Monday, November 13, 2006

Filipinos End on High

It was another successful campaign for the Filipinos as they ended Bad Wiessee without a single loss in the ninth round. I actually saw the So - Georgiev result, via the live game viewer, last night and one word quickly entered my mind: "respect"! A draw after just 10 moves.

Laylo, too, took a peaceful end to his duel with 10th seed Russian GM Konstantin Landa. Emerging out of another Scandinavian, Laylo's position was perhaps slightly inferior by the 30th move. The Russian opponent won a couple of pawns but Laylo's c-pawn passer thankfully proved enough of a distraction to end the game in a draw.

And this is yet to be confirmed but one reader, Mr Manahan, has sent us detailed calculations to say that both So and Laylo have earned GM norms. Thank you also to John Manahan for sending us all the Pinoy games from Bad Wiessee.

By special request, we bring you the game So - Prusikin from the 5th round. Here, the 13-year old Pinoy superstar weaves some magic beginning with 19. Nxe6! Prusikin's position is completely paralysed and there was nothing to do but defend, defend and resign.



How good was that? These teenagers just make it seem so easy. (Think also: Australia's Moulthyn Ly and Zhigen-Lin).

Final Pinoy results from Germany are:

Round 9 results
So, Wesley - Georgiev, Vladimir (GM) draw
Landa, Konstantin (GM) - Laylo, Darwin draw
Gonzales, Jayson - Krivoshey, Sergei (GM) 1-0
Buchal, Stephan (FM) - Dimakiling, Oliver 0-1
Gomez, John Paul - de Francesco, Klaus 1-0

Final scores
So, Laylo, Dimakiling and Gonzales 7
Gomez 6.5

Greek grandmaster Stelios Halkias and American GM Alexander Shabalov topped the event on 7.5 points each.

I'm not sure where the 5 Pinoys will head to after Bad Wiessee. But some time ago, Pinoy journo Marlon Bernardino did tell me that Gonzales will remain in Europe until early next year to play in Hastings. Hey, maybe I'll him in a couple of weeks! If anyone else knows anything about the Pinoys' itineraries, please just drop us a line.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Iwould say the GMs facing the young Wesley So were more scared than respect for him :)

Milan Lee said...

They could come to Serbia to play in Obrenovac on Nov 22-30

Anonymous said...

"Respect", yes I think Georgiev respects Wesley So's playing ability that he will rather have a peaceful 10 move draw than lose more rating points.

"Respect" is earned and not given away for free, a 10 move draw is not an act of respect but a dishonor to the game. I can understand if the game leads to a perpetual or dead draw, or an opponent see's that his position is losing and out of respect to his opponent (hope for him to blunder is nil) resign's the game.