Showing posts with label southern california. Show all posts
Showing posts with label southern california. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Southern California here I come....
I figured I'd update here. I have sad and happy news to report. I'm moving back down to Southern California for a new job. I would like to thank the chess community I've encountered up here, I've greatly enjoyed it. I will still be rooting for the SF Mechanics next year so they better win again... I hope I see all the great people I've met around at tournaments and other than that I wish you all the best.
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Amateur Team West 07
US Amateur Team West
What happened to Caltech this year? Caltech had been a perennial contender (winning 3 of the last 4 and going into the last round in clear first in the other one), but this year we were missing out top board Patrick Hummel which convinced us to name ourselves "No Patrick, No Problem".
Last year we were good and lucky enough to win the event clear, this year we were much weaker (2020 vs 2197) and our last year's 2nd and 4th boards (Yanayt and I) were playing 1st and 2nd boards respectively this year. We had a rough start with Yanayt blundering from a completley won position in round 1 to tie a match we should've probably won despite this result. In round 3 we played the famous Hoo's the Next American Idol and despite being outrated on 3/4 boards only lost 1.5-2.5 and actually our board 3 was better the whole game and then played consecutive blunders throwing away the win on move 40 and losing the game outright on move 41, but such things happen in chess. We beat up some weaker team in round 4 and had a nice upset in round 5 fueled by our very consistant 4th board Mike Kaye's victory over a stronger player and myself on board 2 defeating a master as black (more on this below). In round 6 we were paired against a disappointed San Diego team whose top boards decided to call it an event and headed for the long drive home while their bottom two boards still wanted to play. We bravely allowed our lower boards to play the games to try to keep things as interesting as possible and they valiantly scored 1.5/2 to give us a very impressive result of 4.5/6 despite the early mis-steps. We tied for 4th overall and took 5th place on tiebreaks and 1st place U2100, I can say we can be happy with our early "Swiss Gambit". So sure, it wasn't first place, but this was the lowest rated Caltech team in the past 5 years and we still had a very solid result. Had it not been for some bad luck on our part we might have even been in contention.
My own results were kind of strange. In round 1 I was on the black side of a Slav and my opponent played one lazy move and then needed to accept an inferior position, but instead blundered allowing a nice tactic to win a piece and resigned before making his 16th move. In round 2 I was paired against another weaker opponent, this time as white. It was my first game against the Gruenfeld so I was slightly uncomfortable playing this very technical line I had prepared in general. My opponent played a few inaccurate moves and I was clearly better, but then he blundered allowing me to win a pawn and the bishop pair to which he apparantly decided he would rather be mated in one instead so I played 20. Qh7# (yes, I know you don't see the position) and again was the first one done on the team in under an hour. In round 3 I played the highest rated board 2 in the event in Joel Banawa who was sitting at a rating of 2380+. I missed my chance to generate serious counterplay, but may have still had chances to survive, but I blundered allowing him to win the exchange which I might have had some minimal compensation for if it werent for my followup trying to win the exchange back which I was lazy about calculating and missed (from far) that he had a nice tactic at the end of this line winning a piece and not losing the exchange back so I decided to resign instead of playing on down a whole rook. In round 4 I was paired down again, not quite so far this time and I got to play my first real game against the King's Indian, my opponent played a dubious (but common) variation and I gave a little lesson in ripping the queenside apart and not getting mated and I won fairly smoothly. In round 5 I was paired up to a 2278 as black. My opponent played the Exchange French which is a line that has definitely more poison than its reputation. If black plays lazily he can end up with problems developing his "free" french bishop. My opponent played a move that looked inaccurate in the opening and I found my chance to equalize completely. I realized from looking at the boards that I would probably need to win to give my team a real chance so I wanted to keep my chances high. I was quite proud of the move I found in the following position:
White just played 17. Qf5
(image generated from http://www.eddins.net/steve/chess/chessimager)
I was black in this position against an opponent more than 150 points higher rated than me. I had forseen this position and felt I should be better, but I realized I was a little loose and if I wasn't careful my better minor pieces could become less of a factor than my loose queenside. However, I had prepared a shot in this position which I will post the result at the bottom of this post, so don't scroll down if you want to try to find the strongest move in the position on your own. By the way, this move only achieves a positional goal and clarifies the position, it does not win material or give some overwhelming advantage. I would say after this move the position is clearly =+.
Anyways, I went on to win this game (although even after the diagram my opponent had reasonable drawing chances) which had a nice finish for me as the game simplified to KNNB v K which I could have won faster, but decided to enjoy myself by winning with just KNB v K ignoring my other knight. In the last round I chose not to play a game (otherwise someone else on my team wouldn't have gotten a game) and decided to give the games to the teammates who would get the most interesting games. And our 3rd and 4th boards stepped up as I mentioned to net us the U2100 prize on tiebreaks.
My goals:
Well, I guess I had some miscalculations in game 3 which wasn't great, but it was a tough game and I can't be totally disappointed with it. I am not holding myself to a standard of never missing anything in my calculations as my current goal is still to break 2200 and I'm not insisting to be perfect as that would be unreasonable. I spotted some nice tactics in a few of my games and don't feel like I missed out on major opportunities for the most part due to lazy calculation.
Rating change: 2132 -> 2144 (2 points from my all-time high!)
Solution to diagram: 17... Qc8! White cannot play 18. Qxf6 because Be7 traps the queen so the white queen is excavated (he traded it off on c8).
What happened to Caltech this year? Caltech had been a perennial contender (winning 3 of the last 4 and going into the last round in clear first in the other one), but this year we were missing out top board Patrick Hummel which convinced us to name ourselves "No Patrick, No Problem".
Last year we were good and lucky enough to win the event clear, this year we were much weaker (2020 vs 2197) and our last year's 2nd and 4th boards (Yanayt and I) were playing 1st and 2nd boards respectively this year. We had a rough start with Yanayt blundering from a completley won position in round 1 to tie a match we should've probably won despite this result. In round 3 we played the famous Hoo's the Next American Idol and despite being outrated on 3/4 boards only lost 1.5-2.5 and actually our board 3 was better the whole game and then played consecutive blunders throwing away the win on move 40 and losing the game outright on move 41, but such things happen in chess. We beat up some weaker team in round 4 and had a nice upset in round 5 fueled by our very consistant 4th board Mike Kaye's victory over a stronger player and myself on board 2 defeating a master as black (more on this below). In round 6 we were paired against a disappointed San Diego team whose top boards decided to call it an event and headed for the long drive home while their bottom two boards still wanted to play. We bravely allowed our lower boards to play the games to try to keep things as interesting as possible and they valiantly scored 1.5/2 to give us a very impressive result of 4.5/6 despite the early mis-steps. We tied for 4th overall and took 5th place on tiebreaks and 1st place U2100, I can say we can be happy with our early "Swiss Gambit". So sure, it wasn't first place, but this was the lowest rated Caltech team in the past 5 years and we still had a very solid result. Had it not been for some bad luck on our part we might have even been in contention.
My own results were kind of strange. In round 1 I was on the black side of a Slav and my opponent played one lazy move and then needed to accept an inferior position, but instead blundered allowing a nice tactic to win a piece and resigned before making his 16th move. In round 2 I was paired against another weaker opponent, this time as white. It was my first game against the Gruenfeld so I was slightly uncomfortable playing this very technical line I had prepared in general. My opponent played a few inaccurate moves and I was clearly better, but then he blundered allowing me to win a pawn and the bishop pair to which he apparantly decided he would rather be mated in one instead so I played 20. Qh7# (yes, I know you don't see the position) and again was the first one done on the team in under an hour. In round 3 I played the highest rated board 2 in the event in Joel Banawa who was sitting at a rating of 2380+. I missed my chance to generate serious counterplay, but may have still had chances to survive, but I blundered allowing him to win the exchange which I might have had some minimal compensation for if it werent for my followup trying to win the exchange back which I was lazy about calculating and missed (from far) that he had a nice tactic at the end of this line winning a piece and not losing the exchange back so I decided to resign instead of playing on down a whole rook. In round 4 I was paired down again, not quite so far this time and I got to play my first real game against the King's Indian, my opponent played a dubious (but common) variation and I gave a little lesson in ripping the queenside apart and not getting mated and I won fairly smoothly. In round 5 I was paired up to a 2278 as black. My opponent played the Exchange French which is a line that has definitely more poison than its reputation. If black plays lazily he can end up with problems developing his "free" french bishop. My opponent played a move that looked inaccurate in the opening and I found my chance to equalize completely. I realized from looking at the boards that I would probably need to win to give my team a real chance so I wanted to keep my chances high. I was quite proud of the move I found in the following position:
White just played 17. Qf5
I was black in this position against an opponent more than 150 points higher rated than me. I had forseen this position and felt I should be better, but I realized I was a little loose and if I wasn't careful my better minor pieces could become less of a factor than my loose queenside. However, I had prepared a shot in this position which I will post the result at the bottom of this post, so don't scroll down if you want to try to find the strongest move in the position on your own. By the way, this move only achieves a positional goal and clarifies the position, it does not win material or give some overwhelming advantage. I would say after this move the position is clearly =+.
Anyways, I went on to win this game (although even after the diagram my opponent had reasonable drawing chances) which had a nice finish for me as the game simplified to KNNB v K which I could have won faster, but decided to enjoy myself by winning with just KNB v K ignoring my other knight. In the last round I chose not to play a game (otherwise someone else on my team wouldn't have gotten a game) and decided to give the games to the teammates who would get the most interesting games. And our 3rd and 4th boards stepped up as I mentioned to net us the U2100 prize on tiebreaks.
My goals:
Well, I guess I had some miscalculations in game 3 which wasn't great, but it was a tough game and I can't be totally disappointed with it. I am not holding myself to a standard of never missing anything in my calculations as my current goal is still to break 2200 and I'm not insisting to be perfect as that would be unreasonable. I spotted some nice tactics in a few of my games and don't feel like I missed out on major opportunities for the most part due to lazy calculation.
Rating change: 2132 -> 2144 (2 points from my all-time high!)
Solution to diagram: 17... Qc8! White cannot play 18. Qxf6 because Be7 traps the queen so the white queen is excavated (he traded it off on c8).
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Western Class Championship Results
Western Class Championship Results
The tournament got a decent turnout, GMs Yermolinsky and Khachiyan both played along with IMs Sevillano, Matikoziyan, Pruess, Mezentsev, and Stein. I started out playing okay. I had an interesting game against Robby Adamson in my first game, I had a strong advantage, but made a couple of obviously bad decisions which allowed him to complicate the position with an unclear sacrifice that was much easier to play for him regardless of the true assessment. In my second game a strong expert from Arizona in what was a complicated positional struggle where an early decision to leave the king in the center was later a deciding factor after I defended for quite a while. In the third game I faced IM Mezentsev and I unfortunately walked into a little trap in the opening that left him (with the black pieces) with a better position and me with little active play, I tried to stir things up, but the position was already too bad and I lost in short order. In my 4th game I achieved a position with an extra pawn and a better position straight from the opening, but after one missed move and a couple of serious miscalculations I achieved a position where my opponent had a lot of counterplay despite being a pawn down, in this game I was particularly upset at the various missed tactics even though I saw some reasonably tricky ideas that were necessary to keep the game in control, but ultimately I was only able to draw. In the next game I was paired down and I made several bad decisions missing my chance to get the better of the position, but fortunately my opponent missed his opportunity to put me into serious danger and then in what was at best a slightly better position for me he actively blundered a piece to give me the game. This guy says he's a reader of my blog so I give him the utmost respect. In the last round I was paired agianst a slightly higher rated expert who I've played before, this game was flawed in many ways, I "tactically" won a pawn from the opening, but it turns out the tactic was flawed in a few fairly obvious ways that we both completely missed. After a few more moves I was essentially just a pawn up, but there were aggressive possibilities for both sides. I made a bad practical decision right before the time control (which I could have delayed until after the time control by repeating moves one more time) and then quickly blundered into mate. Overall I feel like I played well, unfortunately my struggles as white continued, it's arguable that I played my toughest opposition as white, but I got good positions in two of the games and then mishandled the positions completely so I think it's fair to say I need more practice both playing an analyzing these types of positions.
How I did at my goals?
Well, I didn't finish +1, in fact I finished -1, but I was within range. I was very good at spending 10-20 seconds on early moves making sure I didn't have two positions confused, thinking about what other options I had, I think this worked quite well as I felt like I didn't catch myself not thinking on any moves, now as to the quality of my thought that was a little lower than I was hoping for. I did miss a few of my opponents moves, but it was at least a rare occurrance. This doesn't sound like a complete success, but I am pretty satisfied and if I can continue this positive trend I will have good results in the future.
The tournament got a decent turnout, GMs Yermolinsky and Khachiyan both played along with IMs Sevillano, Matikoziyan, Pruess, Mezentsev, and Stein. I started out playing okay. I had an interesting game against Robby Adamson in my first game, I had a strong advantage, but made a couple of obviously bad decisions which allowed him to complicate the position with an unclear sacrifice that was much easier to play for him regardless of the true assessment. In my second game a strong expert from Arizona in what was a complicated positional struggle where an early decision to leave the king in the center was later a deciding factor after I defended for quite a while. In the third game I faced IM Mezentsev and I unfortunately walked into a little trap in the opening that left him (with the black pieces) with a better position and me with little active play, I tried to stir things up, but the position was already too bad and I lost in short order. In my 4th game I achieved a position with an extra pawn and a better position straight from the opening, but after one missed move and a couple of serious miscalculations I achieved a position where my opponent had a lot of counterplay despite being a pawn down, in this game I was particularly upset at the various missed tactics even though I saw some reasonably tricky ideas that were necessary to keep the game in control, but ultimately I was only able to draw. In the next game I was paired down and I made several bad decisions missing my chance to get the better of the position, but fortunately my opponent missed his opportunity to put me into serious danger and then in what was at best a slightly better position for me he actively blundered a piece to give me the game. This guy says he's a reader of my blog so I give him the utmost respect. In the last round I was paired agianst a slightly higher rated expert who I've played before, this game was flawed in many ways, I "tactically" won a pawn from the opening, but it turns out the tactic was flawed in a few fairly obvious ways that we both completely missed. After a few more moves I was essentially just a pawn up, but there were aggressive possibilities for both sides. I made a bad practical decision right before the time control (which I could have delayed until after the time control by repeating moves one more time) and then quickly blundered into mate. Overall I feel like I played well, unfortunately my struggles as white continued, it's arguable that I played my toughest opposition as white, but I got good positions in two of the games and then mishandled the positions completely so I think it's fair to say I need more practice both playing an analyzing these types of positions.
How I did at my goals?
Well, I didn't finish +1, in fact I finished -1, but I was within range. I was very good at spending 10-20 seconds on early moves making sure I didn't have two positions confused, thinking about what other options I had, I think this worked quite well as I felt like I didn't catch myself not thinking on any moves, now as to the quality of my thought that was a little lower than I was hoping for. I did miss a few of my opponents moves, but it was at least a rare occurrance. This doesn't sound like a complete success, but I am pretty satisfied and if I can continue this positive trend I will have good results in the future.
Friday, January 12, 2007
Western Class Championship
I'm going down to Agoura Hills, CA this weekend to play in the Western Class Championship. This year it's back to it's glory as a 7 round event (although I can't play tonight so I'll be taking a 1st round bye) after first being reduced to 6 rounds and then 5 rounds last year it's certainly a nice change of pace. Last time it was 7 rounds it got a very strong field, this year I doubt it will have as many strong players since the prize fund has since been reduced, but I imagine it will get the usual suspects from Southern California.
My goal for this tournament is to finish with a plus score, it won't be easy, but it shouldn't be impossible either. I guess in keeping with the spirit of my new year's resolution one of my other goals for the tournament is to reduce the number of moves where I spot critical variations only AFTER I move. So I guess wording it in an affirmative manner is make sure I'm actually calculating and not making superficial judgements. I know this may seem strange coming from a player of my rating, but I'm really not sure if I calculate more than like 2 or 3 moves deep in the deeper variations of my calculation except for when that is extended by forcing moves like checks, captures, or mate threats. I mean the latter part makes sense as those are the easiest variations to calculate. At the same time I don't want to start to become one of those players who spends ridiculous amounts of time on simple moves. Another goal for this tournament is to spend a little more time thinking in the opening. This doesn't mean I'm going to try to innovate significantly at the board, but I think spending 15-20 seconds at least on each move should help me get my wheels turning a little bit so I don't wake up in a middlegame position without having "warmed up". Should be nice to get a full 2 hours for the first 40 moves after my TNM game on Tuesday with only 90 minutes for the first 30 moves (believe me, although the ratio is the same it's a big difference).
Anyways, wish me luck.
My goal for this tournament is to finish with a plus score, it won't be easy, but it shouldn't be impossible either. I guess in keeping with the spirit of my new year's resolution one of my other goals for the tournament is to reduce the number of moves where I spot critical variations only AFTER I move. So I guess wording it in an affirmative manner is make sure I'm actually calculating and not making superficial judgements. I know this may seem strange coming from a player of my rating, but I'm really not sure if I calculate more than like 2 or 3 moves deep in the deeper variations of my calculation except for when that is extended by forcing moves like checks, captures, or mate threats. I mean the latter part makes sense as those are the easiest variations to calculate. At the same time I don't want to start to become one of those players who spends ridiculous amounts of time on simple moves. Another goal for this tournament is to spend a little more time thinking in the opening. This doesn't mean I'm going to try to innovate significantly at the board, but I think spending 15-20 seconds at least on each move should help me get my wheels turning a little bit so I don't wake up in a middlegame position without having "warmed up". Should be nice to get a full 2 hours for the first 40 moves after my TNM game on Tuesday with only 90 minutes for the first 30 moves (believe me, although the ratio is the same it's a big difference).
Anyways, wish me luck.
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