & Antonio will not sure we make it to top ten both are grumpy old men and don’t be shocked in the future we will land in the top ten if we continue producing more GM’s .
Streak ends for them ( Torre & Antonio)! but beginning of a bright future for philippines chess .
‘Streak ends for them (Torre & Antonio)! but beginning of a bright future for philippines chess’
Te dark ages of chess are at the footpad. It’s same like asking Bill not to run for USCF king.
Definitely this is a positive move forward for the Philippine chess. Suddenly, the chances for those chess talents who are yet unknown but could be a potential champion are now more likely.
Hurray for the positive development in Philippine chess!!
Come on Eugene and Antonio. You are not old yet. Start playing and show the young upstarts you still have it.
Start getting your health back and show your fans that you are still the big guns of Philippine chess.