Philippines Para chessers win 3 golds

MANILA, Philippines — Menandro Redor delivered two of the Philippines’ three chess gold medals yesterday that hiked the country’s total to four in the Hangzhou Asian Para Games yesterday.

Redor, a partially blind 49-year-old many-time ASEAN Para Games gold winner, drew his seventh and final round duel with top seed Aydogdy Atabayev of Turkmenistan and bested Amir Rabbi Khorasgani of India via tiebreaker after they ended up tied with 5.5 points each to claim the individual rapid B2-B3 mint.

The Filipinos later claimed the team gold after Arman Subaste and Darry Bernardo finished with four and 3.5 points, respectively.

Cheyzer Mendoza, for her part, ruled the women’s P1 division despite a last-round defeat to Mongolian Mijgee Khishigbayar to add to the country’s golden harvest.

Mendoza, a lawyer by profession, wound up with 5.5 points and tied with Indonesia’s Yuni, but the former won via higher tiebreaker.

The country could have raked in more but FIDE Master Sander Severino lost to Indonesian International Master Tirto and settled for the individual bronze and team silver in the men’s P1.

Henry Lopez snatched the individual silver.

The Filipino woodpushers are expected to replicate, if not eclipse, their five-gold result in the 2018 Jakarta Games.