AlphaZero skepticism

Last week the Chess world learned of a new top dog, Deepmind's AI AlphaZero. It had bested (an older version) of Stockfish by the astonishing score of 28 wins, no loses, and 72 draws in a 100 game match. Two of the games looked like instant classics.

But some doubts started emerging. I didn't read the stories too closely, but I heard a few things via Twitter. Also, when I got to the club last Saturday, Paul had been looking at some of the games and had wondered why Stockfish had embarked on a risky looking piece sacrifice right out of the opening.

Here Stockfish 8 played 13 Ncxe5 fxe5 14 Nxe5, and eventually AlphaZero's extra material prevailed. Paul had found this perplexing and eventually stopped looking at the games. When Paul and I started discussing it, I had an additional piece of information, namely that the time control for the games had been one minute per move. (It seems that 13 Qc3 or 13 Be3 are both more sound.)

Anyone that has played around with computer programs has seen that sometimes a program will look at one move for quite some time before switching to another, better move. If the program is constrained by a time limit, however, it might choose a lone that it would later toss. That seems to be what happened here.

(Lars Bo Hansen tweeted:

My initial thought was "this cannot be good for White, my engine will easily refute White's play". Then I realized that the engine I wanted to consult was the one being crushed...Can't help feeling some concern for the future of mankind.

Turns out perhaps he should have tried it, and just let the engine "cook" a little bit longer that a minute!)

As it turns out, a fair number of people have expressed skepticism about the match, including someone that knows both AI and chess, IM Jose Camacho Collados. His article can be found here, and I recommend it to anyone interested in the topic. He covers several issues, including the time limit problem and hardware issues. Best of all, he includes links to other relevant articles in his footnotes. Check it out!

About the 25^th Space Coast Open Chess Festival

An event created by chess players for chess players! 

This page last updated December 9, 2017. 

Dates: April 27-29, 2018 or April 28-29, 2018

Confirmed Titled Players:

TBD

Past Space Coast Open Champions:

2017 – GM GM Timur Gareyev

2016 – GM Andrey Stukopin, GM Julio Becerra (tie)

2015 – GM Julio Becerra

2014 – GM Mikheil Kekelidze, IM Alex Reprintsev, IM Javad Maharramzade (tie)

2013 – IM Nikolay Andrianov, GM Alex Yermolinsky (tie)

2012 – IM Javad Maharramzade

2011 – GM Julio Becerra

2010 – NM Eric Rodriguez

2009 – NM Jeffrey Haskel

2008 – IM Javad Maharramzade

2007 (Wojtkiewicz Memorial) – GM Alex Stripunsky

2006 – GM Aleks Wojtkiewicz

2005 – GM Julio Becerra

2004 – GM Aleks Wojtkiewicz

2003 – GM Aleks Wojtkiewicz

2002 – GM Aleks Wojtkiewicz

2001 – GM Sergey Kudrin

2000 – IM Virgil Grabliauskes, IM Blas Lugo, NM Marcel Martinez, GM Gennady Sagalchik (tie)

1999 – IM Rashid Ziatdinov

1998 – NM Fabio La Rota

1997 – GM Sergey Kudrin

1995 – GM Gabriel Schwartzman

1992 – NM Mikhail Braude

1991 – Bruce Koopmans

USCF Grand Prix Points: 60

Master Section FIDE Rated (USCF ratings used for pairings and prizes)

5 round Swiss System, Top section FIDE rated at G/90+30 seconds increment. All other sections but Class E/U1200 G/120 d5, Class E/U1200 G/90 d5 (2-day Rd. 1 for all sections G/60 d5).

International Palms Resort, 1300 North Atlantic Avenue. (Hwy A1A), Cocoa Beach, FL 32931. 

$$20,000 b/240 paid, $15,000 Guaranteed     

6 Sections:

1. Master/Expert (open to rated 2000 and higher) $$2000+trophy-1000-500-300, U2400 $1500+trophy-750, U2200 $1400+trophy-700-400.
2. Class A (open to 1600-1999) $$1200+trophy-600-400-200.
3. Class B (open to 1400-1799) $$1100+trophy-500-300-200.
4. Class C (open to 1200-1599) $$1000+trophy-500-300-200.
5. Class D (open to 800-1399) $$900+trophy-450-200-100, Top Senior (55+) $250+trophy.
6. Class E/U1200 (open to under 1200) $$800+trophy-400-200. U1000 $500+trophy-300.  U800 $400+trophy-200, Top Senior (55+) $250+trophy. Trophies to top Brevard County scholastic players in grades K-3, K-5, K-8, K-12.

Special Prizes.

Top Upsets Rds 1-4: Book Prize
Wojtkiewicz Brilliancy Prizes: 1^st $200, 2^nd $100, 3rd $50 (Judge: IM Javad Maharramzade)

Master/Expert Section Modified Sofia Rule: No draw offers permitted prior to move 40.

All, Fine Print:

Players in Master section are required to turn in completed scoresheets at completion of each round (Reference USCF Rule 15G). Rated players may play in eligible sections as show in above Section prize details. Unrated may play in any section but may not win over $300 prize or trophy unless place prize (1st-4th overall) in Master/Expert section.
½-point Bye available any round if requested in advance and before round 2 (limit 2).  No Smoking. No computers. Wheelchair accessible.

Players may not use or watch cellphones during play. Continental Chess Association rules and penalties will apply. Seehttp://www.chesstour.com/devices.htm.

Entry Fee:

$114 by 4/20, $20 more later or on-site. $20 discount if unrated or under age 18.

Special EF for Brevard County students in K-12 playing in any section: $25 on-line by 4/20, $5 more later or at site (counts as ¼ entry for based on prize fund).

GMs and IMs free entry available on-line until 3/31, else $120 from prize.  Free entry to past Master Section winners listed above (GM/IMs enter on-line; Other past Champions e-mail your name, playing schedule & Byes requested to jon@bocachess.com)

Re-entries $50 by round 3 (½ point Byes for missed rounds).

Indicate 2-day or 3-day when mailing entry. Entries not indicating which schedule is desired will be placed in the 2-day schedule.

Registration ends ½ hr before 1st round (ends 7 p.m. Friday or 9:30 a.m. Saturday).

Rounds:          Rd. 1 7:30 p.m. Fri (2-day: 10a.m. Sat at G/60, d5),

Rd. 2 1:15 p.m. Sat.

Rd. 3 6:30 p.m. Sat. (except for Class E/U1200 which is at 5:45 p.m.)

Rd. 4 9:30 a.m. Sunday

Rd. 5 2:30 p.m. Sunday (except for Class E/U1200 which is at 1:45 p.m.)

Hotel Rate: $109, Oceanside $129, Loft $129. Resort fee waived. Reservations: Hotel phone number 800-206-2747 or 321-392-1647. Restaurants, bar & grill, pool, beach, beach volleyball, beach rentals.  Plus many other restaurants nearby. Group code SCC18. Group rate is available for 3 days before and after the tournament. VERY IMPORTANT: Reserve early. Group rate available until April 6 or until Group rooms are sold out, whichever comes first.  The group rate is *unlikely* to be available after the cut-off date.  RESERVE EARLY. Note: our book vendor, Steve Cernobyl, would like to share a room. If interested contact him at (954) 347-2661.

Side events:

Space Coast Open Blitz (USCF rated). G/5 d0. Prizes: Cash prizes based on entries. EF $20 (enter and pay at tournament site). Blitz starts at 10:15 pm Saturday.

Worldwide Broadcast: the top 5 boards will be broadcast on Chess24. Master section results and standings will also be posted on Chess24 after each round.

Extras and more Side Events:

Free Master and GM lectures:

- Saturday: 10am: TBD
- Saturday: 11am: TBD

Books and Equipment by Hollywood Kings Chess.

Send Entries payable to: “Space Coast Chess Foundation, Inc.”, c/o Jon Haskel, 2385 NW Executive Center Dr., #100, Boca Raton, FL 33431. PLEASE: no phone or e-mail entries. Credit Card entry available via this web site only (www.spacecoastchessfoundation.org/p/events.html).  ADVANCE ON-LINE REGISTRATION ENDS April 20, LATE ON-LINE REGISTRATION ENDS 5 PM APRIL 26. Otherwise, you may enter at the site.

General Info: Jon Haskel 561-302-4377 (jon@bocachess.com)

2018 USATS

Once again we're nearing the annual United States Amateur Team Championship dates. This year the South edition will once again be held in Kissimmee, Florida. (That's basically south Orlando for those that may be reading this but don't know Central Florida. It's Walt Disney World's back yard or front porch, depending on how you want to look at it.)

Once again Jon Haskel of the Boca Raton Chess Club is organizing and directing the event. The tournament flyer can be found here, and other information can be found here. Additionally, over to the right you will see that I have added a page with some of this information, so it can always be found quickly even as this post moves down the page. That page of information can be found at this link.

Be sure to get the word out to anyone that might not here about the tournament through other means, and start putting your teams together! We're already working on ours.

BOOOOOM! MAGNUS!

A French chess livestreamer finds out he's playing Magnus Carlsen online. A Grob is assayed. Hilarity ensues.



H/t Tarjei J. Svensen

Another Boring Catalan

FIDE's World Cup Tournament kicked off today. The format is 128 players in a knockout format. Agadmator provides some video analysis of a boring Catalan from the first day. I recommend it.



You can find an interview with the player of the White pieces here.

A couple of endgames to ponder

First, a puzzle from LiChess, who take their puzzles from users games. Find the best move for White.

The answer later.

Second, another position with White to move.

Black's ...Kd7-e6 targets White's h-pawn. White clearly has to move his king now. Which way should the White king go?

A crazy game!

Chess.com tweeted a link to a crazy game one of their users, Spektrowski, had posted the other day. Here's a link to the game, with Spektrowski's analysis. I HIGHLY recommend playing through this game, as it is border-line deranged. Just hit the "PLAY" button first, and watch the madness ensue. If you want to play through it more slowly, either to follow Spektrowski's analysis or to analyze it yourself, do that after letting autoplay take you down the rabbit hole.

Analysis Time

Here's a tweet from FM Carsten Hansen.

Zivkovic-Kurajica
Teslic 2006
White to move
White played 21.Rd2 and draw agreed - White can play another move to win. #chess #schach pic.twitter.com/guPQUv610D

— Carsten Hansen (@CazHansen) August 27, 2017

The first two or three moves suggest themselves. Then it gets harder. Add your analysis in the comments, and I'll post the correct line later.

ANALYSIS can be found here.

A new book coming soon from Quality Chess

Quality Chess has just sent a new book to the presses, Playing 1.d4 d5 by Nikos Ntirlis. They have also kindly presented a 15 page excerpt to wet our appetites. The excerpt can be found here.

Mate in bunch.

If the answer doesn't make you smile, you either (a) haven't found the right answer, or (b) are dead inside.

Most statisfying chess puzzle ever.
White to move and win! 😎 pic.twitter.com/FiMnXCSYKn

— Johan Salomon (@JohanSalomon) August 23, 2017

Product Review: Internet Chess Club

The tl;dr version is: Skip this product.

Longer:

Issues that had been seemingly resolved 20 years ago are making this site unplayable now. Lag is a big problem for online gaming, and has always been so. Chess sites, back in the early days, developed time seal or time stamp programs to solve this issue. The idea is that moves are stamped with the time of sending, so that if one player is lagging, his clock shouldn't run unless he has received his opponents move, and a corresponding signal would be sent back to the server. Thus the problem was solved for ICC back in the day, or at least ameliorated.

That no longer appears to be the case. I am watching my clock either suddenly lose time when my opponent's move finally gets "delivered", or I am watching my clock run for a LONG time. This even occurs after premoves. I once saw my clock run for 45 seconds on a pre-move. One a #$%ing pre-move!

Needless to say, this is making the site unplayable. There are many other good features on the site, including instructional videos and training programs, but such things are ubiquitous these days. I just don't think it is worth the money to get such things when the actual main feature of the site is [redacted] worthless. I've contacted support, and gotten no actual help on this issue. Perhaps other sites also have this problem, but I haven't PAID other sites, either. Save your money, and don't buy it.

...

It's a real shame to watch the early chess playing sites go completely down the toilet. But they haven't kept up, and their actual coding has gotten worse with experience.

Chess is funny

Taking a break from housekeeping today, I reached the following position as Black, with the move. My question is, how would you evaluate the position?

The position arose from a French Exchange variation. I felt pretty good about my prospects here, as I was threatening to win the pawn on d4 in a few moves, and White's play felt too slow on the kingside.

After the game, I backed it up and looked at it to see where my opponent went off the rails. It turns out, it was the move 19 g4. He is now down about the equivalent of a rook! Here's the thing, and the reason I'm posting this: Black doesn't have a big knockout blow here. It's just that his play is very, very easy, and even with the sub-optimal 19...Nf4, I won when my opponent resigned on move 31 with a mate in one on the board. Black looks better, but who would think it was a crushing advantage?

Orlando Chess at the Sinquefield Cup

Yesterday I saw this tweet from @LiChess and thought, "Don't I know the person sitting next to Rex Sinquefield?"

Man of the people Rex Sinquefield can often be found in the front row of the crowd watching the live broadcast at the chess club. pic.twitter.com/Ufc6xliDG1

— Lichess (@lichess) August 5, 2017

Today I got confirmation that it was someone I know. Lars & Jen Hansen's Orlando Chess House twitter account tweeted out the following:

At #SinquefieldCup in St Louis pic.twitter.com/oewKwHn3Ie

— Orlando Chess House (@OrlandoChess) August 6, 2017

Enjoying chess with old and new friends at #SinquefieldCup in St Louis pic.twitter.com/KQvppKcJSQ

— Orlando Chess House (@OrlandoChess) August 6, 2017

The Orlando crowd hanging out at #SinquefieldCup in St Louis pic.twitter.com/BO1z8gMYDI

— Orlando Chess House (@OrlandoChess) August 6, 2017

It turns out there's quite the Orlando crowd up there!

If you're ever looking for a chess shop in Moscow, Russia...

... the ChessOK headquarters might be the place for you! Here's a blog post from Dylan Love at Chess.com about the store. I remember an early version of Chess Assistant on floppy disks being my first data base. The search speeds on CA have alway blown ChessBase out of the water, but CB has had the more popular interface.

Anyway, if you're in Moscow, look 'em up!

Tactics Time at the Sinquefield Cup

In round one of the Sinquefield Cup, Sergey Karjakin smashed Peter Svidler. In his recap for the Internet Chess Club, GM Ronen Har-Zvi spotted an incredible tactic that COULD have occurred. Here's the position, with White to move:
Take a look at see if you can work it out. I was able to spot the relevant ideas, but couldn't put them all together. I really enjoyed this combination, and hope you do as well. You can follow along with the video from the correct time here.

A King on the Rampage

Yesterday at the Club Todd Durham and I were looking at some of his games, and one game had him with a bishop and knight vs two knights.  The ending was very interesting and ended in a draw, but in the course of analyzing it we talked about the concept of king activity.

I have read multiple times (but now can't find the exact references) that the normal sequence of activating pieces in an endgame should be:

1. Queen
2. Rooks
3. King
4. Knights
5. Bishops

I am in the midst of re-reading GM Lars Bo Hansen's Foundations of Chess Strategy (absorbing ideas on the second pass that I missed in the first), and unfortunately it was not until I was in the car on the way home that I remembered the MOAKE (mother of all king endings) known around the world as Browne-Smyslov, Las Palmas Interzonal, 1982.

It prompted a little research when I got home, and I found three books with annotations to the game.  They are:

Foundations of Chess Strategy by GM Lars Bo Hansen
Vasily Smyslov: Endgame Virtuoso by GM and Former World        Champions Vasily Smyslov
The New Bogo-Indian by IM Shaun Taulbut

I suspect that I could also find it in other books, but three will suffice for us here.

The link to the game is below.  I extracted commentary from the above games, citing the author in each case, and I added some "merely mortal" comments where I thought there was an additional idea worth noting.

Before we go to the game, I would like to intentionally bias your viewpoint by recommending that the following ideas be kept in mind:

1) Economy of force is an under-appreciated commodity in chess.  We understand economy of force when applied to defense, but it is rare to see it involved in an attack.  Enjoy it when you can!
2) Prophylaxis can also be an offensive weapon, if it prevents potential defensive forces from participating in the action.
3)  Smyslov is what we "Hansenites" refer to as a Reflector, but even though he is very positional in the game, his moves have very concrete purposes.  His king moves with energy and purpose throughout the game, completely devoid of stereotyped thinking.
4) Smyslov was 63 when the game was played.  Throw your senior stereotypes out the window!

Enough blabber- here is the game!:

Click here to see Smyslov's King kick #$^5434!!

Beat Your Opponents with a Club!

Beat Your Opponents With A Club!

A chess club, that is!  

This weekend I played in the Southern Open in Orlando, sponsored by the Continental Chess Association and directed by David Hater, Krista Alton,  Harvey Lerman, and Harold Scott. 

[My last round game (the $$ game) is linked at the bottom.  The GM games in the notes are really cool, and worth seeing alone.]

The attendance was huge, and the event was an extremely well-run affair. Harold Scott gets a special "shout out" for details such as updating the results sheets in almost "real time", so it was always easy to see how rounds were progressing as games ended.

I attended the event with my fellow Clermont Chess Clubmates Todd Durham, Jim McTigue, and Connor Eickelman.  I was fortunate to score 3.5/5 in the U2100 section, which was good for the U1900 1st prize of $500- the full payout, as the tournament paid 100% due to the excellent attendance.

I have been especially fortunate in that it is my second 1st place finish in as many months (I had a stinker tournament in the middle - gotta keep it real!).  Luck is a big factor, of course, whether we admit it or not.

However, I attribute my primary success to two factors.  First, I have been a big beneficiary of the arrival of GM Lars Bo Hansen and WIM Jen Hansen to Orlando- and I am not the only one.  Attending some of his Master Class sessions, and then especially working with his books, has changed my thinking and approach to the game.  I am the same person, but I am not the same player.

Second, I am very fortunate to belong to a chess club that meets regularly, and to work with other players who share my passion for chess and learning.  The three guys mentioned above, along with Norm Meintel, Joe Sanderlin, and Garry Day, have been my constant sparring partners.

Our club is not a normal club.  For one, we are more talkative than usual.  We want to get better, and we collaborate on our work.  In fact, the Thursday before the tournament, the four of us who planned to play met on Thursday night and discussed positions from GM Chris Ward's Chess Choice Challenge, which gives positions with 5 different assessments, and you have to decide which one is correct (a concept I was introduced to by Lars, I should add).  We would look at a quiz position, we would each weigh in on it, then we would check the answer and discuss/debated it.  It was a great way to get the creative chess juices flowing, and both times we have done it, I have been successful- to the tune of $1100 in prize money in 45 days.

My point is this- working with my buds at the club makes me a better player.  We kibbitz all the time, we play into each other's openings to help each other learn, we work on endgames (read that again!) and we give each other honest feedback to help us all improve.  I also play on the internet, but it is not the same- there is no substitute for sitting across the board from someone and playing a person, not an engine, an icon, or emoji.

If you live close by, come by and see us.  If not, find a club or start one of your own.  Here's a link that might help:

Click here for the USCF list of Chess Clubs in Florida

And as I mentioned, here is my final round game from the tournament.

Leggett-Buyo 2017 Southern Open U2100 Round 5

Chess Puzzle Sites Reviewed ...

...by Johan Salomon, a young Norwegian Grand Master, on his blog. If you're looking for websites to work on puzzles, his review is an excellent place to start.

Congratulations to Martin Hansen

Local expert (and soon to be master) Martin Hansen finished tied for first in the U2200 section of the World Open in Philadelphia! The tournament ended yesterday, and Martin shared first through third with two other players. The section included 244 players, including re-entries, so I'm not going to bother figuring out what his average opposition was, and who cares anyway? Giving up only three draws over nine rounds in that field it's guaranteed he played a rough schedule! (ADDED: Hansen was the only one of the three winners to finish undefeated.)

Congratulations, Mr. Hansen!

...

If you want to see how other players did, you can find links to the standings at this link. I saw at least a couple of other familiar names in the lists, but that's a LOT of players to sort through.

Tournament Players PROTIP #10

When starting a long sequence of mutual captures, hide the first captured piece in your hand. Just do it casually. At some point, your opponent may start counting up the pawns and pieces on the side of the board, and if one of his is missing he may lose his composure and make a mistake, thinking he's doing better than he is.

UPDATED: Unadvertised upcoming events, and a couple of very widely advertised upcoming events

Well, some not widely advertised local events, at any rate.

First, next Saturday Orlando Chess & Games is running one of their scholastic/quick chess tournament combinations at UCF. Details can be found here. This event is running opposite the Chess Educators International Open Tournament, so I'm not sure (a) what kind of turn-out they'll get or (b) if they'll cancel. I'd contact Alex Zelner (407-248-0818) or Steven Vigil (chessteacher1977@yahoo.com or 321-297-7087) before heading out. UPDATE: I received an email today from Alex. It states that they need 10 players to hold the Quick tournament. So if you're planning on playing, let them know.

A couple of weeks after that, on July 8th, the Central Florida Chess Club is running a one day 4SS G/75;d5 tournament, also at UCF. Details can be found here.

Just one week later, on the weekend of July 15-16, the Jacksonville Chess Club is holding their annual North Florida Open. I'm not sure why this isn't listed on the FCA website, but it is listed on the USCF website, which is where I found it. It's a two day tournament, with very reasonable pricing: $50 Early bird pricing until 7/1@11pm; $60 7/2 to 7/14; $70 at the door. This tournament is small for a two-day event, but got a reasonably strong field of club players last year. If you've got someone you can stay with, this could be a good option.

The following week (July 21-23), of course, the big, bad Continental Chess Association rolls in to Orlando for the annual Southern Open.

That's five tournaments in a little over a month, and that's all for now.

A simple problem

Via Norway's newest grandmaster, Johan Salomon:

Very funny and instructive puzzle from @chess24com 😂😂
White to move and win! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/UsBs4p1n7T

— Johan Salomon (@JohanSalomon) June 17, 2017

I'll post the answer in the comments, if no one beats me to it.

THE LUCKY LEDGER : WINNING A TOURNAMENT WITH ENDGAME "ONLY MOVES"

Todd has recently blogged about my success at the Chess Stars Orlando Sunshine Open where I scored 4.5 out of 5 to share 1st Place in the U2000 Section.

I was lucky, of course, and I can show you "how".

Normally it's somewhat customary for a tournament winner to show a game or two as a highlight of the event.  Unfortunately, all of my games range from nondescript to boring, so there's nothing that stands out from the "complete annotated game" perspective.  For instance, in my 5 games, I really only managed a slight plus out of the opening only once.  I was black, and it was my only draw.

In the other 4 games, I was only equal at best, and in some cases I was a little worse.

My tournament result was based on the endgame, and even then is was a near thing, as there were some critical spots where the results could have been different.  Let's take a look.

Our first stop is my game against William Bowman (1883) in round 2.  I had a nice opening, but William outplayed me after I (silly me) declined his draw offer, and I had to spend another 40 moves to correct that error.  Eventually I steered the game to an opposite color bishop ending to reach the following position at move 60:

White had just played 60. h5, and I played 60. ... f6!  At the time I thought it was a good move, breaking up the white pawn formation and allowing me to set up a blockade fortress on the dark squares.

It was only later, in the quiet of my home with only my thoughts, my cat, and Sygyzy Tablebases that I learned it was the only move- everything else loses.

It doesn't end there.  After White plays h6+:

I played 61. ... Kh7- another only move, as ...Kh8 is a mate in 4 and ...Kf8 is a mate in 9.  We drew a few moves later, so the "Lucky Ledger" reads +0.5.

Our next stop is round 3, against Club and Blogmate Todd Durham (1852).  It's always a tough matchup playing your homeys, and this was made worse because it was too early in the tournament for either of us to want to consider accepting a diplomatic solution during the game ( we both wanted to win, of course!). We would have lived with a draw, naturally, but we would have both left unhappy.

After much "back and forth" play, I had emerged with an "Alekhine Fourth Phase"-type endgame advantage, leading to the following diagram at move 70, where Black had just played ...Qe8:

Black is losing, but the last move is the best practical attempt, as White only has one move that wins, which is 71. Qxe8! 

For fun, here is how my Silicon Sancho Panza shows me how close it was:

Analysis by Stockfish 8 64 POPCNT:

1. +- (8.40): 71.Qxe8 Rxe8 72.Rxb7 Rc8 73.Rb6+ Kd7 74.Rxa6 Rc4 75.Rb6 Rc3+ 76.Kf2 Ke7 77.a6 Kf6 78.Ke2 Kf5 79.Kd2 Ra3 80.b5 Ke4 81.Rxe6+ Kf5 82.b6 Kxe6 83.b7 Ra2+ 84.Kc3 Ra3+ 85.Kc2 Ra2+ 86.Kb3 Rxa6 87.b8Q Ra1 88.Qe5+ Kf7 89.Qxd5+ Kf6 90.Qe5+ Kf7 91.Kb4 Rb1+ 92.Kc3 
2. = (0.00): 71.Qxe7+ Qxe7 72.Rxe7 Kxe7 73.Kg4 Kf6 74.Kg3 Kf7 75.Kh4 Kf6 76.Kg3 
3. = (0.00): 71.Rg8 Qxf8 72.Rxf8 Rg7+ 73.Kf3 Rc7 74.Rd8+ Kc6 75.Re8 Kd7 76.Rb8 Kc6 77.Re8 
4. = (0.00): 71.Qf6 Rxg7+ 72.Qxg7 Kc6 73.Kg4 Qc8 74.Kg5 Kb5 75.Qe7 Kc4 76.Kf6 Kxd4 77.Qxe6 Qxe6+ 78.Kxe6 Kc4 79.f5 d4 80.f6 d3 81.f7 d2 82.f8Q d1Q 83.Qc8+ Kb3 84.Qxb7 Qg4+ 85.Ke5 Qg3+ 86.Ke6 Qg6+ 87.Kd7 Qf5+ 88.Kc7 Qf4+ 89.Kb6 Qd4+ 90.Kxa6 
5. = (0.00): 71.Qg8 Rxg7+ 72.Qxg7 Kc6 73.Kg4 Qc8 74.Kg5 Kb5 75.Qe7 Kc4 76.Kf6 Kxd4 77.Qxe6 Qxe6+ 78.Kxe6 Kc4 79.f5 d4 80.f6 d3 81.f7 d2 82.f8Q d1Q 83.Qc8+ Kb3 84.Qxb7 Qg4+ 85.Ke5 Qg3+ 86.Ke6 Qg6+ 87.Kd7 Qf5+ 88.Kc7 Qf4+ 89.Kb6 Qd4+ 90.Kxa6 
6. -+ (-11.35): 71.Rxe7 Qxf8 72.Rxb7 Qf5 73.Ra7 Qd3+ 74.Kg4 Kc6 75.Re7 Qg6+ 76.Kh3 Qe4 77.Kg4 Kb5 78.Rb7+ Kc4 79.b5 axb5 80.Kg5 Qf5+ 81.Kh6 Qxf4+ 82.Kh7 Qxd4 83.a6 Qe4+ 84.Kg7 d4 85.Rc7+ Kd5 86.a7 Kd6 87.Rc1 Qb7+ 88.Kh6 Qxa7 89.Rd1 Qc5 90.Ra1 Qe5 91.Ra2 
White is clearly winning

 A playable version of this mess is here:

The Lucky Ledger now shows +1.0.

Our next stop is Round 4 where my opponent was newly-minted 13 year old Zoe Zelner (1786), playing on her birthday (which I did not know until after the game).  After our knight shuffling from c4-d6 and f6-e8, we had repeated the following position with Black to move:

My record against young ladies is abysmal (I am ashamed to say that, having two daughters, but chess player motivations are complicated and I will say no more), and I would have happily drawn, but Zoe was after bigger game.  Unfortunately, she played 21. ... b6?!, after which I went to work on the weak c-pawn, eventually generating a queenside pawn majority and winning the endgame.  

It could easily have been drawn, so now The Lucky Ledger reads +1.5.

My last dodge occurred in the last round against the up-and-coming Bach Ngo (1832).  We had played a very boring and nondescript opening and middlegame to reach an interesting knight ending (I think I can say "interesting" because anyone still reading probably finds endgames interesting, and all the rest have long since gone back to watching chess opening videos...).

Bach had just played 38. Rc7 to take us to the following position:

My assessment during the game was that I could draw a rook or a knight ending, but that I could possibly win a pawn ending, but work at home shows me that even the pawn ending is drawn.

(Side note:  One way I study such endings is to remove all the pieces, and then analyze the pawn ending with my thoughts, and then the computer.  I then add and subtract pieces to the board.  It has helped me correct misconceptions I have had , and sometimes good technique can be learned.)

I played 38. ... Nf5, completely oblivious to the fact that it is the ONLY MOVE that draws!

Click here for a playable version of the analysis

Even worse (for Bach, not me), he later blundered a knight in a drawn position, which moved my Lucky Ledger to +2.5.

I don't want to overstate the idea of luck, of course.  My tournament strategy was to "volley the ball across the net" each game to play into an endgame, where I thought I could separate from the pack, and it worked.  However, there are no guarantees, and I am fully aware that a few moves played at some critical spots pushed the result.  I am even MORE fully aware that I did not have concrete, thorough analysis to back up those moves when I made them, and a few alternate conclusions on my part would have produced an alternate result. 

The bottom line?  Only a few moves separate 4.5/5 from 2.0/5, which is why we play the game!

Master Class

Today in the sixth round of the Altibox Norway Tournament in Stavanger, Levon Aronian smashed Vladimir Kramnik. I recommend playing through the game once yourself. Just give it a casual run through if you don't have a lot of energy. And then watch Peter Svidler's recap of the game. I'll embed the video here, but the video is on YouTube if you want to watch it on your TV instead.



Svidler's recap is pretty much a master class. I'm particularly struck by the section from the 6:30 to 8:24. The analysis flows quickly in the more tactical phase of the game, and I'm not going to pretend I caught all of it, especially in my current brain-dead state. But I'm going to go back to this again a couple of times this week - it's just that good. It's just over 22 minutes long, and I can't recommend it strongly enough.

Orlando Sunshine Open - Club Memeber Results

The Central Florida Chess Club held their annual Orlando Sunshine Open & Scholastic Tournament this weekend. The tournament also featured side events by ChessStars.com. The event was held at the Rosen Plaza at 9700 International Drive. Personally it was the best location I've ever played at for a chess tournament, with the possible exception of the old Fells Point Chess Club in Baltimore, Maryland, which is right next to a bar.

The purpose of this post, though, is to congratulate Paul Leggett for his fine performance of 4.5 out of 5 points in the U2000 section, which was good for a two-way tie for first. William Bowman held him to a draw, but he mowed throw the rest of the competition, including a grueling 92 move marathon against me.

As for my performance, and that of Connor, perhaps the best way to sum up the results would be with a cartoon dog in a funny hat.

"The last soldier."

The last soldier. pic.twitter.com/PL1Krq7Kp5

— Mohamed Al-Medaihki (@almodiahki) June 6, 2017

Someone responding to this claims it's from Kotov's Play Like a Grandmaster, but that's not one of the three Kotov books I own, so I can't verify it.  Anyway, it's quite clever!

Tournament Players PROTIP #9

I may have posted this one before, but it bears repeating:

NEVER RESIGN.

Never. No matter what. More importantly still, resolve to never resign. Recently I won a game against a master after having chucked two pawns in the opening, leaving my king stuck in the center with my queen-side mostly undeveloped. However, I kept plodding along, and eventually even won the game. Yes, it was a junky quick-chess game, but I have won similar games at Game in 120 against A-players and below.

There are several reasons to not consider resigning. The first is that you can't win by resigning. It's a stupid, obvious, even trite saying, but it's true. Make your opponent prove they can win. Often they will relax after achieving a winning, or even won game, and will start playing non-optimal moves. And in slower games, especially, they will become annoyed, which usually isn't conducive to optimal chess. You are within your rights to do so, and may as well exercise them.

The second reason is that if you don't resign, you won't make a mistake by resigning an equal or favorable position. A few months ago I drew against another master. At some point, though, he played an unexpected move, and I thought I was losing my queen. I very briefly considered resigning, and then remembered my own advice. Looking at it again, I realized I wasn't losing my queen at all. The game continued and after a tough struggle, I scored the half-point. Perhaps I had been helped by the knowledge that a few months before that game, a 1900 had resigned against me because he thought his queen was trapped, even though it wasn't. Oops. Perhaps he wouldn't have seen the saving sequence anyway, but he "took me at my word" when he shouldn't have.

And finally, if you decide before a game to not resign, it saves energy. Resigning is a decision, just like any other move, and it requires energy. If you begin to consider resigning, it becomes a drain on finite reserves of energy available for the game/tournament. Thus deciding to not resign beforehand can save you energy in the heat of battle, especially time pressure. Even contemplating resigning in time pressure is a shameful waste. This is especially true as you get older and have less energy to spare.

All that said, I do resign sometimes. But it has to be really bad, and my opponent has to clearly be strong enough and have enough time of their own that I can't imagine them stalemating me by accident. But generally, I play every game out to mate. And as I've said before, you should expect your opponents to do the same, so don't get aggravated when they do so. It's their right to play on, as it is yours.

Finally, here's an example from the club last Saturday of fighting on beyond all hope, and then getting rewarded for it.

Black to move

White had been completely busted for some time, but played on, hoping for a miracle. White stated that he hoped for Black to march his king up the board and somehow walk into a knight fork, so the spite checks began. Instead, Black,with more than ten minutes left on the clock, played ...Ke6, and White instantly played Re7#. White's dance of joy was most undignified, but quite understandable.

King & Pawn Endgames: Answer Time

The other day I presented this position and asked a couple of questions.

St. Amant - Staunton, Paris 1843 (m11)

After 43 Kc3-c2

What is the proper assessment of the position? How many acceptable plans does Black have?

The answers are that Black has a won position, and he has exactly ONE winning move. In fact, all moves other than 43...Kxd4 lose. Staunton chose to play 43...Ke4 and duly lost. I can only assume he originally intended to follow-up with 44... Kf3 and then promote his e-pawn. However, that plan does not work because of St. Amant's move, 44 Kd1, and now the White king will blockade the Black e-pawn, whilst Black has to run down White's d- and g- pawns, allowing White to easily win Black's queenside pawns. I don't know anything about the particulars of this game other than that Staunton was leading the match by the score of 8+, 1-, 1= prior to this game. Perhaps Mr. Staunton merely had a lapse.

But the winning line isn't 100% straightforward, either. Black still has to worry himself about that pesky g-pawn. How can he catch it and not let White clean up all of Black's pawns? The answer is that he can't. But that he doesn't have to, because White can be deflected from his own queenside pawns by the Black e-pawn, and that plus the unfortunate (for White) geometry between c4, e2 and g8, gives Black a winning position.

After 43...Kxd4 White's best is 44 Kd1 (If 44 g4, then Ke4, and Black will be able to round up the g-pawn and return in time to guard the e-pawn, and if Black tries breaking through on the queenside, Black's e-pawn queens far too quickly for White to get his pawns up the board):

 After 44 Kd1

44      ...     Kd3

45     g4      e2+

46    Ke1    Kc2!

 After 46 ... Kc2!

47    g5          

(47 Kxe2 transposes to the main line)

47      ...     Kxb2

48      g6     c3     

49      g7     c2     

         50      g8(Q)      c1(Q)+

51     Kxe2  Qc4+

After 51 Qc4+

And there's an unfortunate triangle for White. Another interesting fact is that all but one of Black's moves from 43 to 50 are only moves - anything other than the move given above loses. The one exception is that Black can play 44...c3 and still draw. These endings are precise!

...

On a programming note, I hope to return to semi-regular blogging, at the very least. Soon we will have final news on the on-going Club Championship, and there may even be a game or two worth noting.

Making a living from chess?

Forbes has a new article about the prospects of making a living from chess. Tl;dr* version is that things are better than they used to be, but it's still tough. The article is interesting enough, but also familiar enough to chess veterans.

However, the article also has an interesting comment from Susan Polgar, which I give in full:

I completely disagree with the notion that making a good living in chess is hard. It is not.

Making a living from tournament winnings is hard. But making a living in chess in general is not. I have seen many amateurs, with ratings well below 2000, earn much more money than some top 10-20 players in the world.

The problem is professional players know chess. But they lack knowledge in business, management, marketing, and most importantly, people’s skill as well as communication skill. Some are just lazy to learn new skills to enhance their earning ability in chess.

There are plenty of people making a very good living in chess in California (both northern and southern Cal), New York, New Jersey, Illinois, Texas, Arizona, Oregon, Washington State, Maryland, Missouri, and many more states.

Of course, I'd like more data from the Forbes article, and I'd also like more information on who is making a living from chess from GM Polgar, although I can understand if she wouldn't want to name names.

Still, I thought I would put this up for anyone that missed it. There's also a video at the site, with several of the people who were interviewed for the article commenting. So if you haven't seen enough Ben Finegold lately, here's your chance!

* tl;dr is internet parlance from those crazy kids for "too long; didn't read".

King & Pawn Endgames

Below is a position from the eleventh game of the 1843 match between Pierre Charles Fournier de Saint-Amant and Howard Staunton.

St. Amant - Staunton, Paris 1843 (m11)

After 43 Kc3-c2

What is the proper assessment of the position? How many acceptable plans does Black have?

I'm not going to give the answers just yet. This is largely because I don't quite feel like typing it all up, but if I don't post something, I'm not going to get back to writing! But this is also a chance for the reader to work out the problem for himself - practice makes perfect, after all. So, have at it, reader, and enjoy!

King Bishop & Knight versus King

This ending came up again today, in the Women's World Championship. Harika almost blew this ending against Tan in the Semi-finals. Fortunately, she won it with four moves to spare.

Recently, this endgame had come up both online on Twitter and at the club, and the ending ALMOST came up during USATS last week for one of our players.

Personally, I know this ending, and think most players over 1600 can learn it easily. I practice it the week before tournaments until I can bang out the moves instantly. I use the old 'W' method, and find that sufficient. You can find that one in any endgame manual, but perhaps I'll try to find a good YouTube video later. However, in a discussion on Twitter, one @FoptimusSublime suggested the Three Triangles method as being easier. Here's the link to the YouTube video he provided:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWZ7h2yrJME

Having watched it, I don't find the method any easier than the traditional method, but it's really a matter of taste. Use whichever method you find easiest to understand, BUT LEARN THIS ENDING! It's not really that hard, and it could keep you from blowing a hard won half-point.

Averbakh's Barrier or When an Extra Bishop Ain't What it Used to Be

Grandmaster Karsten Mueller of Germany is one of the world's premier endgame experts.  In addition to writing several outstanding tomes on the endgame, he also regularly hosts chess endgame videos on Chessbase.com.

One of his recent videos covers the concept he calls Averbakh's Barrier.  I have included a pair of small chessbase game examples to quickly demonstrate the concept.

Click here to see the concept in pure form

This idea has clear practical application, especially for players such as yours truly, who often find themselves a piece down and in desperate need of yet another swindle!

Of Course, one has to be on the lookout for such possibilities, which is where quality endgame study (coupled with an open mind and a devious nature) can come in handy.  

The alternative is to simply lose, which is where GM Mueller comes in, offering an example of a loss that did not need to be:

Click here to learn from someone else's mistake!

One of the advantages of studying endgames is that such ideas and concepts have application beyond the specific situation- these methods lead to a better understanding of the relationship among the pieces, king, and pawns, thus enhancing our overall understanding of the game.

For those who would like to play through GM Mueller's original video to see what you have been missing, click below (and speak well of our friends at Chessbase for making such things available for free!)

GM Mueller's original Chessbase video on the concept!

No Country for Old Men

GO players have been sent reeling in the last year. First came the AlphaGo program publicly beating one of the best GO players in the world early in the year. At the end of the year, that same program, temporarily disguised, tore through the rest of the GO community, winning 60 of 61 games online against all comers, including the best in the world. (The other game was drawn because of an internet connection failure.) Quote:

“Master” also claimed victories against a number of top Go pros including South Korea’s Park Jung-hwan and Japan’s Iyama Yuta, as well as beating China’s Ke Jie, who is currently ranked world number one, twice.

“When facing it, all traditional tactics are wrong,” commented Ke Jie after his defeat. Ke Jie had stated in December that he is currently not good enough to defeat AlphaGo.

GO had resisted the efforts of programmers for a very long time, unlike Chess, in which the programmers saw incremental improvement until they had surpassed human players. So we've had a long time to get used to this. But GO players are in shock, as AlphaGo seemed to come from nowhere to not only equal them, but surpass them by such a margin as to play at what appears to be a God-like level.

However, [GO master] Gu [Li] struck a different tone on Weibo (a Chinese microblogging site like Twitter), saying, “AlphaGo has completely subverted the control and judgment of us GO players. I can’t help but ask, one day many years later, when you find your previous awareness, cognition and choices are all wrong, will you keep going along the wrong path or reject yourself?” This uncertainty was echoed by GO master Ke Jie [ranked #1 in GO], who said, “After humanity spent thousands of years improving our tactics, computers tell us that humans are completely wrong. I would go as far as to say not a single human has touched the edge of the truth of GO.” [emphasis added = ed.]

Chess players haven't quite had the same reaction to being surpassed, but then Steinitz only started pulling back the curtain from the deeper truths of the game less than 150 years ago. That and our ever constant search for novelties and cooks probably saved us from such a deep crisis of faith.

Certainty is a shaky foundation upon which to build the edifice of one's self.

HT: Alice Maz, whose tweet alerted me to this.

A new rating system

The Grand Chess Tour has instituted a new rating system, which they call the Universal Rating System (tm). This rating combines all ratings (standard, rapid, blitz) into one rating. Their website explains the idea behind what they're doing and provides some evidence to show that their rating system is more accurate than the current Elo system in use by FIDE.

The people that actually did the work are Mr. Maxime Rischard, Dr. J. Isaac Miller, Dr. Mark Glickman, and Jeff Sonas. I don't recognize Rischard or Miller offhand, but Jeff Sonas and Mark Glickman are familiar names. Sonas did interesting work in the past on establishing good historical ratings, and Glickman created the Glicko rating systems, versions of which are in use by FICS (RIP), Chess.com, LiChess, and the USCF. The new system has a fine pedigree, and is funded by the Grand Chess Tour, the Kasparov Chess Foundation, and the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis.

One good thing is that they've adjusted the ratings so that they resemble the old ratings in terms of scale. Magnus is at 2852, so the scale and magnitude are familiar - at least they haven't created something that looks like the ECF monstrosity!

The new rating list does have some oddities worth remarking upon, however. First of all, Carlsen's lead has been extended over his rivals. Games at faster time controls are included in the URS, though given less weight, and Carlsen has been consistently dominant across all three domains. Caruana slips from a close second in the FIDE standard list to a distant fourth, as he's not comparatively that good at faster time controls. Kramnik and Nakamura are tied for second, and Nepomniachtchi rounds out the top five. You can see their January list here.

In any event, Jeff Sonas has written a (not at all brief) summation of what they've done and why. Check it out, if that's your thing. Personally I will say that the work looks good on the face of it, but I'm not sure the old system really needed that much improvement! One thing the old Elo system had going for it was that one could easily calculate one's ratings after an event, and the basic method was clear cut. Now? No so much. Here's an example:

Rather than inventing a specific formula that can be used to calculate ratings directly, like there is for the Elo system and for performance ratings, we have developed a probability model that analyzes a large domain of possible ratings for each player, with some ratings being more likely than others (based upon the overall population distribution of chess strength). Across those possible ratings, our system then determines how likely the actual results would have been to occur, and ultimately determines the most likely overall set of ratings, for all players at once, in order to best explain the actual results.*

Still, this is work upon which Sinquefield (and others) wish to hang their hats, and he who pays the singer calls the tune. I also suspect that this may be part of a plan by Sinquefield, Pein, Kasparov and others to wrest ratings from FIDE's grasp in an attempt to weaken that organization, and perhaps start something new in its place. It's been tried before, though, and failed, so I wouldn't count on this replacing FIDE's ratings in most people's minds any time soon.

* Incidentally, such a system really would not have been practical in the 1950s when Arpad Elo's system went into first use. Such wonders as the URS are possible because computing power has made both the sorting and calculating tasks needed for such a system relatively easily doable.