TCCL 2014 - Final

The 2014 season of the TCCL is finished, and the Rochester teams managed to finish solidly (more or less) in the middle of the pack in all three divisions.

This is confirmation of the Rochester Chess Club's attempt to field teams that are competitive in all three divisions.

Our gold team did have some nervous moments in the last round. We needed to do better than the Twin Knights to secure our place in the Gold, but their opponents first board did not show, and the Twin Knights got a 4-0 sweep by forfeit. We were able to manage a 4-0 sweep by games.

Overall, I am satisfied with my performance this year. I think I improved in how I prepared for an opponent, but I think my overall chess strength has not increased as much as prior years. I am hoping the annotation of games I am doing for "Following Kaufman" will help me progress.

Minnesota Open 2014

Bartholomew won the 2014 Minnesota Open with a perfect score, with Nagle, Tang, and Amarashinge in a 3 way tie for second.

Amarashinge re-entered after losing his first round game to our local protege Leker-Locker. His re-entry gave me my first loss. I was white in a line of the KID that I have not looked at much. I deviated from my preparation on move 8. I had a good idea on move 13, but did not follow up precisely.

Saturday was a miserable day for me with two more losses after the first. In the latter games, I had an advantage and messed up both times. Good learning experiences, I hope. I did not have a good night's sleep Friday and did not eat much on Saturday. I think both were contributors to the latter two losses.

I easily won both games Sunday, after a good nights sleep, breakfast, and lunch.

I need to spend some attention to playing "easier" (Soltis "What It Takes To Be A Chess Master"), so long days do not wear me out so much.

Rochester Chess Club tournament January 2014

The club this year is running a grand prix style for determination who will play in the club championship next fall. The first of these tournaments finished this last Tuesday, and I managed to squeak out a win against another class A player. The time control was G/60+30 increment. This was a little fast for me, and I had trouble in all 4 games, but managed to win many in the endgame to get 3.5 points out of 4.

St Paul Winter Open 2014

The tournament had a good turnout despite the weather. I did well with 2.5 out of 4 (I withdrew before the last round, so I could drive home in the daylight through the blizzard)

There are important lessons for me in 3 of the games, including two Catalan's that I did not get enough out of the opening, one of which I held on to draw FM Wasiluk. My second round game was a bit of a blow out, as he missed a critical move. In the third round, I messed up tactics against P. Amarasinghe in a wild KID (much like our first game years ago), but was unable to swindle him this time. My last game was the second Catalan, and though he equalized, I was able to get to an endgame where only I had winning chances, and he made several errors.

Both Catalan's were not "mainline" and illustrated the problem with memorization of opening lines.

There was a wild card thrown into the tournament. After round 4, Charles Wynn, a class A player who had not played in the last two years, was the leader having beaten Wasiluk and Chakrasali, while the other masters had draws. Iwu beat him in the last round to win the tournament. He is one to watch.

TCCL 2014 round 5

I played Zach Adams, again, and lost, again. The rest of the team did well, but the match turned on my game. We need to get at least a whole point out of the next two matches to stay in the Gold.

It was not a good night for Rochester, as the other teams lost, also.

I had a good idea that did not work tactically. I missed a pin that spoiled the combination. The combination was to open up the center while his king was stuck there.

I misjudged the team situation, and I should have played more solidly.

TCCL 2014 round 4

My team won :D

The opposing team was all mid range experts. We had the advantage on the top two boards and they had the advantage on the bottom two. Two wins on the top boards and one draw on the lower makes for a team win. So far my team is struggling this year at 1.5 out of 4. I think we need 1.5 points out of the next three matches to secure our place in the Gold for next year.

I lost :(

I had played Connor Quinn with the same colors in the Noel Skelton tournament in Sept 2013. I used my new opening memorization process to prepare lines in the Saemisch KID. Quinn shifted from the Saemisch and played the classical KID. Perhaps, because at the Noel Skelton I was able to equalize to a drawish position, and only lost to a tactical miscalculation. (The blunder I made in that game would have given me a slight edge if the tactical justification had been sound. The tactical error was due to poor visualization.)

My loss here pointed out a weakness in my understanding of the KID, and my impatience with the development of the Bc8. I need a deeper understanding of: the offs between maintaining a pawn on e5 versus opening up the long diagonal, what is the proper way to utilize a hole on d4, and denying white the use of d5 versus having a weak d6 pawn.

It is becoming more likely I will get pushed down to the 'B' team next year. Not because I am not doing poorly (I am still plateaued at high class A strength), but because there will be stronger players in Rochester. We recently had a walk in into the club that is a very strong player, and one of our scholastic players is improving very rapidly. We have several other strong class players that are not participating in the TCCL that might make a jump in strength, also.

OTOH, the 'B' team won and  is doing very well in the Silver division and match up well against their coming opponents. They might get into the Gold division next year.

The 'C' team won and is doing well in the bronze.

Next round is in three weeks. I will be white, and have no idea what my opponent would play against my normal opening plans.

TCCL 2014, round 3

Our first non loss was a drawn match, 2-2. I managed to squeak a win in a worse position, because my opponent ran out of time. This will be a very important game for me to analyze.

I need to spend more time with KID positions with exchanges of black e-pawn for white d-pawn. I know I have have issues with dxe5, but also with ...exd4, both of which are common in the mainline variations I play. I am becoming more familiar with the problems black has to overcome, and I need to pay more attention to how to mitigate those and cause problems for white. Fortunately, there are usually a good number of games in my periodic extractions from the TWIC database.