Westly So, 14 years, one month and 28 days old from the Philippines is now  The 7^th youngest Chess Grand Master in the world and country eighth and the youngest at that. He now joins Eugene Torre, who became Asia’s first GM in 1974, the late Rosendo Balinas (1976), Rogelio Antonio Jr. (1998), Buenaventura ‘Bong’ Villamayor (2000), Nelson Mariano (2004), Mark Paragua (2005) and Darwin Laylo (2007) in the elite list of Filipino chess players.

 So, a high school sophomore of St. Francis of Assisi College System-Bacoor,  holds the distinction of being the country’s youngest chess Olympian at 12 in Turin, Italy, in 2006, and youngest National Junior Open champion at 13 in May. So also holds the world’s strongest player in his age-group with an Elo rating of 2531, edging Indian GM Parimarjan Negi (born 1993, Elo 2514). His strength was amply proven when So won this year’s World Under 16 Team Championship Board 1 gold medal in Singapore with a phenomenal score of 9.5 points out of a perfect 10.

 The list of Grand Masters titles at an earlier age

1. Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine (12 years and seven months),

2. Parimarjan Negi of India (13 years, three months and 22 days),

3. Magnus Carlsen of Norway (13 years, three months and 27 days),

4 Bu Xiangzhi of China (13 years, 10 months and 13 days),

 5. Teimour Radjabov of Azerbaijan (14 years and 14 days),

6. Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine (14 years, 17 days).

So, currently the country’s second-ranked player with Torre, dislodged GM Etienne Bacrot of France, who got his GM title at 14 years and two months, at seventh spot.