So the conclusion to the first game must be explained, as the final position is certainly not drawn. Around the 85th or 90th move I had 6 and a half minutes on my clock and my phone rang. I quickly turned off the ringer in my pocket and everything continued as normal. Then the TD (who was from the south) waved his hand in the air motioning 5 at me. I could not understand him. Then he said I had to take 5 minutes off my clock. I got up and disagreed with him that they did not provide adequate warning for such a rule and that if he had stated this rule in advance my phone would have been off (it pays to know the rules sometimes). Unfortunately at this time the captain of our team and National TD Jerry Weikel was out of the room so he could not back me up and the director took 5 minutes off my clock which left me with 90 seconds and left me extremely distressed. I ended up allowing myself to get mated unnecessarily and walked out without losing the game, my clock expired. Then when I got back I told Jerry what had happened and in a lengthy arbitration with the other team we agreed on a draw for the game. The rule should not have been enforced so I did not feel like the result of the game was fair. It was controversial for sure.
The second game features a very provocative move that is more like a bluff than anything else. It is not actually sound but it is so amazing to look at I think that it caught my opponent by surprise. Actually it has been played 3 times in my database and won 2/3.
Anyways it was an interesting experience going to Tonopah, I could have played a lot better but that's a different story.
7 Northern Nevada players and 7 Southern Nevada players met there to decide the State Championship and the State Team Championship. Everyone played 2 games against someone of similar strength, a pretty standard team match. I faced Virgilio Reyes, the state champion from last year on board 2 of the teams. His rating is 2092. I have seen him play before and I'm sure we have played blitz games in the past but I don't think he remembered me. When I lived in Vegas we went to the same club for a while but I wasn't around for that long.
The first game I thought things were going pretty well and then we got to this position:
where White unleashed a pretty tactic that wins a piece. It's the first time I've been hit by something like this in a while. I felt like resigning but played on for about 80 more moves before we reached a drawn position and then some crazy stuff happened. Tune in later this week for the game and the dramatic ending.
This was the first tournament I've played since the club championship and also signaled an end to my short hiatus from chess. I lost my game with Weikel, but I feel pretty good about how I played in that game. I played very aggressively in all games and achieved quick wins in the four games I did win. My rating even went up a little bit. Here are all 5 games. They are pretty entertaining but I need to work harder to avoid the stupid mistakes that I made.
I still need to post some games from over the summer but I'm going to try and stay current in the mean time.
I have started playing at Reno Chess Club again and won my first three games. None of them went over 30 moves. Tonight I face Jerry Weikel, a Reno chess club legend and Tournament Director of the big Reno tournaments. He has been playing extremely well this tournament and I feel like this will be a very good game. I'm excited about it. Also I have been following the tournament in Bilbao, some amazing chess going on. I feel like I play much better when I've been watching high-level games. Not just looking over them but actually following them live. There was a post I started a long time ago about that topic that I never finished, I should probably work on that. Anyways.. just checking in.
At this point I was up 2-0 in the match so Fischer needed to win 2 consecutive games to stay alive. Needless to say, Fischer should have been reluctant to draw as this would eliminate him from the club championship, but I offered him a repetition and he chose to end the match this way. I was happy with the game, normally I would have played for a win but given the circumstances surrounding this game I felt that it was well worth just taking the half point.
This is the second game of the Gafni-Fischer match that was the quarterfinal round of the club championship. This was right before my trip to Las Vegas and it is not a very impressive game. I play horribly. It's interesting to note that Fischer deviates from the Najdorf he played against me in the past (here and here).
This was my first game analysis in a couple months. Bear with me, I'm just warming up. I think part of the reason I've been slow to resume posting is because after I got out of the habit of analyzing games I forgot how much I enjoyed it. Hopefully more games to follow..
I've been away from chess for a while. It probably requires some explanation. I went to Vegas for a chess tournament and left Vegas imfatuated with No Limit Holdem... I used to only play Limit Holdem, which is ok, but then my friend started turning me on to no limit a couple months before I went to Vegas. After I lost the first round of the National Open, I decided to jump in a No Limit game to pass the time til the next round. I ended up playing all weekend and then when I came back to Reno I kept playing constantly. Hours and hours. Then I went to Israel for 2 weeks. I read poker books instead of chess books and started devoting more and more time to poker. And less and less time to chess. So for the past couple months I haven't really spent any time on chess.
Also contributing to my disinterest in chess was the fact that a good friend of mine would not give me an opportunity to make up our game from when I was in Israel and I was forced to take a forfeit in the Club Championship. Although I probably could have still won the match, I lost interest and didn't devote adequate time to chess during this match. My opponent played well and I lost 2 out of the three games. He wanted it more than me.
I also think that after gaining 200 points in under a year I needed some time to consolidate my growth. This has happened to me before. Sometimes it lasts a couple months, sometimes it lasts a couple years. But I always come back hungrier and stronger.
I am deciding whether to play tonight at the Reno Chess Club, the only reason I'm leaning towards not playing is because I know I won't get a strong game. On the other hand maybe I need a game against a weaker player just to get back in the mood. I'm definitely planning to play the Western States Open. Either way, I have over 10 games that are sitting there waiting to be analyzed. I should start working on them while I watch High Stakes Poker. :)
This bluff is so sick, they both just sat down this was the first hand of their session: