Pestaño: John Velarde and new Cepca members

By Frank 'Boy' Pestaño

Chessmoso

Thursday, June 27, 2013

THE future of Philippine chess is as bright as the super moon of a few days ago. Meet John Jerish Velarde, the six-year-old Cebuano chess prodigy.

He was born on Aug. 13, 2006 to proud parents Edilberto Velarde and Maria Juby Dalde and resides in Lapu-Lapu City.

He gained his chess experience playing in tournaments like Milo, Shell and other local tournaments.

On the National level, he won the 8-Under Age group chess championship in Gen. Santos City last Jan. 31 to Feb. 3 with six wins in six games.

In the Luzon leg in Malolos City, Bulacan, he was also undefeated in seven games. He also qualified to be a member of the Philippine 8-Under in an elimination tournament in Taguig City last April 6-14.

In the last Asean Age Group Championship 8-Under held in Thailand last June 5-13, the Philippine team won two gold medals--Standard and Blitz--and a silver in Rapid. The other members of the team are Alekhine Nouri, and Manuel Concio Jr. Other countries who competed were China, Indonesia, India, Malaysia , Mongolia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

John’s coaches are Peterson Sia, Rigel Amacna and NM Leonardo Alidani.

Cepca gained several new members the past two months under our “Road to 100 members program.”

Jerry Maratas is a Civil/Structural engineer and owner of Jemar Engineering Services which specializes in structural analysis and design of buildings.

He is also a faculty member of the University of San Carlos and a former reviewer of Civil Engineering at the Besavilla Review Center.

Jerry is 34 years old and is married to Engr. Leiz Klade Maglasang.

He learned chess from his father at eight and also played at USC during intramurals.

Other hobbies include tennis, boxing, basketball, billiards and biking.

Another new member is Peterson Sia, whom I have known for a long time being a chess fanatic like me. He is a businessman, coach and instructor (taught Jerish Velarde). He has been playing chess for 27 years and was the champion of the Lapu-Lapu Open several times.

He was a Gold medalist in the 2009 Inter-cities and Municipalities held in Tarlac, He also wrote a chess column for several years with NM Loloy Ruelan (grandfather of IM Kimkim Yap) “Chess for fun and relaxation.”

There are three new members from the Philippine Air Force—Amado Olea, John Caiboy and Cris Lim.

Staff Sargeant Amado Olea is assigned at 205 Tactical Helicopter Wing in Lapu-Lapu City . He was the champion in the 2009 Lapu-Lapu Fiesta tournament in 2009 and runner-up in 2010.

This Sunday will be a big event for him as he is will be married in a mass wedding sponsored by the Philippine Air force in all air force bases throughout the country.

Cristopher Lim is a Medical Service Specialist and a Staff Sergeant assigned at Mactan Air Base, He is a graduate of Bachelor of Computer Science in 2002 and played chess during his student days.

Among his achievements are gold medals during his third year and fourth year high school and in the Mactan Air Base Summer League. He was also a bronze medalist in the Philippine Air force Inter-wing National Tournament.

John Caiboy is assigned at Ormoc City and has a BSCE degree, and still single at 30 .

Big tournament. The Engr. Blas Hipulan tournament starts today at 1 p.m. in Deep Blue at SM City. The format is 9 rounds Swiss with a time control of 25 mins per player.

Registration is P350 and P200 for kiddies.

Prizes total P100,000 with P40,000 going to the champion. The second and third placers will get P20,000 and P10,000, respectively. e organizers are expecting a record number of entries including GM Richard Bitoon, who came all the way from Manila.

(boypestano@gmail.com,www.chessmoso.blogspot.com)

Pestaño: Greatest child grandmasters in history

Chessmoso

Thursday, June 20, 2013

CHESS is the only sport in town where children can compete on an equal level with adults. I have seen six or seven year old kiddies beat adults as old as 50 or 60.

Early chess prodigies were Paul Morphy and world champion José Raúl Capablanca, both of whom won matches against strong masters before becoming teenagers. Samuel Reshevsky was giving simultaneous exhibitions at the age of six.

Morphy is considered by Bobby Fischer the strongest player of all time.

In 1958, Fischer became a grandmaster, a record then, at 15 years and 6 months. It was not broken for 23 years until 1991 when wonder girl Judit Polgar became a GM 15 years and four months. Peter Leko beat that record in 1994 by one year and Ruslan Ponomariov became a GM at exactly 14 years old in 1997.

In 1999 Bu Xiang Zhi became the first 13-year-old GM. The youngest to become GM is Sergey Karjakin at an amazing 12 years and 7 months on 2002.

There is a future GM who might break the record of Karjakin and he is proudly Pinoy.

Alekhine Nouri of Taguig City has won the Open 8 Under title at the recent 14th Asean Age Group Chess Championships 2013 in Chiang Mai, Thailand and gained an outright Fide Master title with a rating of 2300.

“Our daily routine features 10 hours of training; no computer games, no TV. We only ease up on Sundays,” the chess prodigy’s father and personal coach Hamed Nouri, also a Fide Master, said.

He is only seven years old and is still in grade one.

I checked the past records. Not only is Alekhine the youngest FM in the Philippines but he is also the youngest ever in the world!

One measure of chess prodigies is the age at which they gain the Grandmaster title.

Below are the 10 players who have held the record for youngest grandmasters according to chessbase.com. The age listed is the age at which they qualified for the title.

1.) Sergey Karjakin (Ukraine)- 12 years and 7 months. 2.) Parimarjan Negi (India)- 12 years and 4 months 22 days. 3.) Magnus Carlsen (Norway)- 13 years and 4 months 27 days, 4.) Wei Yi (China) -13 years and 8 months 23 days. He is currently the youngest GM as he got the title early this year. 5.) Bu Xiang Zhi (China) -13 years and 10 months 10 days. 6.) Richard Rapport (Hungary)-13 years and 11 months 6 days. 7.)

Teimour Radjabov (Azerbaijan)- 14 years 0 months 14 days. 8.) Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukraine)-14 years and 17 days. 9.) Wesley So (Philippines)-14 years and one month 28 days, 10.) Etienne Bacrot (France)-14 years and 2 months .

Other notable records are Hou Yifan (China)-14 years and 6 months 16 days. She is also the youngest girl to become GM, breaking Judit Polgar’s record. Ray Robson (USA) became the youngest American GM at 14 years and 11 months 16 days. Fabiano Caruana of Italy also became a GM at 14 years and 11 months 20 days. Japanese origin Hikaru Nakamura , born in the USA, became a GM at 15 years and 2 months.

Another interesting record is that of the youngest players to gain a rating above 2600.

1.) Wesley So was rated at 2610 on October 2008 at the age of 14 years 11 months and 22 days. 2.) Teimour Radjabov got a rating of 2610 on April 2002 at the age of 15 years and 20 days. 3.) Magnus Carlsen had a rating of 2625 on January 2006 at the age of 15 years 1 month and 1 day. 4.) Sergey Karjakin achieved 2635 at the age of 15 years 2 months and 20 days. 5.) IIIya Nyzhnyk reach 2610 on May 2012 at the age of 15 years 7 months and 4 days. 6.) Anish Giri was rated at 2624 on March 2010 at the age of 15 years 8 months and 1 day. 7.) Fabiano Caruana reached 2620 on April 2008 at the age of 15 years 8 months and 2 days.

Cepca. Our monthly tournament will be this Sunday at Deep Blue in SM and starts at 1 p.m.

(boypestano@gmail.com,www.chessmoso.blogspot.com)