Day 2 at Hereford - 2 wins

I am in Wetherspoons in Hereford having breakfast with Colin.

The weekend has been going well both in chess terms and otherwise.

Yesterday I won both my games; in some ways it was the best day of my chess "career" to date - both of my opponents were reasonably strong, given that we were in the Minor section that is - one was rated 127 and one was 117, thoughit must be borne in mind, by those of you to whom that means something, that this is the new grades, and in the"old money" they were probably about 110 and 100 respectively or around 1500 in US/Irish terms.

Still, I have only beaten a handful of players of that level, so to beat two in one day was quite an achievement. The other encouraging part was that the games weren't even close - I didn't really give them much of a chance - whenI put the games into the computer it was evident that I'd outplayed them throughout.

The tournament is good for a number of reasons, not least that, being over a Bank Holiday weekend (today is the AugstBank Holiday), it means the games are spread over three days, and only two games a day, with a very civilised10h30 start time each day. Colin and I had a Thai dinner on Saturday night and a few beers and could still sleep in and have breakfast in a pavement cafe before going to the venue.

My morning game was against a quite smartly-dressed character (by the low standards of chess events positively dressy) of about my age. It wasn't a bad game though I felt I was better throughout. He played the Queens GambitAccepted which I've not met for a while but I was able to control the centre and soon had open lines and tacticalchances. I got a pawn up via a tactic and then he made a mistake, taking a pawn with his Queen which was fatal - I either won the Queen or had a mate in 2. As it was he didn't even see the mate so it was over right there.
All the tactics exercises I've been making myself do over the past few months have certainly paid off - I wouldnthave seen that mate myself until recently I think. I have come to the conclusion from this tournament that tactics problems are the single most valuable way of improving one's results - as Jonathan Rowson said in his bookChess for Zebras, lots of people regard chess practice as almost an intellectual exercise - calling it "study"whereas he says you should see it as training, like you would do for a sport, and rather than (in his words) "reading and nodding" you should do proper training - noone practices running by reading a book! Anyway, movingaway from academic study of openings to tactics practice has certainly proved worthwhile for me.

We went out for a little walk at lunchtime across some fields, admiring good views of the Herefordshire countrysidetowards the Malvern Hills. We found a pub and had a pint - by chance, Colin's opponent from yesterday was in thereso we had a chat to him.
In the afternoon, I was playing a bloke with sideburns and a bristly moustache. The opening was a Colle, the exactsame one that the lady played against me in round 1. I played the same system against it, since it worked OK thelast time. Knights on d7 and f6, bishops on b7 and e7, small centre with pawns on e6, d6, c5, b6. It seemed quite flexible.As on Saturday's game , I soon saw a way to win a piece since he left a bishop with no retreat squares whereI could trap it. I fell foul of the exact same tactic in Gonzaga, so I knew well how annoying it is. After thathe fought on for ages trying to drum up some counterplay with queenside pawns, but it was really just a matter of beingcareful to bring home the win. In the end the tactics started flowing and his position fell apart and he hadto resign just after the time control.

Colin won his first game as well, after 2 losses. He beat a woman rated 117 and it must be remembered that he'snot played a serious chess game or done any practice for 18 months, so its avery good achievement to win any gamesat this level.

We were going to have a quiet night and take it easy but we did have to celebrate a bit. We went to a Wetherspoons-likeplace for dinner - two meals for £7 and a bottle of wine for a fiver. THen we went to another pub to analyse the games, and met up again with the bloke we met at lunchtime. He had one beer and then left, and we carried on a bit. Colin talked a lot more about the Tarot and his new fitness campaign that he's starting up in an attempt to shiftthe old middle-age weight problems we all get. He's full of enthusiasm for his "army style" training routine.
Ended up going to bed about midnight then - woke up at 3am whenthe laptop fell off the bed - I'd fallen asleep with it on. Luckily it doesn't seem to be broken. Got up this morning at about 8, checked out of the hotel and now we have just had breakfast and are heading off to the venue.