Young guns hard to beat in blitz chess

MANILA, Philippines — A team of youthful players may end up comprising the Philippine team seeing action in blitz chess in the Southeast Asian Games this November in Subic.

Daniel Quizon, who is just turning 15 on Oct. 11, kept his grip of the lead with 40.5 points after 72 rounds, or two points ahead of 24-year-old fellow International Master Jan Emmanuel Garcia with 38.5 after the third and penultimate day of the SEAG qualifying tournament at the Alphaland Makati Place.

IM Paulo Bersamina, 21, was tied with Grandmaster Darwin Laylo at third with 36.5 points apiece.

GM John Paul Gomez couldn’t recover from a disastrous second day and sank to fifth with 31 points, ahead of GM Joey Antonio (30.5), FIDE Master Mari Joseph Turqueza (29) and FM Narquinden Reyes (28).

IM Ronald Bancod stood last with 17.5 points before withdrawing after 63 rounds.

The long tournament has expectedly benefitted the younger chessers while it has taken its toll on the veteran guys like Laylo, Gomez and Antonio.

Laylo, 39, was second overall coming into yesterday’s round but sputtered early and slipped to joint No. 3 while Gomez was in the top three after Day 1 but had a disastrous effort the next day and couldn’t recover from it.

For the 57-year-old Antonio, once the king of blitz in the country, had several winning games only to lose by time.

To remove the chance of qualifying via luck, the National Chess Federation of the Philippines has scheduled a total of 108 games for each participant that was scattered to 27 games a day for four days.

Bancod’s withdrawal may just help the last eight woodpushers standing in cutting their ordeal as they will be left with about 20-25 games when the tournament concludes today.