KYLEN JOY MORDIDO isn’t a woman grandmaster (WGM) candidate for nothing.
The 22-year-old Dasmariñas, Cavite bet on Wednesday gave a glimpse of her immense talent as she stopped 15-year-old wunderkind Ruelle Canino on her tracks with a smashing victory Tuesday that created a four-way logjam at the helm after five rounds of the Philippine National Women’s Chess Championship in Malolos, Bulacan.
Ms. Mordido, who owns two of the three norms required to be a WGM, unleashed a pawn sacrifice that Ms. Canino erroneously pounced on to launch a decisive kingside onslaught.
When the smoke of tactical battle dissipated, Ms. Mordido was a rook up and two moves away from checkmating a befuddled Ms. Canino, who made heads turn after zooming to the solo lead with four victories including three against higher-ranked rivals.
Now Ms. Canino shares the top spot with Ms. Mordido, 2019 titlist Jan Jodilyn Fronda, who trounced fellow Woman International (WIM) Master Bernadette Galas, and Woman FIDE Master (WFM) Shania Mae Mendoza, who bested Mhage Sebastian, with identical score of four points.
WFM Cherry Ann Mejia missed out on seizing a piece of the lead after halving the point with WFM Allaney Jia Doroy and settled for solo fifth with 3.5 points, or just half point off the pace.
The 11-round, 12-player tournament is staking a spot to the Asian Indoor Martial Games in Bangkok, Thailand this November, three slots to the FIDE World Chess Olympiad in Budapest, Hungary this September and the top purse worth P85,000 courtesy of host Malolos City Mayor Christian Natividad. — Joey Villar
