Archive for 2017
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Cork Congress 2017
The Cork Congress happened over the weekend of 29th-31st March and I didn't do too bad in it. I finished third in my section and got some cash for my troubles! The event was very well organised - great credit must go to those at the club who ran the tournament.
Thankfully this year didn't coincide with the clocks changing but it did share the hotel with a Fawlty Towers show! It's a bit sureal to be playing the game and hearing Basil's German speech coming from the adjacent room. At times during my games I wished I was in that show rather than at the chess board!
My first game was a long draw. I got an ok position as black in the QGD but then lost the plot a bit and got into some trouble. I managed to get into a rook endgame where both of us were threatening to promote. I picked up an extra pawn here at this stage but when things simplified it was into a theoretically drawn position. I could and probably should have played on here but my brain was frazzled and I was down to a couple of minutes. My opponent had offered a draw and I accepted. One of my problems here is that I know the position is a draw but I'm not sure what to try to do to complicate it and win. In future if I have this position, I think I would play it until the pawn endgame and see what happens.
I was paired against an unrated opponent in the next round so I had no idea of how strong he was. It was a crazy game. He attacked on the kingside and I on the queenside. I held him off and I think I had a good position before it all went to pieces in mutual time trouble. I missed a win with Nxc6 - I managed to miscalculate this both during the game and also in the post mortem. He managed to get a pawn on f3 and with the way my pawns were arranged I realised I had serious back rank issues. Thankfully he missed some critical moves and I managed to get a win when he blundered his rook.
The next round had me as black against the French Exchange. I always think that this is the variation to go for as white as the pawn structures and positions are completely different to the other French variations. I've had good results though with it but I'd struggle to find a coherent plan or common thread in my Exchange games. I equalised fairly easily in this game but wasn't sure where to go from there. I had a bye booked for the fourth round so when my opponent offered a draw and I didn't see much of a plan I took the opportunity to knock off early for the day. The idea was to come back more refreshed the next day and try again.
Realistically this bye and the two draws put me out of contention for the top prize from early on but I was enjoying myself playing at this more relaxed pace.
The first game on the Sunday morning was another King's Indian game. I tend to lump these in with the Dutch and various kingside fianchetto games as they all seem to end up in similar positions. I think I'm learning in these positions. Up to now I tended to mess around on the queenside too much with unnecessary preparation moves. This time I just went for it with the attitude that if he survived my attack and countered then fine - but at least I'd get an attack in first. This worked out well for me and I won an exchange just out of the opening. I slowly increased the pressure and managed to convert the win. I may have had an easier win on move 26 with Bxf7 Qxf7, Nxe5 Bxe5, Rd8+ getting the piece back and gaining a pawn. I was worried that my rook may find it hard to get back out but going over this after the game I think it would have been fine. I went for the more solid option and eventually my opponent flagged in a lost position.
My last game in the tournament was one in which I was fortunate to get a win. I thought I was winning a piece after the opening but in reality it just forced him into playing it as a sacrificial attack! I had to give back the piece to survive. I think I took my longest think ever for a move on Qc7 - about 30 mins. My opponent waited a bit, went away, got a coffee, came back and still had to wait for another 10 minutes. I was thinking that I was in trouble during the game but on the computer I'm perfectly fine. I have great trouble evaluating these kinds of positions. In the endgame I think he should have tried to keep on both rooks as that would have been far more drawish. Once I won a pawn and traded off the rooks, the King and pawn endgame was always going to be good for me and eventually I queened and won the game.
In the end I won a prize for joint third place in my section. I even gained a few rating points! All in all a good tournament for me.
→ posted on March 29, 2017chess
Munster League Division 1. Rounds 10 and 11.
This was a bad day for us in the Munster League. We lost both our matches to Adare and Limerick B. The Limerick B match was especially bad as they now leapfrogged over us in the table.
I was close to getting a draw against a much higher opponent in my first game but lost a crucial pawn in the endgame and went down from there. The second game was a disaster for me. I got a slightly better position going into the endgame - my opponent had an isolated pawn - but then I lost a piece to a pawn fork and with it, the game.
On a more amusing note, the Munster Chess Union got a little confused as to what game we were playing. We'd probably have had a better chance in the rugby!
→ posted on March 26, 2017chess
Cork Club Championship Round 5
The club championship continued and I also continued my streak of losing to higher rated players. I had a chance to get a great position early in the opening with 9. Ng5. I looked at it, thought it was good and was going to play it. Then however I thought I would take a deeper look, completely miscalculated and convinced myself the move was bad. If I was a worse or better player I would have played the move. Unfortunately I had just enough knowledge and skill to make a complete mess of things.
After that my opponent got a great attack against my kingside and finished it off nicely. I still think I'm messing about with less active moves in these positions and should be more direct on the queenside in future.
→ posted on March 24, 2017chess
The Pro Chess League was interesting but I didn't watch it often as there was no easy way to just watch one team's games so I couldn't easily track how the Irish team were doing. Hopefully next year each time will have their own page on the site showing just their games.
→ posted on February 25, 2017microposts
Cork Club Championship Round 4
I played my fourth round in the Club Championship and won. I thought I was doing fine and then my opponent sacrificed a knight for a couple of central pawns and an open f-file. The computer would have been fine in this position but I wasn't! The tactical complications were too much.
I played a bad move and after e5 I spent ages trying to find a good response and failed. All I could see was diagonals opening up for his queen and bishop to complement his open file. So I sacrificed a piece back and got the queens off and started over again. I was able to win from when my opponent later dropped a piece.
That's after bringing me back to 50% in the tournament. I'm still down a few rating points but they won't be taken into account until the tournament completes so I have time to try to win them back.
→ posted on February 24, 2017chess
Excellent post by Danny Gormally analysing the games of a 1500+ player over at GingerGM
→ posted on February 19, 2017microposts
Started doing tactics exercises on Chessity.com and I'm tracking them here. Will see if this leads to an improvement in my general chess play
→ posted on February 12, 2017microposts
Games for the 7th round of the Munster league were backdated in the rating system recently so I had a personal record rating of 1548 in December. Unfortunately the Mulcahy brought that down since.
→ posted on February 11, 2017microposts
Munster League Division 1. Rounds 8 and 9.
Rounds 8 and 9 of the Munster League took place on the 5th February and the B team had a tough assignment playing Ennis A home and away. We lost boths rounds heavily - 1.5-3.5 and 1-4.
I drew my first game with black. It was a Rubenstein French which ended up in a R+Kn vs R+Kn endgame which we drew by repetition. My opponent at one stage around move 21 had a potential sacrifice of his knight on f7. Even in the analysis afterwards we weren't too sure if it worked out. One interesting thing is that my opponent spent a lot of time trying to calculate this sacrifice. I had a similar experience in the last round of the Mulcahy where my opponent spent a lot of time trying to calculate a potential attack. My new strategy is to get into a position where there is a just plausible enough attack against me so my opponents burn lots of time on their clocks and I end up with a time advantage!
The second game was a complete disaster. I had sucessfully navigated my opponents attack and just needed a couple more accurate moves - h4 and knight somewhere - and we would havea level position. Instead I didn't realise my pawn was pinned and moved my knight to where it could be taken for nothing. What an absolute disaster. We have important games coming up against Limerick so I need to be a lot sharper for those.
→ posted on February 5, 2017chess
Cork Club Championship Round 3
I played my third round in the Club Championship and lost. I think I was ok for most of the game but then lost the plot near the end. I didn't have a clear idea of what I was supposed to be doing during most of the game. I think I should have brought my rooks over to the queenside early and pushed there.
→ posted on January 27, 2017chess
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