Mysterious Rook Moves

After going 4-0 and winning the Under 1700 section in January, I decided to move up into the Under 2000 section for February. This isn’t so absurd, as my rating after the January tournament went up to 1601, but due to the way the USCF ratings system works the ratings lag by about 2 weeks, so my official printed rating for February was 1491. The only real affect that this has is that if you are at the bottom of the group you are more likely to be forced to take a bye if there are an odd number of players, and indeed, in round 2 I was paired out of my section (receiving a full point bye) and had a side game (still rated but doesn’t contribute to tournament standings) against George Callahan. I’ll post that game later.

Continue reading Adventures in U2000

I went into this last round game for the January Metrowest Chess Club tournament with 3/3 points and a chance to win the section if I won this game. I’d been playing pretty good chess all month so I was hopeful. I was outrated, but not by so much that I was intimidated.
Continue reading Schnair – Wollkind 0-1

Having won the first two games of the January tournament, I was paired against a strong player in round 3. Larry Kleine, 1651. I’ve only played a few games in my chess career against players over 1600, but with white I’ve now scored 4.5/7 against them, which is respectable. (Interestingly, I’ve never beaten a player rated over 1550 as black…) As is often the case against the stronger players this was a pretty clean and well played game. Sadly, the ending is somewhat marred by the fact that on my last move I turned a winning position into a draw, and that my opponent didn’t recognize this and resigned anyway.

Continue reading Wollkind – Kleine, 1-0

This was my fourth encounter with Mr. Hong. In our previous 3 games I had managed a measly half a point, but last night I got the better of him. I don’t think we were playing on even footing though: he had an unexpectedly complicated evening and arrived late and a bit frazzled. In the past he’s shown himself to be an extremely solid player.

Continue reading Hong – Wollkind, 0-1

Round 2 of the MCC Holiday Swiss tournament happened last night and I was paired with Alex Fauman, the youngest member of a chess playing family that are regulars at the tournaments in Natick. I’m not a good judge of ages, but I’d put him in the 6-8 year old range. Don’t laugh: Danny Angermeier, who is rapidly becoming one of the best players at the club, and I suspect will eventually be one of the best in the state, turned 10 last night….

This was sort of a strange little game, and I’m starting to think that a lot of these games that I’m going to be playing on the black side of the Modern Defense are going to look, well, not like your usual chess game. At least I got a win and broke my 3 game losing streak.

Continue reading Fauman – Wollkind, 0-1

Chess requires a few different abilities which all fall under the heading of “mental toughness.” Sometimes, the best move in a position undoes one of your prior moves (like moving a piece back to the square it was just on). It’s psychologically tough to do that, but the best move is the best move. Another is the ability to assess your opponents threats with a clear head and stick to your plan when his scary looking move isn’t really so scary.

Neither of these came up this week, but another one did: the need to play the position and not force things that aren’t there. I have a bad habit of wanting to just blow things up when the position is boring. Sometimes there’s nothing much to do, you just have to play simple, quiet moves and maybe end up with a draw. I’m bad at this. When I can’t find a plan I tend to want to just fling pieces at the enemy king. My 21st move in this game is an example of a move like that, and it lost me the game (as these sorts of moves tend to).

Continue reading MCC Thanksgiving Swiss 2009 Round 4: Loss

Sometimes you lose ugly. I’m still working out some of the typical things that you have to watch out for in the opening I’ve started using as black. Apparently, one of those things is the bishop sacrifice on f7. I ended up on the ropes back in round 4 of the October tournament after such a sacrifice. I was able to draw that game after a long struggle.

This time around I was busted on move 11 and resigned on move 15.

Continue reading MCC November Swiss Round 3: Loss

Round 2 of the November Swiss tournament at the MCC saw me paired against Walt Champion. Walt is in his 60’s and plays very solid chess. I’ve seen him around the club a fair bit (frequently holding off other good players) but didn’t have a chance to play him until now. I had white in a Closed Sicilian, and managed to get a winning position, but was distracted by paper tigers, couldn’t see a clear path to victory, and took a draw. This is two out of the last 3 games at the MCC now where I’ve taken draws in winning positions against equal or higher rated competition. I must be getting soft in my old age.

Continue reading MCC November Swiss Round 2: Draw

Two months in a row I’ve had the same opponent in the first round. This isn’t too surprising given how pairings are made. Most chess tournaments use what is known as the “swiss” pairing system. Basically, starting with the people with the best scores so far, you take each group of people with the same score, sort by rating, split into a top half and bottom half, and pair across. Player 1 plays player n/2+1, and so forth. There are some additional rules for dealing with odd numbers of players, evening out the color distribution, and making sure you don’t play the same people twice.

At any rate, since the pool of players stays somewhat constant over the months, and the ratings don’t change THAT fast, it’s no surprise that things shook out the same way again. This time I had black, though, so I got to trot out my new black defense one more time. It’s still very rough around the edges, but at least I wasn’t busted by move 6 like I was last week.

This game is a bit sloppy on both sides. I gave white too much space at the start, then gave back the pawn he let me win, and more, and then had a hard time finding a win in a fairly level endgame until my opponent offered a queen trade that turned out to be winning for me.

(show chess board)(hide chess board)

Unexpected but nice moment: when I arrived to sign up for this month’s tournament, I was informed that my tie for second place last month won me 30 dollars, which is a net of 10 after paying for the registration. It’s not much, but if I can win even a small amount of money playing this game I can’t be doing it all wrong.

This week figures to involve more chess than usual for me, as the Boston University open, which happens every November, is taking place this Saturday. It’s a four round tournament, G/60 (players get 60 minutes to make all their moves) so you can get it done in a day. It’s always a good time, and I’m looking forward to it.