MANILA, Philippines – Wesley So vaulted into No. 3 in the list of the world’s top junior players in the newest rating list released by the International Chess Federation (FIDE) for January 2011. The 17-year-old Filipino champion raised his Elo rating by four points – from 2669 to 2673 – to climb to third place overall behind GMs Fabiano Caruana of Italy and Anish Giri of the Netherlands. [...]

Second seeded Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta went down fighting against Sipke Ernst of Holland while Dejan Bojkov of Bulgaria annexed the crown in the Groningen International open chess tournament that concluded here today. For the second tournament in a row, Abhijeet could not withstand the last-round-tension and lost from a clear better position. A couple of [...]

NEW DELHI: After ending an otherwise disappointing year on a high by winning the National Chess Championship in his third attempt, India’s youngest Arjuna Awardee Parimarjan Negi now aims to break into the 2650 bracket on the FIDE rating list next year. The 17-year-old Delhi boy went through a rough patch this year, losing titles [...]

Searching for Samuel Sevian Nine days ago, Samuel Sevian of Santa Clara, just a few weeks short of his tenth birthday, played in a tournament at the Mechanics Institute in San Francisco, tying for first place. Photo Bay Area Chess That showing was good enough to qualify him as the youngest chess master in U.S. [...]

Women’s chess is no longer a poor cousin to men’s chess. MANY years ago, I was asked in a casual conversation my opinion about women’s chess. Can women really play chess as well as men, this friend of mine wanted to know. I was about to answer him but I hesitated. It wasn’t that I [...]