Philippine Sudoku champ bags 3rd in China

Former national Sudoku champion Sarah Jane Cua proved her mastery of the logic-based number-placement puzzle one more time when she placed third in the youth category of the just concluded 2012 Beijing International Sudoko Tournament.

The news was relayed to the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Thursday by Dr. Simon Chua, president of the nongovernment Mathematics Trainers Guild-Philippines, whose wards represented the country in the 14-nation competition held on May 19 and 20 in the Chinese capital.

Young math wizards from the Czech Republic and China placed first and second in the contest’s “18-and-under” category, according to Chua.

Seventeen-year-old Cua, an incoming management engineering sophomore at Ateneo de Manila University, topped the same competition last year. Another Philippine contestant, Timothy James Tan of Trinity Christian School in Bacolod City, placed second.

In 2010, she bested over 50 Asian participants to emerge as grand champion in the Brand’s Asia-Pacific Sudoku Challenge contest in Singapore, where she won S$10,000 (about P332,600) and a glass trophy, among other prizes.

Cua, a mainstay of the Philippine math team, ruled the same regional contest in 2008. Jerry E. Esplanada