AFTER a humiliating medal shutout in the 2019 Southeast Asian Games, Filipino chess players hope to do better this time when they compete in the Vietnam SEA Games chess tournament opening today in the Vietnamese city of Ha Long in Quang Ninh province.
Chess action gets going at the Quang Ninh Exhibition Palace of Urban Planning & Expo with the men’s and women’s individual standard chess events in the scenic city featuring Ha Long Bay, a World Heritage site, located 153.1 kilometers east of the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi.
“The national team has been training hard, with virtual training last year and early this year. From March 1 to the first week of May our workouts have been face-to-face with daily physical exercise as well as training matches,” Grandmaster Jayson Gonzales, the national women’s coach, said.
“We don’t want our embarrassment in the 2019 SEA Games to be repeated,” said Gonzales of the chess debacle on home grounds, with International Master Jan Emmanuel Garcia emerging as the saving face for the hosts by winning the demonstration event of online chess.
Gonzales, who is also the National Chess Federation of the Philippines executive director, said the training involved the local players going up against the senior and veteran masters teams composed of former Chess Olympiad veterans, International Masters and titled players.
He is proud of the women’s squad led by Woman Grandmaster Janelle Mae Frayna “which played excellently and remarkably by demolishing some of them.”
The men’s squad is composed of GMs Darwin Laylo, John Paul Gomez, IMs Garcia, Paulo Bersamina and Daniel Quizon while the women’s team is made up of Frauna, Woman International Masters Bernadette Galas, Jan Jodilyn Fronda, Antoinette San Diego and Woman FIDE Master Shania Mae Mendoza.
Venerable GM Eugene Torre is the men’s national coach with National Master Edmundo Gatos as his deputy.
With a total of five golds each at stake in the men’s and women’s events, Gonzales said the Pinoy players are keen on returning home with at least two gold medals.
“We expect to win two gold medals in the individual events; most probably in the team events we can bring home at least a bronze medal,” he said.
The last time the country won a gold medal in the biennial sportsfest was through GM Wesley So, who ruled the individual men’s blitz event in the 2011 Indonesia SEA Games. So is now an American citizen.
