SFEA Lecture Series

My next lecture for the State Farm Employees Association will be January 15th @ Northbridge Baptist Church. This will be the third in a series of four lectures. Don't worry, attendance at previous lectures is not required. The topic will be Advancements in Opening Theory. All are welcome.

More info coming soon on BNASC.org.

Interesting Position

The following position also occurred at the Twin Cities Chess Club and was played between Nathaniel Sobery (white) and Johnathan Bonwell (black).

We have come to a critical moment in the game:



Very exciting stuff!

White to play and keep an edge.

Twin Cities Chess Club, 11/1/10

This past Monday, I visited the TCCC at Colley's Chess Cafe and played two G/20 matches- one against my student, Niranjan, and the second against an old friend, Dennis Bourgerie.

My match with Dennis was actually quite exciting, and so I have annotated it lightly:

1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.f4 g6 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.Bb5 Nd4

One of the main "book" moves. The idea is to prevent the exchange on c6, which would weaken black's pawns.

6.0–0 Nxb5 7.Nxb5 a6 8.Nc3 b5 9.a4 b4 10.Ne2 Bb7 11.d3 d6

A flexible move. 11. ...c4 or 11. ...Rc8 or even 11. ...e6 were worth consideration.

12.c3 Nf6 13.Ng3

A move I had been waiting for. I already had the following idea in mind a few moves ago:

13...h5 !?

The point is to pry open the light square diagonal, if allowed. Also, black is trying to avoid castling short, as white may have a typical attack with f5 and a queen transfer to the kingside via e1. Now it is black who will attack on the kingside, and the game takes on a very sharp nature.

14.Re1

[14.h3 Was worth considering, with the plan of preventing a black pawn from reaching h3. 14...h4 (14...Nd7) 15.Ne2 Nd7 16.Qb3]

14...h4 15.Nf1 h3 16.g3

Now black has g2 and h1... nice spots for a queen.

16...Qb6 17.e5 dxe5 18.fxe5 Nd5 19.c4 Nc7 20.Ne3 0–0–0 21.a5

Pushing the queen to the perfect square.

21...Qc6 22.Rf1

Now, I missed a nice opportunity. Can you find it?




22...Rh5 was the move played, but...

[22...Bxe5 !! instead, was much better. Can you see all the variations if white takes the piece? 23.Nxe5 Qh1+ 24.Kf2 Qxh2+ 25.Ke1 (25.Ng2 Qxg2+ 26.Ke3) 25...Qxg3+ 26.Kd2 Qxe5 And h2 is coming.]

23.Kf2 Bxe5 24.g4

A nice shot, which I missed. Fortunately, I have plenty of compensation after ...

24...Qxf3+ 25.Qxf3 Bxf3 26.Kxf3

[26.gxh5 Bxh5 27.Rh1 Rxd3 Black has plenty of compensation for the exchange.]

26...Rhh8 27.Rf2 Rd4

[27...Rxd3 Not this move! Now white wins a piece: 28.Ke4 with a fork.]

28.Bd2 Rf4+ 29.Ke2 Rxf2+ 30.Kxf2 Bxh2

The rest of the game finished in time pressure. 31.Rh1 Be5 32.g5 Bxb2 33.Ng4 Ne6 34.Be3 Bd4 35.Bxd4 Nxd4 36.Nh6 f6 37.Rxh3 fxg5 38.Kg2 Ne6 And whites flag fell. 0-1

Nanjing 2010

The "Nanjing Pearl" tournament, one of the major Super-tournament circuit, starts tomorrow, October 19th, in Nanjing, China.

According to chessbase.com, this will be an historic event:

"Nanjing 2010 is possibly the hottest round-robin tournament of the year, and is the first in history with three players rated 2800 in it."

In fact, this is one of the few times in history we have even had three 2800+ players in the world - Magnus Carlsen, Vesselin Topalov, and Vishwanathan Anand. (Perhaps the first time ever?)

Want to watch the event, or read analysis? Check out www.chessbase.com and www.chessdom.com.

(Image courtesy Nanjing Pearl official website)

Chess Olympiad, 2010

For those of you who didn't know, the 2010 Chess Olympiad is currently underway in Khanty-Mansiysk.

You can visit the official site for standings and round-by-round updates.

I strongly suggest all Internet Chess Club Members check out the "Game of the Day" segment (under your events tab when you log in) for great video lectures from Grandmasters Joel Benjamin, Gregory Kaidanov, Larry Christiansen, and Alexander Yermolinsky.

After 9 rounds, the U.S. currently sits in 6th place with a team score of 6 wins, 2 draws, and one defeat.

Bradley Summer Open

I went +3 -1 at the BSO this past weekend. My final round was an interesting game. I achieved a micro-advantage against 2352-rated fellow master Nikhilesh Kumar, of Peoria.

The opening went:

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 Nf6 5. O-O b5 6. Bb3 Be7 7. Re1 O-O 8. c3 d6 9. h3 Na5 10. Bc2 c5 11. d4 Qc7 12. Nbd2 cxd4 13. cxd4 Nc6 14. d5 Nb4 15. Bb1 a5 16. a3 Na6 17. Nf1 Bd7 18. Be3 Rfc8 19. Ng3 Nc5 20. Nd2 Na4 21. Ra2 Rab8 22. Bd3

Which led to this position:




Here I evidently went wrong with 22. ...b4?! which allowed the intrusion Ba6! Still, the game was probably equal though I mishandled later play.

What could I have done to keep the advantage?

TCCC and USchess.org MSA stats

I will be in attendace tonight at the Twin Cities Chess Club, though will not be able to make it until around 8:45 or so. This will be my trend for the duration of the Fall semester at ISU, as I have a class from 5:30-8:20 on Mondays.

In other news, uschess.org has introduced some new functions to their Member Services Area. Now, located directly on the player card, one can find links which detail past performance based on year, rating of opponent, or specific opponent, or one can also view past rating history in graph form. I wanted to look up my lifetime stats as a master. I became a master in the late Summer of 2005, so I started with my first full year as a 2200+, which was 2006:

Year #Gms. W D L Score %

2006	86	57	10	19	72.1
2007	84	58	15	11	78.0
2008	54	31	11	12	67.6
2009	28	21	5	2	83.9
2010	34	21	11	2	77.9

Total 286 188 52 46

Total Draw percentage (Draws/Total Games): 18.2%
Win % in decisive games (Wins/[total games-games drawn]): 80.3%

I was interested to see that my win percentage does seem to be increasing slightly, though my number of games have obviously fallen off significantly.

Sorting according to opponent rating, I noticed in the last twelve months I have played only one player in the rating range 1700-1800, and NO players below the rating of 1700.

Also in the last 12 months:
-I have played the most games against players between the rating 2000-2099, and scored 9 wins and 2 losses, with no draws.
-Against fellow masters I am undefeated, with 3 wins and 6 draws
-Overall I have played 42 games with a record of 27W 12D 3L, or a 78.6 score %

Some other interesting stats:
-My most games ever were played in 2003, the year I broke the 2000 rating barrier. During that calendar year I played 142(!) rated games.
-In 2002 and 2004 I played over 100 rated games (132 and 111 respectively)

Twin Cities Chess Club

I will be in attendance for tonight's meeting of the Twin Cities Chess Club at Colley's Chess Cafe in downtown Normal.

Hope to see you there! Check back here for updates on my club attendance schedule.

Tournament Schedule

My next tournament will be the 47th Bradley Summer Open in Peoria, Illinois. Free entry to Masters!

The Bradley tournament has a special fondness in my memory. The first Open event I ever won outright was the 2002 edition (which must have been the 39th?). My rating, at the time, skyrocketed from 1890-1913.

I may also attend the upcoming CILG scholastic event as well, but that's a bit far off for me to be sure.

Position of the moment

I plan to post 'positions of the moment' periodically. As I study and review my own games, those of others, AND those from books, I will save interesting or unique ones and post them for discussion here.

Here is a position from Just the Facts, and endgame book by GM's Lev Alburt and Nikolay Krogius.

In the text white plays f5. But what if white instead simply sits on the position, for example Bc1-d2 and back? Can black demonstrate a winning plan?

Statement of purpose

I have created this blog with the intention of tracking both my playing and coaching endeavors. Herein you can expect to find:

1) Information on upcoming tournaments and events in the Central IL area or that I will be attending.

2) Information on my personal coaching- both goals and philosophies and more boring things such as contact information, schedule, and availability.

3) Annotated games, chess stories and news, and other interesting updates as they come along.

Thank you, and enjoy!

_pdk