Insider Theory

Today on Twitter, not-quite-our-own Theo Slade had a very interesting exchange with Peter Svidler about opening theory. (@polborta is Svidler's personal twitter account.)

@theosladechess In topical lines in particular, top players independently look at the same positions in great depth, resulting in a pool 1/

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess ... of shared knowledge which has not yet been shown in practice, creating a kind of 'insider theory'. Official theory is 2/

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess ...stuff that has already been seen in published games, and is therefore openly available to everyone.

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@polborta existed. So would that mean that, eg, Black shouldn't go 9...d5 for fear of "insider theory," or is it more a case of Carlsen 2

— Theo (@theosladechess) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess That's a lot harder to say, requires levels of speculation I am not happy with, sorry. Both are possible.

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

Apologies for formatting issues, but I think that's easy enough to follow.

One can come up for many reasons for Svidler to defer further comment, too. Ultimately, anything he says could be construed as giving away information to potential competitors about what he does and doesn't know, or may or may not know. Although choosing what to believe of anything he says after that last tweet would become a poker problem, and not a chess problem, if that makes any sense. (And it may not. I am sick at the moment, and I'm not sure that my brain cells have survived the illness, or if having survived they still function with a reasonable modicum of coherence.)

More from Theo Slade

As I've said, I asked Theo Slade to write for us. It turns out he's already writing for BCM and the CFCC. That's good! I care more about decent content than I do where it gets published. I'm particularly interested in the writing about the local chess scene, as I suspect that could help generate, or at least maintain, local interest.

Theo's first article for BCM from Florida concerned his culture shock adjusting to American chess culture. His articles for BCM since then have been more about the international scene. But I'm happy to report that Theo wrote up a lengthy report about his three tournaments in July, two in Philadelphia and one here in Orlando. You can find that article here, kind of hidden on the CFCC's Games page. Recommended, especially if you're likely to play local Class A or Expert players. Consider it a scouting report!

Theo Slade's second article.

As mentioned a few posts back, Theo Slade writes for BCM, and also posts the articles on the Central Florida Chess Club website. His second article to appear at the CFCC was on the Candidates Tournament from a few months ago. Theo analyzes the magnificent round nine encounter Giri-Caruana. If you haven't seen that one yet, definitely check it out.

Articles by Theo Slade

I recently asked Theo Slade if he'd like to write for our blog. But it turns out he has been a regular contributor to British Chess Magazine for a few years now! I knew about one article he had written, but didn't know about the others. So he's already writing a fair amount.

Fortunately for us, his articles are available even if you don't subscribe to British chess periodicals. In recent months he has allowed the Central Florida Chess Club to post his articles on their website. Here's the first one, Culture Shock, which many of is at the club have already seen. This covers some of the differences between English and Florida chess cultures. (Yes, it's really US chess culture, but each of the bigger states will have their own particular culture.)

One of the big points is that in the USA we use delay time controls instead of incremental time controls. This is something I wonder about myself. Increments were first proposed to a wider audience by Bobby Fischer. (Off the top of my head I can't remember if anyone else suggested the idea earlier.) As far as I know, we're the only major chess country who prefers delay to increments, and I just don't understand it. Increments have been popular online since the days of ICS, and that got its start at Carnegie-Mellon University. So why USCF tournaments prefer delay really baffles me.

Regardless, you can read Theo's article there, as well as play through the game he annotates. I recommend it, and I will link to the other articles in coming days, or readers can find them on the CFCC website. Enjoy!

A peculiar result

Back in February, club stalwart Garry Day had an unusual result at the USATS: he played five games, at the end of which his rating was completely unchanged.

Over the last weekend, club semi-regular Theo Slade had an even more peculiar result: over eight games at the World Open, his rating was also unchanged. Perhaps this is more common because of the new rating formula they instituted a few years back?

Theo is having a busy summer, BTW. He played in the Summer Solstice Open and the Orlando Sunshine Open in back-to-back weekends at the start of June, and he's playing the World Open and the Philadelphia International Open back to back this week. If you've got the FollowChess app on your phone or tablet, you can follow his games live.

Congratulations due....

... to Theo Slade. I just noticed his results from the 8th Summer Solstice Open, held the first weekend in June in Coral Springs, Florida. I imagine he is probably disappointed in his overall result (1.5/5), but his draw against GM Sandro Pozo Vera must have been some salve on any wounds. It's always nice to take points from players rated more than 500 ELO higher than oneself!