Wesley So settles for draw with Russian in Swiss chess

Filipino Grandmaster Wesley So settled for a draw with Russian GM Evgeny Tomashevsky in the 6th round of the 43rd Biel International Chess Festival Young Grandmasters tournament in Biel, Switzerland on Saturday.

So agreed to a draw after 24 moves of a Slav defense using the disadvantageous black pieces to tally 3.5 points in 6 rounds in the company of Tomashevsky, Russian GM Dmitry Andreikin of Russia, Israeli GM Maxim Rodshtein and French GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.

When the draw was offered, Tomashevsky had 6 pawns, a knight, a white bishop, a rook and a queen while So had six pawns, 2 knights, a rook, and a queen.

The Filipino chess prodigy is scheduled to handle the white pieces over to Vietnamese GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son in the 7th round.

The 16-year-old So is currently half a point behind the leaders in the category-17, all-GM tournament.

Italian GM Fabio Caruana, conqueror of So in the 5th round on Friday, remains on top with 4 points.

Caruana settled a truce with Ngoc Truong Son after 31 moves of Trompovsky Opening.

In other results, Vachier-Lagrave defeated GM David Howell of England after 40 moves of King's Indian Defense, Andreikin split the point with Rodshtein after 20 moves of English Opening, and Dutch GM Anish Giri settled a truce with Indian GM Parimarjan Negi after 20 mves of Slav Defense.