A Fun Game 10/08

I hope this helps Josh!

Back to What's Important

So I am feeling pretty happy. Today I played 6 games of chess, I lost 2. Now normally this would have angered me, however I was not shaken. I planned to lose a couple games in the process of getting back up to where I used to be. I fell far and hit the ground hard, and now I start the long, but exhilarating climb back up.
So my first 4 games today were against an old friend, whom has never proven to be any challenge. The first game lasted about 67 moves and then I made a crucial mistake and lost. Like I have stated before, it was not such a bad thing to lose. First of all losing keeps strong players humble and trust me, I sometimes I have a problem staying humble in the face of my success. Second a loss only serves to teach a player to do better, not that they have no ability. If a decent chess player can accept and understand that losing is going to happen a lot, then they have already jumped half the distance to becoming a great player.
My next 2 games were at home against my brother, who used to be a very difficult opponent when we were much younger. He beat me on the back rank after about 30 moves and I accepted the defeat and played again. The next game lasted even fewer moves and I won a staggering 14 point lead on him before checkmate. Needless to say, that win was what made me aware of the fact that I was starting to remember my skills.
I have recently done a little redecorating in my bedroom. I have put up all of my trophies, much to the dismay of my parents who wish me to leave them hidden in my closet so I do not get too arrogant. I use these trophies as a reminder of my potential and what I can accomplish.
Now I know I am not the strongest chess player, but that is what goals are for. I plan to work hard and come back stronger next year in tournaments and skittles.

NPHS Disctrict Tournament

I have been invited to compete in the district tournament against the top players from other school. I have been asked to select the best players from TOHS and invite them to attend with me.
Unfortunately I have only asked 1 player who has agreed to compete. Alan, the guy in charge, has asked me not to invite certain players who he has deemed unacceptable, not because of their abilities, but because of who they are.
It should be a fun event, there is a main tournament section that lasts about 2 hours and then in between and following there will are bug house games and an open discussion.
Myself and one member from the TOHS club will be representing the school. I did bring up the tournament at a team and club meeting once, but no one was interested so I personally asked the best in the club to come with me.
This tournament is also just a get together for the Conejo Youth Chess Commission which I am one of three chairpersons of. We will use the time after competition to discuss plans for each club in the district and decide how best to make each club better and determine whether or not the clubs are maintaining the standards we have set.
In February I will be hosting a tournament at TOHS for top players from each school, it will be catered and possibly USCF rated. The tournaments put on by TOHS are always looked forward to by club members as they are usually very enjoyable, but so are the ones form other schools.
The tournament will feature the best of all three schools. So far the TOHS team is

1. Dakota Jones
2. Darwin Wu
3. Kai Henry

Those are the top players from TOHS and they deserve to play the tournament. I would invite other players as alternates, but the tournament is reserved for the elite at each school and will only be open to players who present an invitation.
That is about it, so yea I will post on the NPHS tourney after it's over, I am really looking forward to it since Alan always makes tournaments a lot of fun.

Chess in Hoag's 1

Well when I don't have to go to Editors meetings for journalism or the regular chess club meetings, I go to room E-3. The teacher there is Mr. Tim Hoag my 10H chemistry teacher last year, he likes chess so he keeps some of his own boards in the room for me and my friends to use. He doesn't play chess, but he likes to watch and ask questions.
Well anyway today I noticed something that kinda stuck out to a couple other people too. There is a player in chess club who, when winning, can be a little rude, he will keep telling his opponent to move, and move quickly. Of course when he is losing a game he gets very funny and starts laughing at himself and makes jokes and then eventually resigns, he rarely finishes a game he thinks he is going to lose, but w/e I mean that is his choice so I don't care either way.
This just shows how a player has a very hardened personality when winning and then turns it around when he is losing. I mean everyone does it, when we win something we are happy and on top of the world, but when we lose we become withdrawn and try to shake it off with humor and soon enough we do get over it because most of know that we can come back and when we play again we do even better.
Personally when I lose a game it is not that big of a deal, I mean I know I play good chess and losing mean very little, I find my mistakes and correct them so I come back stronger the next time. Losing is actually one of the best things that can happen to a chess player, losing teaches us that to play well and lose is better then playing badly and getting destroyed. Every now and again a strong player will make a mistake and lose the game, it happened to Fischer, Anand, Kasparov, Laker, and even Capablanca. Besides the winner is only the person who made the next to last mistake.
In theory, both players are bad, and they play well badly. If they both played perfectly it would always be a draw.

St. Louis Chess Club

Well I am in St. Louis right now for a JEA/NSPA convention for high school journalists. It is a lot of fun, some cool things are happening and you really get to learn about people when they are not at home and forced to act a certain way, I have blacklisted 5 people so far, lol jk. Anyway, Today was the last day of competition and workshops and after everyone was done with their classes, our chaperone's wanted to take us to the museum. Now before we had left to Missouri I had arranged with my advisor so that I would be able to go the the St. Louis Chess Club, they will be holding the 2009 National Championships there in May.
So I was the only one who wanted to go to the chess club and none of the adults were able to go with me so they told me I was to take a cab to the club and just call them when I was back at the hotel. So I did and the cab drivers were cool.
I finally arrived at the chess club and was impressed so much my what I saw. The club was absolutely amazing. There were three floors, the main floor was the casual playing room with beautiful wood chess boards valued at $200 each. The basement had been converted into a chess library, there were tons of books on shelves, some as old as Emanuel Lasker, lol. I spent about an hour downstairs reading through the books and looking around the tournament room where some of the most brilliant minds have played chess.
The third floor was the executive chess level and they let me go upstairs to see it. The boards upstairs are the triple weighted plastic pieces on vinyl boards, but the layout was still stunning. There were flat panel televisions lining the walls. The televisions were playing out famous games from top players and I spent some time watching them and I learned a lot.
I got a chance to play two games and only those two games in the 4 hours I was there. I played the same gentleman twice. Our first game was about an hour and half long. It was classical Sicilian and I played it out correctly, only when he strayed from the opening principals I was thrown a little and then I quickly regained tempo and made it work. During the middle game I exercised the power of my knight and the game took a sharp turn and I was suddenly ahead. My back rank was strong and my pieces were not over worked so I had good defense and a stronger offense. In the end it came down to me having a king, knight, and two pawns and he had a king, rook and pawn. He made a devastating error and I was able to fork his king and rook and eventually trade off my knight with one of his pawns making it a King and pawn endgame which I would have won. He resigned and we shook hands and decided to play again.
Our next game lasted all of 20-25 moves. I was playing black this time and he opened with 1. d4 the queen's pawn. I was not used to playing against a queen's pawn opening, though I knew how to react. I played a Nimzo-Indian and was up a knight within the first few moves (reminded me of my first game against that james goff person, lol another good game I have played) he realized his pieces were over worked and I had exploited that so he decided to start pushing pawns and I reacted by moving my kings knight up the board. I put him in the position in which he had to sacrifice his queen or be checkmated, he did not see the checkmate and moved his queen, and I checkmated him on the back rank after he had castled. The diagram on the left is roughly what the board looked like though that is the correct checkmate position. There were more pieces on the board, though I omit them because they are irrelevant to the point of the story.
The game was a lot of fun and win or lose, just being able to play in one of the nicest chess clubs in the country is an experience of its own. After each game we shook hands and complimented each other on the games we played and pointed out the strong moves we each played and where we made weak moves. Overall it was an amazing day.
Some other new things, I have recently begun to get a tad bored of the Chess Club at my school. I play chess and answer questions, but it is always so boring being surrounded by people who dismiss chess as a game only. It is still a great place to play chess, I just have fun playing, though it dismays me that the other players don't take it as seriously, however I know they have fun and I am not there to judge them.
I am tired of the current tournament we are paying in chess club, I knew i was going to play the same opponent in the finals win or lose so I figured I might as well lose, Jack has bee trying to get me to enjoy the game, more then just play competitively constantly. and lost to my opponent who then got out his laptop, which was to say, a bit chunky like old school, lol and played some game or something.
Anyway that is my stuff for today, I should be back and posting more often since everything is a lot easier then I expected it to be. So yea that's all.

Chess Classes Starting Up

Well Both the Chinese School Chess Classes and the Borchard Chess Classes are starting on the same day. So I will be very busy teaching both, luckily I will have the time to do it. However this will mean, spending way less time on the computer and absolutely all of my extra time doing home work. I think the classes will be great, the Borchard class only has 5 students, but the Chinese School Class has around 33 students, luckily I will have some back up, Tim Hughes, and Ivan, a man I have yet to meet will be helping me on and off so we all don't have to be at the classes every time.

I look forward to working with them and teaching chess, however I think I may be taking on too much, I am a Junior and it is great to do a lot to look good, for college, but I know my academics are very important and I need to concentrate on them as well. However college is not the main reason I do all these things, I love to teach and to teach something I love.

So I may not write on this blog for a while. If you are a reader and would like to know how thing's turn out, please email me at chess4evr@gmail.com to ask questions, please do not spam me. Well I guess I will be signing off for a while, I am sorry, but all the little things have to be cut out in order for me to succeed this year.

Woodpusher

Yesterday, 9-9-08, a sophomore at my High School started talking smack about my chess ability, he was spreading rumors that I was all talk and no skill, so I found him and challenged him to a game the next day at lunch at the chess club meeting.

Oh, btw I use the term woodpusher not to insult, but to emphasize the point of this post, it really does not mean he is a bad player just not as knowledgeable as some other players in the club.

So he showed up and we waited until the club President was finished with the weekly informational, and then we sat down at my board (which one of my students so generously set up for me). It was a G/30 or for those of you who do not know the lingo, the game lasted 30 minutes on each clock.

He had brought with him a few of his friends and they stood back behind him while he played and then the rest of chess club stood behind me, the room was almost dead silent as we played. So we begun, I opened with a classic Sicilian, and set up my defense. Within 5 moves I was up a knight. His morale was shaken, but he played on. Then he traded bishops but when I took back with my pawn I was attacking his knight and he left it there, so I looked at the board and saw nothing good he could do if I took it so then I was up another knight.

The game went back and forth, we traded queens and I won his rooks. Eventually I got him down to a King, and I had a queen, a rook, 4 pawns, and a bishop. Of course at this point checkmating him was a simple task. Here is what the position looked like:


The worst part of the whole thing was that after I won he said "I was tired and wasn't paying attention". I really hate these excuses, players lose because they played badly, if they played well they would have won there is no in between or excuses.

The best part of all was that he tried to outline his mistakes and the following dialogue occurred:

Woodpusher- My first mistake was hanging my knight and letting him take it for free.
ME- Your first mistake was calling me arrogant, that upset me and I let it out on the board.

He calls me arrogant, but anyone who was ever good at something was a little arrogant. They have the right to be after all of our time dedicated to learning the game and especially if we are good at the game. Whatever though.

Well I don't really care, he is of little concern to me. I usually just play him and walk away, I could care less if he won or lost, that just gives me more room to improve. He does have bad sportsmanship and that just ticks me off so whatever, he is inconsequential to my chess playing anyway.