Well that's Christmas over for another year

How was it for you? I had a nice quiet Christmas at my place with Michelle. Chess didn't rear its ugly head which is one of the bonuses of Christmas, though I did get a most unexpected Christmas present from Dave Stephenson - a book on the Nimzo-Larsen "attack" 1. b3. I'm not about to rush out and start playing that, but the book does appear to be amusingly eccentric, with strange chapter headings and commentary. In chapter 1, after several pages on the Daniels-like move 6. Nh3, the author then says "so is this a good move? No. In fact its a bad move"...

I wanted to do a review of the year and talk about my chess goals and resolutions for 2010 but first I realise I still didn't finish the story of the Preston tournament. (Resolution no. 1 = write up chess 'blog within 24 hours of playing!). Its a bit pointless now, since the whole aim of writing here is to capture immediate impressions, but for the sake of completeness, I will do a quick survey of the remainder of the tournament.

You may recall that I crashed spectacularly in game 1 on the Friday night to an annoying tactic, and then Chris Welch and I went to the pub and had a game of chess and several beers.

On the Saturday morning, after updating the 'blog and eating a very good fritatta courtesy of Chris, I went back to the tournament hall for round 2. The game was a fairly dour Sicilian Rossolimo. Presently, Dave Stephenson arrived. He wasn't playing but had dropped by to spectate for a while. He opined to Chris that my game would go on for ages , when all of a sudden I was in their midst, telling them that I'd won! My opponent dropped a couple of pieces all of a sudden in a level position, which is more or less what I'd done the night before.

We sat in the canteen and did a little analysis and Dave showed me how I should have played on a piece down the previous evening. He has an annoying habit of taking my resigned position and then reversing the board and making me play my opponent's position and win against him, which of course, since he's a very strong player, I always fail to do, which then to his way of thinking "proves" that I should not have resigned.

Chris and I went back to his parents' place for a bite to eat (nice home-made fish pate) and then I headed off to drive to Birmingham where I was going for a reunion/drinks evening/Christmas market. I was taking a bye for the afternoon game for that reason. The drive down was fine and I checked into the Hilton where I was staying with no difficulties. The evening was enjoyable; I managed a couple of pints of weissbier and a sausage before the rain rather spoilt the German market and we just went to the pub.

Sunday morning I rose early and drove all the way back up to Preston again. Not the ideal preparation for two tournament games. The rain was torrential in the Birmingham area, but I still managed to get back only a few minutes late.

My round 4 game was against an earnest-looking unrated Indian student. I knew he was going to be good, and the game was a right struggle as he kept me penned in. I was behind in development throughout and struggling to keep going, but I managed to just about hang in there and eventually turn the tables a bit. He turned down a draw offer at a point when he was probably ahead, and then less sensibly, another one when he was 1-2 pawns down. Shortly after that he blundered in a strange way. He made a move and then immediately cursed himself volubaly. I couldn't see what was bothering him. I could put him in check, but his King had an escape square. I played the check and he immediately gave up his Rook for the Pawn. He must simply have missed the escape square. Later on, Fritz confirmed that I had been right and that he had no reason to give up the Rook.

So I was a Rook up in a K+P ending, pretty simple, but in all the stress I managed to forget for a while how to mate with K+R which would have been a bit embarrassing. With only 2 minutes on the clock I pulled myself together and maanged to get the mate. It was a long slog, 70 moves or so, and a game I shouldn't have won - but I've lost enough games I should never have lost, so I suppose there was a degree of things evening out.

I had some lunch in a pub. Game 5 started out pretty well for me. Recently (Scarborough and Bury St Edmunds) I've done well in round 5 games when there's been nothing to play for and today I was going well and comfortable out of the opening as well. All of a sudden I felt my 'phone vibrate in my pocket - I was panicking that it would make a noise and I'd be ignominiously drummed out of the tournament, so I made any old move and rushed from the hall. Of course, that move led to my entire position falling apart and I lost pretty fast!

So Preston ended as a distinctly par 2/4 peformance, but it was never a tournament I was taking all that seriously - given the 100 mile dash to Birmingham and back I was never going to be able to give it my full attention.

And so ended the 2009 tournament season. Sometime in the next couple of days I will write my Review of the Year.