Garcia and Nazario making waves in Online GibTelecom 2010 Blitz Chess

BY: MARLON BERNARDINO

MANILA, PHILIPPINES---Quietly, there are two young Filipino chess players who are also making waves internationally. Marc Christian Nazario and Jan Emmanuel Garcia qualified in the exclusive online GibTelecom 2010 Blitz Qualifier Tournament on Internet Chess Club (ICC). The tournament, joined by many of the world’s leading grandmasters and thousands of players around the world, was held 28-30 November 2009.

Credit should be given to these two young Filipino chess players as the tournament is being conducted starting at 3:00 am Philippine time. The time control throughout the tournament (both qualifiers and knockout stage) is 3,0. The 16-player knockout final will be held on Sunday, December 6. The 16 finalists, led by 7 GMs, 4 IMs, and an FM, are from Serbia-1, USA-3, England-1, Germany-1, Argentina-1, Peru-1, Russia-3, Brazil-1, Turkey-1, Philippines-2 and Norway-1. The top seed for the Final is GM Igor Miladinovic from Serbia with an Internet Chess Club Blitz rating of 3130. Our young players Marc Christian Nazario and Jan Emmanuel Garcia respectively ranked 13th with a blitz rating of 2639, and 14th with a blitz rating of 2612.

The champion will get a round trip ticket, hotel room, breakfast & dinner and an automatic invite to the 8th GibTelecom Chess Festival, running January 26 to February 4, 2010 at the Caleta Hotel, recently voted Gibraltar's best hotel.