Qiyu Zhou

WGM Qiyu Zhou [pronounced Chee-you Jo], born in 2000, is a Canadian chess player who has competed for Canada at the Women's Chess Olympiad since 2014 and who won the Canadian women's championship in 2016.

Qiyu learned to play chess at the age of four in France. In late 2004, the family moved to Finland, and Qiyu won the Finnish Youth Chess Championships five times (in 2005, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010) in the U10 Open section. Also in 2010, she won the Nordic School Chess Championships in the U11 Open division in Sweden. In 2008, she won the silver medal in the U8 Girls section at the World Youth Chess Championship in Vung Tàu, Vietnam.

In 2011, Qiyu transferred chess federations from Finland to Canada. She won the Canadian Youth Chess Championship in 2012 and 2013, in the Girls U-12 and Girls U-14 sections respectively. She won the Girls U-14 World Youth Championships in Durban, South Africa, 2014.

Also in 2014, Zhou made her debut at the Women's Chess Olympiad in Tromsø, Norway. She played board four for the Canadian team scoring 6½/9 points. In the same year, she also took part in the World Youth Under-16 Chess Olympiad in Gyor, Hungary playing board four for team Canada, which finished fifth. She finished first in the U-18 Girls category at the North American Youth Chess Championships in 2015 Toluca, Mexico. As a result, she was automatically awarded by FIDE the title Woman International Master (WIM). In September 2016, Zhou won the Canadian women's championship and as a result, qualified to play in the Women's World Chess Championship 2017. You can watch a speech she did on how to achieve one’s goals:

Recent news

Scroll down to reload more