Posted by Steve on the 15th of May, 2008 at
6:32 am under Chess. This post has no comments.
I was getting rid of some junk yesterday, and I was about to toss an old score book that I’ve had since I first started playing tournament chess in high school. But I decided first to look up some of the names of my opponents, and that’s when I made an interesting discovery.
In the fourth round of the 1979 Atlanta Scholastic Congress, I was defeated by unrated player named Stuart Rachels. My rating at the time was 930 (provisional, based on 6 rated games). I was 14, and Stuart was 9.
Well, Stuart went on to become a somewhat better chess player than I ever did. About two years after this game was played, Stuart set the record for becoming the youngest National Master in U.S. history. Later he became an International Master, and he was the 1989-1990 U.S. co-champion. He retired from chess in 1993 and is now Professor of Philosophy at the University of Alabama.
Posted by Steve on the 11th of May, 2008 at
8:49 pm under Chess. This post has no comments.
I have a three-game winning streak in the Team 45 45 T37 tournament.
Posted by Steve on the 10th of May, 2008 at
11:05 pm under Chess. This post has no comments.
My previous post had a number of variations that explored possible continuations following the last move of the game. ChessBase 9 unfortunately makes it pretty difficult to do this. For my future reference, and to possibly help others, here is Mig Greengard’s workaround:
At the last move, press T and enter any random move as a new variation. Then promote that move to be the main line. That makes the real last move of the game a variation. Now with the last move of the new (spurious) main line selected, press T and enter the real last move again. Now you will have the real last move twice as variations. Promote one of them to be the main line, delete the spurious variation and there you have it.
From Mig’s November 2004 “ChessBase Cafe” column at chesscafe.com
Posted by Steve on the 8th of May, 2008 at
5:58 am under Chess. This post has no comments.
I was back at my club Tuesday for the first time in a while, and I had a nice upset win.
In particular, I was pleased with my 15th move (as White). I was worried that my kingside pressure was draining away, and that the initiative might turn in Black’s direction. My solution was a square-clearing pawn sac. That’s not the sort of thing I can usually find during the game!
Posted by Steve on the 28th of April, 2008 at
7:30 pm under Chess. This post has one comment.
Two Russian Igors (IMs Foygel and Khmelnitsky), have both advised me against changing my opening repertoire, which has remained basically unchanged for several years. They both felt that changing my openings would be counterproductive, because as an adult with a “real life,” I have relatively little time for chess study and play.
But with the Team 45 45 League’s T37 tournament starting up this week, I found myself with no enthusiasm for reviewing any of my standard opening choices.
After some reflection, I decided that I’m ultimately in this hobby to have fun. And, therefore, deciding to try some new openings because I’m bored or frustrated with what I’ve been playing requires no further justification.
So there! 
Of course, in my Round 1 game (I was Black) my opponent opened with 1.f4, so neither my old nor my new prepared lines were much help. But I came out of the opening OK and was heading toward an approximately equal endgame when my opponent blundered it away.
