Rust, removed

Well, I finally got off my butt and played a competitive game. Tournament, actually.

I played in the Daily Standard (G/20) on ICC yesterday. I came into the game the lowest rated player out of 30 and scored 1.5/4. Not too bad, if I do say so myself, particularly since I had black three times. I finished off with a rating in the mid-1300s.

I can already see where the tactics training is helping. Both my non-losses involved pinning the opposing queen in non-obvious ways. In my draw, I subsequently couldn't figure out a convoluted attack with my queen alone on his back rank, ended up surviving a counter-attack and forced a draw by repetition with 13 seconds left on my clock.

I'm noticing my thought patterns slowly moving towards what Heisman recommends in A Guide to Chess Improvement. Though, I'm still not doing the full scan for checks/captures/threats like I should be. At least I'm sporadically doing the “what are all the things his move does” exercise.

How I played was having a tournament set in front of me, and I duplicated what was going on with the set. Yes, this slowed me down a bit (and I was consistently using more time than my opponents), but I do think it helped a lot. I don't see the game as well on the computer as in person.

Thank goodness my DGT electronic chess board is on the way. Oh, didn't I mention that? I'm getting one for Father's Day, and I had the money early from a couple large boardgame and book sales, so I went and placed the order. It hasn't left Germany yet, but I'll be watching its progress like a kid watches the calendar near Christmas.

BTW, I recommend Doska Chess if you want to order a board. After shipping, it was well over 10% lower than anywhere else I could find before shipping.

As I would really rather play the game over a real board, the ability to link the DGT up to ICC is perfect. I get to play any time I can on a real board. Now, to just make the time for slower games – I hate blitz chess. G/15 is as fast as I want to go.

Getting the rust off felt good. Getting a win felt even better. I only really botched one of the games (3rd round), and fought a 1700+ rated player to a long loss that Fritz felt was within a pawn of even for most of the game.

What I found most interesting was, as Black, neither opponent who led 1.e4 followed the standard Scandinavian line beyond the 2nd move. Neither player played the “obvious” 3.Nc3 designed to chase the queen away. I'll certainly have to pay attention to the early deviation lines.

My first tournament is just over a week away. I'm going to try getting in two or three more ICC games before then, to be sure. Last month, the Portland Chess Club had 26 players in their monthly G/60 tournament, with an average 1544 rating, and 11 players under 1400. So, there's certainly opportunity there to score a win or two.

So, lots of practice between now and then. Oh, and the kids have their second tournament tomorrow night. I have a hunch Megan might just get her first win.