Shannon Yearwood, 14-year-old St Joseph's Convent student, has earned two titles for her splendid performance at the IX Pan American Schools Chess Championship held in San Jose, Costa Rica, last month.
She scored 6.5 out of 9 points in the Absolute U15 category, winning first place among female players and third overall.
She tied on points with second placed CM Alejandro Nieto of the Dominican Republic and fourth placed WFM Mischel Ruiz of Equador.
As a result of her success, Shannon has gained both the FIDE Candidate Master and the Woman FIDE Master titles. Further, they enhance a chess career marked by a string of successes, at home and abroad, over the last four years. 2015, in fact, was a notable one for Shannon.
She began with a Bronze medal in the U16 category of the Carifta Championships in Barbados. She was a decisive force in helping St Joseph's Convent win the Paladins' Secondary School competition.
She tied for second place in the Women's National Chess Championship thus qualifying to join the T&T women's team for the Olympiad in Baku, Azerbaijan, later this year.
She tied for second place in the U16 category of the Caribbean Junior tournament held at the Queen's Park Oval and won a Bronze Medal at the Carifta tournament in Barbados.
In 2014 Shannon not only emerged T&T's joint Women's national champion but also won gold at the Carifta event in Martinique.
In 2013 she won bronze at the VII Pan Am Schools Championships held at the Hasley Crawford Stadium. In 2012 she won her first major title, the national U12 and coupled this with Bronze at the Central American and Caribbean Junior Chess tournament in Puerto Rico.
In that same year she became the first girl to win the Barbados Chess Association's Open Junior Championship in the U12 category.
Shannon also happens to be one of four Yearwood siblings who have adorned the sport by their love for the game, their contributions to it and their many competitive achievements.
Her eldest brother Sylvan, while no longer playing competitively, is actively involved in the management of the recently revived QRC Chess Club.
Sean, her second brother, is a Candidate Master and national champion in the U8, U10, U12 and U14 age groups. Sheldon, her youngest brother, won the national U8 category in 2014, took second place in the U10 group last year and tied on points for first in the same category last month.
Thanks to their enlightened parents, the Yearwood children are excelling in a mind game that is now well recognised for its many cognitive benefits.
The boys first learned the game from their father, then studied awhile with the Chess Foundation and, together with Shannon are now under the tutelage of coach Alex Winter Roach.
The Yearwood youngsters have created something of a phenomenon in the local chess world, but the question DR must now ask is whether any of them will choose to pursue the sport to their ultimate ability, making history perhaps as T&T's first chess grandmaster, or whether they will follow the moves of so many other former chess stars and enter the less exciting but more secure world of the professions.