I'd be happy for someone stronger than I to weigh in on that question, to be honest. As White I'd try to prevent it, but as Black I probably wouldn't play it. I'm not sure the pawns are that easy to attack and Black may miss that bishop...

The main goal is just to open a way to attack g6 for the bishop -- Black's kingside pawns are hard for him to defend (he can't use his bishop, and his king is far away). With your pawn on e4, your bishop is also pretty limited in scope, and it's likely that things get completely locked up for the draw.

And that pawn's not free -- if 29.e5 Bxe5 is probably a mistake as after 30.Kf2, Black can't stop you from winning the g6 and h5 pawns. I think that Black plays 29...Bg3 instead, to trade off all of the kingside pawns, but now 30.Bxh5 or 30.Kf4 both look like candidates, but that's too tough for me to figure out without moving the pieces around. But only White can win that.

It's nice to post a link to a replayer, too...

3...Be6 seems weird, blocking in the B@f8. But I can't see a way to punish is that much...5.e4 but c6 seems OK. Hmm. I'll have to look that up. But 7.e4 works; e5 and d5 both threats.

10.Ng5 just hangs the knight, but luckily he didn't play 11.Nxe6, so you were able to get it the second time.

14...Qf5 is not great; better to get some more pieces into the attack, maybe e5 or h5.

I like that you played 15...Be4 instead of trading bishops -- lots of people tend to trade pieces too much when they're ahead instead of playing for mate. (But still, get more pieces into the attack!)

17.Qh5 was a little too fancy and he punished you for it.

22.Nc2 is a move to be proud of...a true swindle. Actually, 21...Nxd4 is no good because of 22.Qxa7--that knight's the only thing keeping your king safe. In the game, White can just play 23.Qxb7+ instead of dropping the queen!

Good game though.

Oh, just realized I'm spamming the BBV thread with analysis. Oops.

Brag: Outplayed some master for 30 moves.
Beat: Still lost when I blundered in time pressure.
Variance: None. I'm making a bad habit of this...

Well, in general it's a good idea to keep your pawns intact but here the bishop pair is probably more important. Having the king over to potentially protect the doubled pawns is just a good thing in this case since there is no real danger of an attack on the king. I would have played 9.Bf4.
29.e5 just makes sure the B has access to g6 before Black gets to blockade it out.

Black actually played the middlegame quite well before ruining it with 26.-Rf2? and 27.-Rh2?, the rook was very nicely placed on f4. He could start by improving the K a little with Kc7, then consider his options re: penetrating the queenside with the king.

Brag: My USCF rating is up to a new personal best of 1938 after the tournament earlier this evening. Went 3/4 with wins over a 1473, 1810, and 2150. The loss came at the hands of a 2610 GM so I don't feel too terrible

Variance: The 2150 is an 11 year old boy that had a score of 5-0 against me before tonight.

Beat: Sadly thrilled to finally be on the scoreboard against an 11 year old

Nice result!

Great job, Tex! The short break did you some good.

Thank y'all, much appreciated Yep, a short break every once in a while to clear the mind really works. It's like your brain needs some time to sort things out.

Tex, congrats. Keep up the good work!

Fwiw, age doesn't matter (that much) in chess.

But why did you wuss out and play the under 2700 section rather than the open section?

It's not too often that I actually laugh out loud at the internet. gg sir.

wrong thread, nm

I can't wait to play a live event, bink it, get interviewed and asked who my favorite poker player is!



TexAg I also had a good laugh

Beat: Awful play by me tonight at the chess club. 0/2 including blundering while up a piece against an NM and then just playing like garbage against a 1900. Not really worried about the loss of rating points, because those quickly come and go, but I'm frustrated at myself for playing so poorly tonight. Horrendous.

man I just won on time on a 5/0 game where my oponent has 30 seconds left and I had 3. Im the GOAT premover, this year I have 13 wins on time and only 3 losses.

I made an expert check sacrifice at the end to win it.

I lose too many won positions by just doing stupid stuff

brag: My U1800 team won their division in the T4545 tournament (t51)

I was board 6 though and only played 4 regular season games - I was almost called up for a playoff game but the higher ranked boards took precedence

still two more free months of ICC aint nothing to snarl at

rb

Congrats whiskeytown!

Beat: My computer froze and disconnected me right as I was reaching for the resign button in a lost position, so now I look like one of those "you beat me so I'll just ragequit and force you to wait for adjudication" jerkoffs.

fyp

You can always resign the stored game...

Took me way too long to determine what you fixed.

make fixes Bold in the future.

nh tho

White to move and win (this is from a 3-minute blitz game on FICS)