Saturday March 27th
I got up quite early on the Saturday morning and went out for a walk in the woods first thing, bit of fresh air and exercise. It was a sunny day and the walk was pleasant. As I went I looked at the burgeoning spring life, flowers and birds.
Soon I was back far from burgeoning life, ie in a chess hall. Chris drove us this time so I could have a drink. Dave Stephenson was playing on the Saturday too, in the Open section, having taken a bye on the Friday night so he could do his hair.
Game 2 - A serious reverse - I miss a mate in 1 and lose horribly
I was playing John Eddershaw, a circuit regular whom I had beaten fairly easily at Bury St Edmonds last year. He's a tallish older bloke who sometimes wears a long distance walking blazer. I wouldn't say that he's a particularly strong player, and has a rating of 88. I was pleased with this draw, because I thought I should have a fairly good chance. I was black as I was last time I played him, but this time instead of the offbeat "Spike" opening 1. g4 he played last time, he stuck to a conventional 1. d4.
Soon I was in a good position - I'd found a way to go a pawn up, had a Bishop pair and rooks on an open d-file. It should have been a fairly easy cruise to victory from there.
Last night, I input this game into Fritz and imagine my shock and chagrin when I discovered that I had missed a mate in 1 as early as move 15 of the game. There is no excuse for missing a mate in 1! I can't even believe it's possible - I simply didn't look for it, didn't look at all that was going on on the board. We get so bound up in one idea that we don't look further. Rowson talks about buying into an internal narrative of what we think is going on in the game and this was a good example. It was an odd position - he hadn't castled and I (as black) had a pawn right up on d3, which allowed me to mate with Qd2 but I suppose we just don't think of putting a Queen right into the enemy camp so early in the game. I need to think more broadly is all I can conclude from this.
The game continued and I got a big attack going .. the problem was that all my pieces were now well advanced into his camp, and what happened was that I found I had over-reached myself and got tangled up. It meant he could trap one of my Rooks with his Knight and win the exchange (ie win Rook for Knight) and the attack petered out. I was left with two Bishops against a Knight and a Rook. Still with chances, but definitely behind now.
At least I don't give up as easily as I used to , which is one good thing, and I battled on in the endgame right up to move 55. I did managed to pose him some problems and keep my two Bishops active.
But I committed another fatal chess crime near the end of the game. He offered to give up his Knight on the Queenside and pushed a pawn on the other side of the board. I assumed that I had to take the pawn to prevent him Queening it, which I did. In fact, I could have afforded to take the Knight and let him push the pawn, because my King could have come round to stop the pawn Queening. It might have been a bit awkward, but I would have been a piece up.
I was guilty of that classic problem of "believing ones opponent" - I should have calculated it out myself.
So anyway in the end I lost a game I should have won. I felt at the time that I should have won, and that was before I even knew about the missed mate in 1 and the missed win in endgame. So two very hard lessons in that game.
Chris lost too, after another tough game, and we went for a beer in the Grove.
The Grove is the best pub in the world - its 10 minutes' walk from the venue and serves the biggest range of beers I've ever seen in any pub - hundreds of real ales and bottled continental beers. Last year imbibing there too freely led to me scoring 0/4 in the tournament - at least this time I managed to limit myself to one beer. Well, two, but they were only halves.
Dave was still playing. He had got a bye but was playing a graded friendly which he won.
Game 3 - Karpovian end-game style sees me home
It does seem as though the Precepts with which I launced this 'blog a year or so ago are starting to pay dividends. I don't quit games so early (as evidenced in the game from this morning) and I don't let lost games affect me so badly when the next one starts.
In game 3 I was black again and faced a very dreary opening system against a 92-rated opponent. It was, it must be said, an exceptionally boring first 20 moves or so with no real engagement and lots of pedestrian manoeuvring.
My opponent made some rather ill-advised loosening pawn moves around his King which enabled me to swap off the Queens and take control of an open file. I had a positional advantage because he had weak pawns. I could have taken a pawn but it would have ceded control of the d-file, so I simply piled pressure on the weak pawn and forced him to tie up his two remaining pieces defending it. My advanced rook stopped him bringing his King into the position, so I could calmly walk my own King the full length of the board from f8 to c1 to mop up the pawn and then the win was easy. It felt quite nice to play that way. I think a stronger player than he would have given up the pawn to get his pieces more active since playing it as he did was only going to lead to defeat.
So - somewhat back on track on 2/3. Dave and Chris both lost.
Evening - knock-down tournament and enormous curry
We headed back to my place. Chris and I headed to Horbury to get a take-away curry. Dave Stephenson managed to find his way to my house despite totally failing to follow us, and he 'phoned in his order. He doesn't drink but he can certainly put the food away and ordered an enormous 3 course curry including a heaped plate of tandoori mixed grill. Chris had the same but without the other 2 courses, and I had a modest chicken balti.
We played Fell Knock-Down - a 5 minute tournament where you lose a minute on the clock after each victory. Predictably, Dave destroyed Chris and me in all the games even when he only had 1 minute v our 5. It was quite depressing - it wasn't even close, ever. The gulf between him and us is so enormous - I know I can try as hard as I like but I will never be anywhere near as good as he is. And yet if he sat down to play a Grandmaster, he would get destroyed as badly.
I'd like to see him play Morgan Daniels at Knock-down, since Daniels wiped me out just as comprehensively. That would be a battle I'd pay to watch. Maybe it will happen one day.
Chris and Dave wanted to watch Match of the Day, so I decided to get some sleep on the sofa. And thus another chess day drew to a close.
Tuesday, 30 March 2010
Monday, 29 March 2010
Huddersfield
Friday March 26th
Chris came straight from working down South to my place and we met up in the pub over the road from my house. He was sitting drinking a pint of beer and reading an Iain M Banks novel. Very good, though as I pointed out, he should have been doing chess problems or studying an openings manual. He was very impressed that the beer there is £1.50 a pint! We went to my place and I gave him a quick briefing on things like tournament etiquette and how to record your moves, and then we headed off to the venue in Huddersfield.
This is the most local chess tournament to my house, about 10 miles away, and the drive only takes half an hour. The tournament is held at the Ukrainian club which is an old builiding standing in mature gardens just to the north of the town centre. It's a small venue, and a small tournament, but it's well run and has a good atmosphere. The place is nice too - there's a good bar there selling pleasant Ukrainian beer.
I had a distaster here last year, 0/4, but this year the bottom section had been split into two and there was a novices section (tactfully called "Standard" rather than "Novice"!) which had an upper grade limit of 110. I felt that I had a good chance with such a low upper limit (I am 99 but playing this year somewhat higher than that) and set myself a target of 3.5/5 for the event.
Game 1 - a narrow escape
I was playing one of the weakest players - according to grade - in the whole tournament, an old chap rated 62, so I knew this was a game I had to win. Chris was up and running and seemed to be doing OK. My opponent played the opening badly but then for some reason I managed to make a mess of things and my position went from good to not so good. Then, after a long 20 minute think, I embarked on a strategy which I felt woiuld win me a slim advantage - I won a piece but conceded him some passed pawns. I had a long think becuase it was a risky strategy to give him those dangerous passed pawns.
Imagine my consternation when he played a completely different move that I'd not even considered - which cost me a piece! I simply had overlooked that he could check me with his Queen and win an undefended Knight. A really bad blunder on my part and the horrible thought sank over me that I was completely losing to one of the lowest-rated players in the event. I had no counter-play whatsoever. I made my next half-dozen moves quickly, not really thinking at all - I was very lucky not to simply blunder again. All I could hope for was that he would blunder back , which, luckily for me, he did - giving a piece away and then , quickly, another. After that it was soon over; I spotted a tactic to win the game.
It was a dreadfully poor game with blunders on both sides and I was really lucky not to be on 0/1 with my hopes shattered, all because of a really careless oversight. On the plus side I had managed a win, hopefully laying the ghost of the "round 1 hoodoo" and had "won ugly". I hoped that presaged a lucky tournament for me.
Chris lost against a good opponent, but had played well in his first-ever serious game - in fact it went on longer than mine.
We headed back to my place and analysed the games in the pub over a beer.
Chris came straight from working down South to my place and we met up in the pub over the road from my house. He was sitting drinking a pint of beer and reading an Iain M Banks novel. Very good, though as I pointed out, he should have been doing chess problems or studying an openings manual. He was very impressed that the beer there is £1.50 a pint! We went to my place and I gave him a quick briefing on things like tournament etiquette and how to record your moves, and then we headed off to the venue in Huddersfield.
This is the most local chess tournament to my house, about 10 miles away, and the drive only takes half an hour. The tournament is held at the Ukrainian club which is an old builiding standing in mature gardens just to the north of the town centre. It's a small venue, and a small tournament, but it's well run and has a good atmosphere. The place is nice too - there's a good bar there selling pleasant Ukrainian beer.
I had a distaster here last year, 0/4, but this year the bottom section had been split into two and there was a novices section (tactfully called "Standard" rather than "Novice"!) which had an upper grade limit of 110. I felt that I had a good chance with such a low upper limit (I am 99 but playing this year somewhat higher than that) and set myself a target of 3.5/5 for the event.
Game 1 - a narrow escape
I was playing one of the weakest players - according to grade - in the whole tournament, an old chap rated 62, so I knew this was a game I had to win. Chris was up and running and seemed to be doing OK. My opponent played the opening badly but then for some reason I managed to make a mess of things and my position went from good to not so good. Then, after a long 20 minute think, I embarked on a strategy which I felt woiuld win me a slim advantage - I won a piece but conceded him some passed pawns. I had a long think becuase it was a risky strategy to give him those dangerous passed pawns.
Imagine my consternation when he played a completely different move that I'd not even considered - which cost me a piece! I simply had overlooked that he could check me with his Queen and win an undefended Knight. A really bad blunder on my part and the horrible thought sank over me that I was completely losing to one of the lowest-rated players in the event. I had no counter-play whatsoever. I made my next half-dozen moves quickly, not really thinking at all - I was very lucky not to simply blunder again. All I could hope for was that he would blunder back , which, luckily for me, he did - giving a piece away and then , quickly, another. After that it was soon over; I spotted a tactic to win the game.
It was a dreadfully poor game with blunders on both sides and I was really lucky not to be on 0/1 with my hopes shattered, all because of a really careless oversight. On the plus side I had managed a win, hopefully laying the ghost of the "round 1 hoodoo" and had "won ugly". I hoped that presaged a lucky tournament for me.
Chris lost against a good opponent, but had played well in his first-ever serious game - in fact it went on longer than mine.
We headed back to my place and analysed the games in the pub over a beer.
Friday, 26 March 2010
Four tournaments
There are four tournaments coming up in the next five weekends, and things kick off in a few hours with the Huddersfield event, followed by Coulsdon over Easter, then a trip to see Michelle in Berlin and then two more tournaments - St Albans and finally Hereford where I will be going with Colin at the end of April. Then that's more or less it for the season, with only the Grange-over-Sands tournament at the end of June to go until things start again in September.
So a lot of games and work coming up in the next month - in fact, 18 games by my calculations. Added to which, the tournament limits suit me - Huddersfield this weekend is an under-110 tournament and both Hereford and St Albans are u-120s, so it shouldn't be such hard pounding as my recent tournaments (Kidlington was a u-145 for example). So I really should have some chances to do well, if I can follow the precepts and get a bit of luck.
The omens aren't too good at Huddersfield - this was the event where, last year, I managed 0/4 after finding an absolutely superb real ale/World Beers pub 10 minutes from the venue, and I must endeavour to postpone its charms until after the games this weekend. It has to be one of the best pubs in the world, and only half an hour from my house, but chess and 10% Belgian Tripel Ale don't mix too well.
I tend to find that doing badly in a tournament one year doesn't augur well for later years, but I will have to hope that I can put that behind me. I also have the "first round" hoodoo to contend with tonight - I am only scoring around 25% in the first rounds of tournaments, probably because of the pressure of expectations. And there's also the fact that in my last three tournaments (Gonzaga, Kidlington and Doncaster) I've only managed 1 win, 3 losses and 7 draws, though it must be remembered that the sections I was in were harder than the one I will be in today.
History seems to be against me, then, but I will have to do my best to overcome these hurdles.
Dave Stephenson is playing this event too, though he is taking a bye tonight. The other news is that Chris Welch is going to be making his tournament debut in this event. He is a friend from work who has been playing online and is now going to make the step up to serious tournament chess. Some of you may recall that I stayed at his parents' house in Preston when I played the tournament there last November. He cooked me a superb omelette for breakfast. Well, on that occasion he seemed to catch the chess bug, and now he's competing.
In fact he's going to be arriving at my house shortly for a quick pre-tournament briefing on tournament stuff like writing down the moves, etiquette etc, so I'd better get moving.
So a lot of games and work coming up in the next month - in fact, 18 games by my calculations. Added to which, the tournament limits suit me - Huddersfield this weekend is an under-110 tournament and both Hereford and St Albans are u-120s, so it shouldn't be such hard pounding as my recent tournaments (Kidlington was a u-145 for example). So I really should have some chances to do well, if I can follow the precepts and get a bit of luck.
The omens aren't too good at Huddersfield - this was the event where, last year, I managed 0/4 after finding an absolutely superb real ale/World Beers pub 10 minutes from the venue, and I must endeavour to postpone its charms until after the games this weekend. It has to be one of the best pubs in the world, and only half an hour from my house, but chess and 10% Belgian Tripel Ale don't mix too well.
I tend to find that doing badly in a tournament one year doesn't augur well for later years, but I will have to hope that I can put that behind me. I also have the "first round" hoodoo to contend with tonight - I am only scoring around 25% in the first rounds of tournaments, probably because of the pressure of expectations. And there's also the fact that in my last three tournaments (Gonzaga, Kidlington and Doncaster) I've only managed 1 win, 3 losses and 7 draws, though it must be remembered that the sections I was in were harder than the one I will be in today.
History seems to be against me, then, but I will have to do my best to overcome these hurdles.
Dave Stephenson is playing this event too, though he is taking a bye tonight. The other news is that Chris Welch is going to be making his tournament debut in this event. He is a friend from work who has been playing online and is now going to make the step up to serious tournament chess. Some of you may recall that I stayed at his parents' house in Preston when I played the tournament there last November. He cooked me a superb omelette for breakfast. Well, on that occasion he seemed to catch the chess bug, and now he's competing.
In fact he's going to be arriving at my house shortly for a quick pre-tournament briefing on tournament stuff like writing down the moves, etiquette etc, so I'd better get moving.
Tuesday, 2 March 2010
Dreary Doncaster
Friday 26th February
The Doncaster tournament took place last weekend and it turned out to be a bit of a damp squibb as far as I was concerned.
It was meant to be something of a gathering with Morgan Daniels, Dave Stephenson and Russell Goodfellow all playing. But at the last minute, Morgan had to pull out owing to other committments and Russell pulled out due to concerns about the snow in the north, even though in the event the weather was fine.
I, too, was feeling a bit under par because I'd only just got back from Germany. On the Thursday I had to get up at 4am for a 7.15 flight, then went to my parents' for breakfast, met my Sister in Oxfordshire for lunch and ended up in Nottingham to meet John Peach for a few gins and dinner. He cooked a very nice vegetarian curry, but it did end up being a 21-hour day and on Friday I was feeling somewhat weary and not really up for a chess tournament.
I drove home and went to meet work colleagues for the traditional Friday "lunch club" in the pub. Went home again and got a message from Dave Stephenson saying that he wasn't going to play the Friday night game either and would be there in the morning. It was dark, raining and miserable, so I decided to give the Friday game a miss as well and just have a night in and get tidied up from my trip. I 'phoned the organiser and asked for a bye in round 1.
Saturday, 27th February
Game 1 - boring draw
Things didn't start too auspiciously on the Saturday either. As usual, I left too little time for the drive, and also as usual there was insufficient parking at the venue. I parked on the street and arrived 15 minutes late. I was playing a bloke called David Scorer, who it transpires I had beaten 4 years ago in Nottingham.
I had to take another 15 minutes break to move the car since it was only on a 40 minute ticket, which also didn't help.
Clearly I have deteriorated since 2006, because I could only manage a draw this time. The game was pretty dreary and never really got going. A dull Gruenfeld, with me on the White side. He was higher graded than me, and so a draw was a reasonable result but it was very uninspiring.
When I got home and looked at the game with Dave, it turned out that I'd missed a tactical win towards the end. My cup runneth over.
Doncaster Congress is held in a large Victorian school near the town centre. Its a bit of a rabbit warren of a place, but I quite like it as chess venues go. One big plus is that there are adequate toilet facilities, so you don't end up with the noxious bogs you often get in chess events, which so often drive me to the local pub.
Even though Russell wasn't playing, his friend Nigel was there. And even though Morgan wasn't playing, his friend Nick was. There were other readers of this 'blog playing there too - Brendan O'Gorman was plying his trade as usual in the Major section, and Peter Brace was in my section. I think this was the first time that the potential existed for me to play one of the 'blog readers, but Peter had a rather better tournament than me and so it didn't happen.
However, I did learn one of the drawbacks of being the author of a popular 'blog, which is that you attract rather more attention than you might like. Several people wandered over to watch my game from time to time and it really wasn't worth watching.
I had lunch in the pub with Nigel and some other people. Nigel is a sound man and we had a good chat about this and that. There were some other people there whom I don't know, including a very strong player aged 77 who hails from the Netherlands originally. He lives near Hull and knows Dave so we had a chat. He was clearly a sound man - he said he always enjoys a drink or two before and after games. He grumbled that Dave never resigns early enough, costing him valuable pub time!
Game 2 - Poor
I can't even think of a subtitle for this one! I was playing black against someone rated 122. I was going OK until I blundered, just when both Dave and Nick were standing there watching. I lost a rook for a bishop and then 2 moves later blundered away my Queen. At least it was a quick affair so I could spend a couple of hours watching the other games, and having a beer in the pub with Nigel.
Once Dave's game had finished we headed back to my place. He followed me back, and grumbled a lot later on about how slow the route was. We went and got an Indian take-away and went back to my place and went over the games. I struggled to stay awake. Dave ate a huge pile of Tandoori mixed grill.
Sunday, 28th February
Got up and drove back to Doncaster. Dave kindly drove us both so that I could have a beer or two. He grumbled a lot about how slow the route was - this from a man who had driven home so slowly last night that I had to keep slowing down so he could catch up behind me!
Game 3 - Uninspiring win
Well I did contrive to win my first tournament game since York, after not winning any games at Gonzaga or Kidlington, but it wasn't anything to be proud of. My opponent blundered a pawn in the opening, but then I got bogged down and he came back into the game, taking advantage of an open c-file, until he made a bad mistake later on and allowed me to win a large amount of material. The result was all down to mistakes by him rather than any credit to me.
Went to the pub for lunch with Dave and Nick.
Game 4 - Benko against a blind player
I got back to the venue to find I'd been drawn against a blind player. You might recall I'd had a game against a blind man at Grange-over-Sands. It's quite a tricky business, because there are two board to keep in sync and you have to call out all your moves using the phonetic alphabet. It feels more like a collaberative effort to get all the paraphenalia working properly more than a competitive game.
At Grange, I won fairly easily but this chap was a different proposition, a student at Sheffield University who turned out to be a solid and competant player. The game was a Benko and he took an unusual line - after taking the a6 pawn he played e3 before Nc3, changing the nature of the positions quite a lot. I think it's a good line for White and posed me a few problems. I offered a draw by repetition, which he turned down. I started to get more and more tired and generally not in the mood. Dave, who came and watched as is his custom, said he'd rarely seen someone looking less interested at a chess board! The position was fairly dull and drawish, though I felt he was having the better of it. Eventually we got to the time control and he said he'd take the draw because setting his special clock back was too much of a faff.
Apparently, he'd drawn all 5 of his games.
Had a nice chat at the end to Peter Brace who had also had a draw against the bloke I played in the last round. I told him that I'd thought he must be a chess coach, because he always seems so knowledgable and full of good advice for others.
I ended my campaign with 1 win, 2 draws and 1 loss. An uninspiring performance. I have had tournaments with worse results than that - plenty of them - but few where all my games were as dreary and boring as this one. It's probably because I was tired before the start, after the travelling and long day I had on my return from Germany.
Dave ended with 3/5 which is pretty good considering he was in the open section. Had a beer with him and Nick, then went back to my place. Dave enjoyed the tandoori mixed grill so much that he had another one and I opted for a prawn bhuna. We went through some games, but I was really struggling to stay awake. In fact I think I did nod off at the analysis board, which somehow summed the whole tournament up.
Grand Prix news
One bit of good news which emerged this week is that I am lying second in the under-120 Grand Prix section. This is a table of performance across all tournaments. Your best seven tournament results count towards points. The system obviously rewards people who play in a lot of tournaments, but its still nice to be lying as high as 2nd.
I'm on 472 points (dont worry about how they are worked out), a long way behind Alan Fraser who is on 615. He must play in every tournament that there is; last year he topped the "most games" list. I played him once, at Coulsdon last year, when I lost after being ahead, in what was a particularly disastrous tournament for me. I'm back in Coulsdon over Easter, so maybe I will get a chance to level the score with him and eat into his lead in the Grand Prix standings.
The Doncaster tournament took place last weekend and it turned out to be a bit of a damp squibb as far as I was concerned.
It was meant to be something of a gathering with Morgan Daniels, Dave Stephenson and Russell Goodfellow all playing. But at the last minute, Morgan had to pull out owing to other committments and Russell pulled out due to concerns about the snow in the north, even though in the event the weather was fine.
I, too, was feeling a bit under par because I'd only just got back from Germany. On the Thursday I had to get up at 4am for a 7.15 flight, then went to my parents' for breakfast, met my Sister in Oxfordshire for lunch and ended up in Nottingham to meet John Peach for a few gins and dinner. He cooked a very nice vegetarian curry, but it did end up being a 21-hour day and on Friday I was feeling somewhat weary and not really up for a chess tournament.
I drove home and went to meet work colleagues for the traditional Friday "lunch club" in the pub. Went home again and got a message from Dave Stephenson saying that he wasn't going to play the Friday night game either and would be there in the morning. It was dark, raining and miserable, so I decided to give the Friday game a miss as well and just have a night in and get tidied up from my trip. I 'phoned the organiser and asked for a bye in round 1.
Saturday, 27th February
Game 1 - boring draw
Things didn't start too auspiciously on the Saturday either. As usual, I left too little time for the drive, and also as usual there was insufficient parking at the venue. I parked on the street and arrived 15 minutes late. I was playing a bloke called David Scorer, who it transpires I had beaten 4 years ago in Nottingham.
I had to take another 15 minutes break to move the car since it was only on a 40 minute ticket, which also didn't help.
Clearly I have deteriorated since 2006, because I could only manage a draw this time. The game was pretty dreary and never really got going. A dull Gruenfeld, with me on the White side. He was higher graded than me, and so a draw was a reasonable result but it was very uninspiring.
When I got home and looked at the game with Dave, it turned out that I'd missed a tactical win towards the end. My cup runneth over.
Doncaster Congress is held in a large Victorian school near the town centre. Its a bit of a rabbit warren of a place, but I quite like it as chess venues go. One big plus is that there are adequate toilet facilities, so you don't end up with the noxious bogs you often get in chess events, which so often drive me to the local pub.
Even though Russell wasn't playing, his friend Nigel was there. And even though Morgan wasn't playing, his friend Nick was. There were other readers of this 'blog playing there too - Brendan O'Gorman was plying his trade as usual in the Major section, and Peter Brace was in my section. I think this was the first time that the potential existed for me to play one of the 'blog readers, but Peter had a rather better tournament than me and so it didn't happen.
However, I did learn one of the drawbacks of being the author of a popular 'blog, which is that you attract rather more attention than you might like. Several people wandered over to watch my game from time to time and it really wasn't worth watching.
I had lunch in the pub with Nigel and some other people. Nigel is a sound man and we had a good chat about this and that. There were some other people there whom I don't know, including a very strong player aged 77 who hails from the Netherlands originally. He lives near Hull and knows Dave so we had a chat. He was clearly a sound man - he said he always enjoys a drink or two before and after games. He grumbled that Dave never resigns early enough, costing him valuable pub time!
Game 2 - Poor
I can't even think of a subtitle for this one! I was playing black against someone rated 122. I was going OK until I blundered, just when both Dave and Nick were standing there watching. I lost a rook for a bishop and then 2 moves later blundered away my Queen. At least it was a quick affair so I could spend a couple of hours watching the other games, and having a beer in the pub with Nigel.
Once Dave's game had finished we headed back to my place. He followed me back, and grumbled a lot later on about how slow the route was. We went and got an Indian take-away and went back to my place and went over the games. I struggled to stay awake. Dave ate a huge pile of Tandoori mixed grill.
Sunday, 28th February
Got up and drove back to Doncaster. Dave kindly drove us both so that I could have a beer or two. He grumbled a lot about how slow the route was - this from a man who had driven home so slowly last night that I had to keep slowing down so he could catch up behind me!
Game 3 - Uninspiring win
Well I did contrive to win my first tournament game since York, after not winning any games at Gonzaga or Kidlington, but it wasn't anything to be proud of. My opponent blundered a pawn in the opening, but then I got bogged down and he came back into the game, taking advantage of an open c-file, until he made a bad mistake later on and allowed me to win a large amount of material. The result was all down to mistakes by him rather than any credit to me.
Went to the pub for lunch with Dave and Nick.
Game 4 - Benko against a blind player
I got back to the venue to find I'd been drawn against a blind player. You might recall I'd had a game against a blind man at Grange-over-Sands. It's quite a tricky business, because there are two board to keep in sync and you have to call out all your moves using the phonetic alphabet. It feels more like a collaberative effort to get all the paraphenalia working properly more than a competitive game.
At Grange, I won fairly easily but this chap was a different proposition, a student at Sheffield University who turned out to be a solid and competant player. The game was a Benko and he took an unusual line - after taking the a6 pawn he played e3 before Nc3, changing the nature of the positions quite a lot. I think it's a good line for White and posed me a few problems. I offered a draw by repetition, which he turned down. I started to get more and more tired and generally not in the mood. Dave, who came and watched as is his custom, said he'd rarely seen someone looking less interested at a chess board! The position was fairly dull and drawish, though I felt he was having the better of it. Eventually we got to the time control and he said he'd take the draw because setting his special clock back was too much of a faff.
Apparently, he'd drawn all 5 of his games.
Had a nice chat at the end to Peter Brace who had also had a draw against the bloke I played in the last round. I told him that I'd thought he must be a chess coach, because he always seems so knowledgable and full of good advice for others.
I ended my campaign with 1 win, 2 draws and 1 loss. An uninspiring performance. I have had tournaments with worse results than that - plenty of them - but few where all my games were as dreary and boring as this one. It's probably because I was tired before the start, after the travelling and long day I had on my return from Germany.
Dave ended with 3/5 which is pretty good considering he was in the open section. Had a beer with him and Nick, then went back to my place. Dave enjoyed the tandoori mixed grill so much that he had another one and I opted for a prawn bhuna. We went through some games, but I was really struggling to stay awake. In fact I think I did nod off at the analysis board, which somehow summed the whole tournament up.
Grand Prix news
One bit of good news which emerged this week is that I am lying second in the under-120 Grand Prix section. This is a table of performance across all tournaments. Your best seven tournament results count towards points. The system obviously rewards people who play in a lot of tournaments, but its still nice to be lying as high as 2nd.
I'm on 472 points (dont worry about how they are worked out), a long way behind Alan Fraser who is on 615. He must play in every tournament that there is; last year he topped the "most games" list. I played him once, at Coulsdon last year, when I lost after being ahead, in what was a particularly disastrous tournament for me. I'm back in Coulsdon over Easter, so maybe I will get a chance to level the score with him and eat into his lead in the Grand Prix standings.
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