Quizon, a chess prodigy from Cavite, is now the 17th Filipino to earn the Grandmaster title. The last Filipino to achieve this accolade was Oliver Barbosa in 2011, alongside Richard Bitoon. In 2017, Janelle Mae Frayna made history as the country's first and only female Grandmaster.
Quizon’s journey to the Grandmaster title has been marked by significant achievements from a young age. In August 2018, he became an International Master (IM) after a stellar performance at the Eastern Asian Juniors Open Championships in Gangneung, South Korea. The following year, he qualified for the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games but narrowly missed out on a podium finish.
In 2019, Quizon was honored as the MILO Junior Male Athlete of the Year by the San Miguel Corporation-Philippine Sportswriters Association, sharing the accolade with tennis star Alex Eala. He also clinched gold in the under-16 standard category at the Eastern Asia Youth Chess Championships in Bangkok, Thailand, that year.
Quizon's talent earned him a spot in the 2021 Chess World Cup, where he was eliminated in the first round by Russian-Canadian GM Evgeny Bareev. Determined to achieve Grandmaster status, he focused on meeting the three required GM norms—a benchmark of exceptional performance in high-level tournaments.
He secured his first GM norm in February 2023 at the AQ Prime ASEAN Chess Championship, followed by his second in December 2023 at the Eastern Asia Juniors and Girls Chess Championship. Quizon completed his third and final norm in March 2024 during the Hanoi Grandmaster Chess Tournament in Vietnam.
With this remarkable achievement, Daniel Quizon not only elevates his own career but also brings a renewed sense of pride and excitement to Philippine chess.
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