Wesley So

Wesley So, born in Bacoor, Philippines, in 1993,
is a Filipino-American chess grandmaster, three-time US champion and former world number two.
He learned chess at the age of six and began competing in local junior tournaments three years later.
In 2006, aged 12 years and ten months, So became the youngest Filipino International Master at the time
and represented his country as its youngest-ever national team player at the Chess Olympiad in Turin.
He earned the grandmaster title at the age of 14 years, one month and 28 days.
In late 2014, So transferred from the Philippine to the US Chess Federation.
At the 2016 Chess Olympiad in Baku, he won team gold with the United States
and achieved the best individual result on board three.
That same year, he won the Sinquefield Cup, the London Chess Classic and the overall Grand Chess Tour.
In 2017, So won the Tata Steel Masters, claimed his first US Championship title
and reached number two in the world rankings with a rating of 2822.
Further US Championship titles followed in 2020 and 2021, and he also won the Grand Chess Tour again in 2021.
In 2019, So defeated Magnus Carlsen convincingly in the final
to become the first official World Fischer Random Chess Champion.
In 2025, he won the Sinquefield Cup for the second time.