“But with some luck, my experience still prevailed in the games I [played],” Apelo said in the statement.
In a separate email correspondence with Asian Journal, Apelo also said he was proud of his victory as a Filipino representative in the tournament, and noted that he was the only Filipino in the contest. Aside from the honor of representing Fil-Ams in the tournament, Apelo said the prize money which amounted to $1,185 was “not bad.”
The report said Apelo is known in Filipino chess circles in the tri-state area for his aggressive chess-playing style, “which he complements with great sacrificial instincts.” Meanwhile, Rafael was described as saying he considers Apelo as one of the best Filipino-American chess players in the East Coast.
According to the article, Apelo tied for first place at the 31st Annual Empire City Open, Under2200 section in December last year at the New Yorker Hotel in Manhattan, New York. In 2008, meanwhile, he won the Central Park Open and the Brooklyn Blitz Open tournaments.
The article said the year before that, he placed second behind former US Champion Grandmaster Sergey Kudrin in the Harlem Chess Open, while he won gold in 2004 as a member of the Philippine team that was victorious in the Merkeda Open in Malaysia.
Rafael said Apelo’s next tournament will most likely be the World Open, which will be conducted in downtown Philadelphia sometime this year. (Gian C. Geronimo, VVP, GMA )