Pacific Coast Open

I'm back from the USA and suffering from jet-lag. However, there's a million things to do after being away for 3 weeks and on top of that I am going back to work on Friday, for the first time after 10 months of sabbatical! I'm so glad that BT gave me this opportunity to take the sabbatical as I think I had the best 10 months ever despite some low points at some chess tournaments.

My Pacific Coast Open tournament ended fairly well as I got 3.5 points out of 6 (including a half-point bye) drawing last two games against stronger opponents. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to win one of those games with an extra pawn! And I ended up half a point behind a large rating prize. I don't know why in the USA they have very large rating prizes - it was larger than a second place prize! Nevertheless, I'm happy to add another 9 rating points to my FIDE rating despite a slow start to the tournament. My partner IM Simon Ansell did very well by getting a share of the second prize. You can see the final standings here: http://www.chesstour.com/pco10r.htm I didn't have any exciting games to show although I haven't had a chance to analyse them in detail and may yet find something worth showing at a deeper level. I bought a new laptop in the USA so I hope my Rybka will now run even better and faster! J 

New FIDE ratings have come out at the beginning of July and I'm back to over 2000 mark at 2062. ECF ratings have come out as well and I am now rated 178 - a bit higher than a year ago but lower than I believe my current strength is. Unfortunately, ECF ratings are published only once a year and can be a bit misleading for an improving player. British Championship has started on Monday and will keep me entertained for the next 2 weeks. The top seed GM Mickey Adams is the favourite to win the title. Unfortunately, there are only 3 women participating (I decided against playing because of going back to work) so I hope ECF would do something to encourage more women to play in the British.

I haven't got any firm plans for my next chess tournament but I am considering playing my next tournament at the Berks & Bucks congress during the August Bank Holiday weekend. It's a 6-round FIDE-rated tournament. I'll just have to see how tired I'll get being back at work and if I need my weekends to recover rather than play chess! I am also hoping to play in the 9-round FIDE open at Cap D'Agde in the South of France in October.

A Small Step Forward

It's one month exactly before my sabbatical starts. I'm counting the days as you can see :)

It's been quiet on my blog as I played in the FIDE-rated Berks & Bucks congress over the bank holiday weekend. It was held in Twyford and I didn't think it would be too far to travel from London, but I ended up spending 4 hours on travelling each day for three days on a row. Probably not a wise idea as I also had to play two games of up to 5 hours each day! So I won't be doing that in the future and stay in B&B instead.

Here is me playing in the first round against Liam Varnam. We both ended up in a mad time scramble in a tactically complicated position where I lost in what looked like a better position for me.

Despite all the travelling, I managed to perform a little above my rating at 2055 and gained 3 rating points. Much better than in Kavala, so I'm making some progress. My ECF performance was 177, which is also above my current rating. Apart from losing in the first round I drew all the other five games. I wasn't trying to draw, it just so happened! The good thing is that before zeitnot I was probably losing in only one game out of six (need to analyse to confirm), but I didn't convert my advantage in some other games. So basic learning points for me: don't get short of time and learn to convert the advantage! It's not as simple as it sounds though...

The interesting fact is that by move 12 in the last round I had exactly the same Slav position as Simon Ansell in his round 3 Kavala game that he published here: http://www.gingergm.com/2009/08/05/bishops-part-one/#more-1040 But unlike Simon, I was on the black side of it. I remembered Simon's advice to put black's rook on 12...Re8 and keep my queen on d8-h4 diagonal to avoid getting mated like his opponent, so I easily equalised and drew the game. It was quite handy, as I was rather exhausted by then!

As you probably know, FIDE has just moved to bi-monthly publishing of ratings. On the September rating list and for the first time ever I've dropped below 2000 at 1981 because of my earlier poor performance in Kavala. That sort of hurts my pride - another reason to work hard at chess and get better!