MANILA, Philippines—Filipino Grandmasters Wesley So and Darwin Laylo rebounded with victories over their respective rivals to remain in contention in the sixth round of the first former Fide president Florencio Campomanes Memorial Cup chess championships at the Ninoy Aquino Stadium Tuesday night.
Smarting from a fifth round setback to top seed GM Le Quang Liem of Vietnam, So subdued compatriot IM Oliver Barbosa and climbed to 4.5 points, a point behind surprise leader GM Zhao Jun of China.
Laylo stunned fifth seed GM Chanda Sandipan of India to match the output of So and seven others heading into the last three rounds of the $100,000 tournament organized by the National Chess Federation of the Philippines.
“With still three rounds left, it’s still anybody’s race,” said the second-seeded So.
Zhao continued his remarkable run when he upset compatriot GM Li Chao and stayed in front with 5.5 points on five wins and one draw.
Chinese GM Zhou Jianchao subdued IM Richard Bitoon and Singaporean GM Zhang Zhong outwitted GM John Paul Gomez in other crucial sixth-round matches to join GM Ling Diren of China, GM Merab Gagunashvili of Georgia, So, GM Ehsan Ghaemmaghami of Iran, Le, GM Murtas Kazhgaleyev of Kazakhstan, Laylo and Zhang with 4.5 points.
Ding split the point with Le, Ghaemmaghami drew with Kazhgaleyev and Chinese GM Ni Huasplit split the point with Gagunashvili.
Newly crowned Pichay Cup champion GM Anton Filippov of Uzbekistan and Asia’s first GM Eugene Torre were among those within striking distance at 4.0 points.
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