GM Barbosa Annexed Chess Title in India

The Filipino woodpushers went berserk in the last round of Parsvnath International Grandmasters Tournament at the Ludlow Castle Sports complex in New Delhi, India as they copped the 1^st, 2^nd and 4^th places.

Fast-rising Filipino Grandmaster Oliver Barbosa edged out IM Shyam Nikil to capture the elusive crown by piling up 9.5 points and became $4,000 dollars richer.

On the other hand, Filipino GM John Paul Gomez extracted a hard-earned draw over Chinese Ma Qun to tie Indian IM M.R. Lalith Babu for 2^nd to 3^rd place. Gomez grabbed the second spot when the tiebreak was applied.

GM Mark Paragua outclassed Russian GM Evgeny Gleizerov to claim fourth place.

The fourth Filipino campaigner in the 11 round Swiss system that attracted more than 700 players, GM Richard Bitoon was not successful as he yielded to Kulkarni Chinmay of India to finished tied for 66^th place with just 6.5 points.

The Filipinos strong performance in India is indeed marvelous and this is evident that chess in the country is on a rise.

The Philippines so far has 13 Grandmasters and two are Super Grandmasters. Barbosa now has a live rating of 2610 and Wesley So who totes a rating of 2658 is still in the Top 100 Players in the world.