Lucky tournament win
It can be seen here with fairly lengthy annotations. This was my game in the U1300 division of T45/45. He was good, and the previous day I had a crazy game against a 1700, and I wasn't that motivated. Thank goodness he did something to really piss me off right before the game started, so I was very motivated to win.
Don't worry, I'll be posting losses soon. And I should have lost this one. I overlooked a tactic he used to cripple my position, but then he made a few bad moves that gave me a killer King attack.
Don't worry, I'll be posting losses soon. And I should have lost this one. I overlooked a tactic he used to cripple my position, but then he made a few bad moves that gave me a killer King attack.
posted by Blue Devil Knight at 10/22/2007 09:53:00 PM
12 Comments:
There are some that would say it's better to forgive and forget, but it is apparent you don't heed this maxim. What pray tell, did the knave do to offend thee? Details please, as many as possible.
Tempo will be pleased with your use of the reverse grand prix.
We both had our vars set to noescape, so one of us had to change it so the other could invite. He was sort of a dick "You need to change it." I was like OK, "How do I do that again?" And he goes to the T45 channel and says "Can someone help BDK, he doesn't know how to change his variables." So instead of asking how he could change it (either one of us could have done it), he goes and asks it about me like I'm a shithead. I was pissed, and it helped me in the game. He was OK after the game. Not someone I took away a good feeling about overall though. Sort of a tosser.
Good game, and great danish gambit game previously posted. I was very curious when I stumbled on your blog a few weeks ago, as I too have been using CTB to try and hammer home tactical principles. I initially started with CT-ART, but got bogged down in the mid 40s. I am on my fifth cycle (or should I say circle) through CTB, and am definitely getting better at it. Due to very limited time, I have taken over one year to go through it four and a half times, so I solve the problems by figuring them out, not by remembering what the best move was from last time through. I must say that there are a few problems that really seem to have more than one answer (esp in the endgame set at the end of stage five). Also, if all of these problems are for "beginners" (again , esp the endgame stage five problems) then let me be the first to admit that I will always be a beginner! It is frustrating to do fairly well on the middlegame tactical positions and fail to find the correct 17 move long king and pawn endgame sequence. How did you deal with these issues?
I just joined ICC after playing on Yahoo and getting frustrated by the prevalence of blitz only players. Maybe I will see you there.
Slithytove: thanks for the note, and glad to hear you left Yahoo. That place sucks for chess.
Those K/P endgames are tough. For each of such problems in which I had any uncertainty, I fired up Fritz and analyzed it. About half of them had false negative errors, i.e., perfectly reasonable alternative moves that it counted as wrong. For those I simply learned what the program thought was correct. I'll post the errata list soon. I think there were more than thirty errors in the fifth stage (and that's the only stage in which I started maintaining the list!).
As I've discussed a lot (FOVEA method on my blog and lots of subsequent posts, most recent discussion is here), the method you use to study individual problems is very important, and should probably be shaped by your goals. MDLM didn't talk much about this.
If the goal is to work on calculation skills, then the stare-for-ten-minutes method is best (though why not just play slow games: that's like a straight hour of calculation). This was MDLM's original reason for taking ten minutes on each problem in the first circle.
If the goal is to understand the solution thoroughly, to remember how to play in the same situation, it is much more efficient to take less time staring, more time actively thinking about the solution using something like FOVEA. By the end I didn't care how I learned the solutions, I just wanted to learn them.
Is my memory now somehow tainted because I didn't go through fifteen circles of staring first? My hunch is my understanding of the positions, and my memory of the positions, is actually much better, as I no longer had the problem of remembering the position but not what to do! After all, we are trying to learn what to do in the position, not to just recognize the position. To know the solution 'by hand' is to move the mouse so fast you haven't even had time to think about the solution. I reached this point much faster using FOVEA.
At first I wanted everything: work on calculation, recall, etc.. By the end I just wanted to be done. Now I'm glad I did the last set of circles the way I did. It started as a lazy attempt to be done quicker, but now I think it is also a better method given my goals.
I like your use of the fovea. Unfortunately, sometimes I feel more like the optic disk (the blind spot on the globe where the optic nerve inserts) than the fovea. I completely agree that training should be shaped by goals. I just want to have fun playing chess, and get away from those forehead smacking moments that turn what should be a challenging strategic struggle into a self flagellating exercise in humility. It would be nice to be a good enough player to implement a plan early in the game, and actually have later moves in the game reflect that plan. Or even (as Capablanca said we should all do) see the influence of the chosen opening on the end game. Fat chance!
I am glad to get away from Yahoo too, though there are some tricky devil-players there who taught me a thing or two.
Slithytove: I hear ya! I smack my forehead regularly. Yeah, there are some great players at yahoo, but at least as many yokels who disconnect and such.
Have you considered starting a blog to record your trials and tribulations?
game notes appear objective (this is most critical of all. objectivity after the game ==> objectivity during future games!). you have progressed to the point where "positional blunders" are the main weakness of your game rather than tactical blunders. (a big step!) As you note, Nd3 & Bf8 were lemons. both remove an active piece from the field of play, and both lose a pawn. (Black cannot hold a pawn at d3, and Bf8 refuses a free pawn.) i believe it was Temposlacker who said, You are not correctly prioritizing the values of the position. Bishop pair is NOT worth a pawn in this position. Trading knight for bishop on d3 is NOT worth losing a centralized knight and getting an anemic pawn on d3.
but you are on your way, obviously. do not be surprised if you see a big jump in the next few months.
Many thanks Katar for the useful comments! When the game was over I was like, hey way, my biggest blunder was mostly positional in nature. Sweet.
Oops I didn't notice that Tempo and Loomis had left comments there. I responded...
Yes, I've thought of blogging, but decided against it due to time constraints (wife, kids, work). I have certainly enjoyed reading the efforts of others, and appreciate the time it has taken you and other knights to share your experiences.
Oops - I failed to post under my slithytove handle. Another reason I don't blog: lack of computer expertise.
If the goal is to work on calculation skills, then the stare-for-ten-minutes method is best (though why not just play slow games: that's like a straight hour of calculation).
When you play, a lot of the time it is your opponent to move. Sometimes they take quite a while to figure out what you've already calculated.
It may also be more efficient to practice calculation on positions that experts have deemed to be good to practice on. On the other hand, nothing comes closer to what you'll see in your games than your own games!
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