The more tactics training I do and the more time I spend on a move, the more I manage to lose in more and more spectacular ways:



[Event "ICC"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2010.12.23"]
[White "JimmyJ"]
[Black "KyleMayhugh"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "1660"]
[BlackElo "1500"]
[TimeControl "2700+45"]

1. d4 d5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Bf4 g6 4. e3 Bg7 5. Bd3 O-O
6. Nbd2 Nbd7 7. h3 b6 8. O-O c5 9. c3 c4 10. Bb1 b5
11. b3 Qb6 12. bxc4 bxc4 13. e4 Qb2 14. Bc2 Qxc3 15. exd5 Nxd5
16. Bg3 Bxd4 17. Be4 e6 18. Rc1 Qa3 19. Nxd4 c3 20. Nb1 N7b6
21. Nxa3
1-0

Ugly. And that's even without spending six minutes trying to figure out a way to save the position only to space out and hang the queen.

i was listening to the radio and i heard some rap song by some female (lil kim maybe?), a line in the song goes: Bobby Fischer the flesh, taught by the greats. So on my next move, I’m yellin Check Mate
hahahaha

(slight fyp)
Yeah, Lil Kim's Black Friday (not censored version of the song, so I guess NSFW).

And if we're allowed to pick sides of this rap battle here, Nicki is soooo much better.

lmao

A+ rap

Four games this week that were within a single endgame move against being drawn or maybe even won against much higher-rated opponents.

It's a sign of progress that I'm playing guys 200-400 points above me and not getting skunked. Frustrating, gut-punching progress ...

And a few more, including one against a player 900 points above me.

If I could just master (or become competent at) rook+pawns endgames, I'd shoot up a couple hundred points overnight.

Ha, you have no idea how true this is. Those are really hard endgames. Check out my threads here from a while back about R v P and R + P v R to see how complicated the "simple" positions are.

I'm not even talking about winning them. I just want to be able to not lose these when I'm up a pawn or have a theoretically winning pawn structure advantage.

I'm working my way through the Silman endgame book and he's just starting to get heavily into rook endgames in the chapter I'm on (I think fifth, we're just past the Lucena and Philidor and into the next level of concepts). Just basic principles, not even getting into hard calculations or the really advanced stuff yet.

I'm going to start just feeding various positions like that into Fritz and playing them out every day for practice.

I played a 15 0 knockout tournament and got a 2135 standard player (I'm 1300 standard, but that's probably deflated by about 100 points by my once-a-week tilt sessions where it's 3 a.m. and I keep trying to beat the hard computers).

I got into this position as white after 30 moves, which Crafty evaluates as +1.31 at 15-ply.



Given that I had just been practicing my rook endgames with the Silman book earlier in the day and that I would have been very happy with just a draw, I was feeling pretty confident. But I was in trouble in 8 moves later and dead lost in 10.

But practice makes perfect, and I'll work on these relentlessly since they keep coming up.

Post the moves? I'm curious how you lost that so fast.

31. f3 h5

(misses the main idea, which is Rd6, but still in an advantageous position)

32. g3 g5 33. h3 g4 34. hxg4+ hxg4 35. f4 Re7
36. Rb3 d4

(throws away the advantage. Had myself convinced the rook wasn't doing anything up there and needed to come back to protect against d4, when really Rd6 kept it in a good spot *and* protected against d4 to a degree).

37. Rd3 g6 38. Kf2 Ke4 39. exd4 cxd4 40. Ke2 Rh7

(now it's getting bad)

41. Rd2 Rh2+

(And that's the dead loser. I honestly don't know what I was thinking there)

Hm, my 2c. First, you missed two very fundamental concepts in rook and pawn endgames. The first is that you should make your rook and king as active as possible. Lots of authors will happily tell you that a more active rook is frequently worth a pawn or more. Rooks tend to be the most active when behind the pawns or along a rank where they can hit a bunch of pawns (aka the 7th). If the rook is behind the enemy pawns, awesome. If it's behind your own pawns, then you should be aiming to creat a passer. You sandwiched your rook between the pawns, which was pretty much the worst place for activity. You also let his king become more active than yours, primarily by moving your pawns without a good reason. Leave the pawns alone! Secondly, you let him dictate the play. This obv takes practice, but just reacting to your opponent's threats is almost always a good way to lose in any phase of the game. Find threats of your own. Make him react to you.

Thanks for the advice! I "knew" some of those principles (trying to find that good, deep rank to penetrate was how the rook ended up on the 6th in the first place, which Silman said can be almost as good as the 7th). I just lost my nerve and started panicking trying to react to threats. "Knowing" isn't the same as having the skills to play it out on the board.

I spent a couple of hours last night loading up various pawns+rook battles into Deep Fritz and playing them out. Many, many more hours like it and I should get there

Sorry to post so many games over the weekend. But it was a three-day weekend at my parents house, and with them to watch my kid I had a ton of time to play serious games online. I'll slow down after this one

This one goes in BBV because it's a draw as black against an opponent 200+ points better than me, and I think my first ever result against a player who has a peak standard rating of over 2000. And what a shock, we have yet *another* rook and pawns ending. I think I played this one a little better.

[Event "ICC"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2010.12.26"]
[White "Villain"
[Black "KyleMayhugh"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[WhiteElo "1747"]
[BlackElo "1532"]
[ECO "C34"]
[Opening "King's knight's gambit"]
[TimeControl "2700+45"]

1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4

That's the second king's gambit I've seen this weekend. I think I went months without seeing one before this. My standard rule is that I don't study openings, just the basic ideas of all openings, so I'm definitely not responding by book.

3. Nf3 Nc6 4. d4 d5 5. exd5 Qxd5
6. c4 Qa5+ 7. Nc3 Bg4 8. Be2 Bd6

This was screaming for a long castle but I just didn't have the nerve, especially with his queenside pawns already so far forward and ready to storm.

9. c5 Be7

At this point, I notice that my queen is in really, really big trouble. Oops.


10. Bxf4 Rd8
11. Bd2 Nb4

I think I should have played Bxc5 here and salvaged two pawns for the bishop. Instead I tried desperately to provide some cover for the queen, but I can still be forced to lose material here.

12. a3 Bxf3 13. axb4 Bxe2


14. Nxe2 Qb5

Opponent makes a mistake on the capture order that saves the day.

15. Qa4 Qxa4

Then he generously declines the a-pawn and just forces an exchange of queens.

16. Rxa4 a6 17. O-O Nf6 18. Re1 O-O 19. Bc3 Nd5 20. Ng3 Nxc3

Looking back, I regret exchanging the well-placed knight for the mediocre bishop.

21. bxc3 Bh4 22. b5 axb5 23. Ra7 Bxg3 24. hxg3 Rb8

After 24. hxg3 we've reached the rook and pawns ending, which looks like this:


My goals here are to prevent the creation of a passed pawn with the c and d pawns white has, then to activate my rooks or remove his from their great spot even if it means giving back the pawn I'm up, then hope that his doubled pawns on the other side will hurt him enough to allow me the win or at least a draw.

25. Re7 Rfc8
26. c6 bxc6 27. Raxc7 Rxc7 28. Rxc7 Kf8 29. Rxc6 Ke8 30. Rc7 b4
31. cxb4 Rxb4 32. d5 Rd4 33. Rc5 Kd7 34. Ra5 Ke7 35. Kf2 Kd6
36. Ra7 Rxd5 37. Rxf7 Rg5 38. Kf3 Ke6 39. Ra7 Kf5 40. g4+ Ke5
41. Ra5+ Kf6 42. Ra6+ Ke5 43. g3 h6 44. Ra5+ Kf6 45. Ra6+ Ke5
46. Ra5+ Kf6 47. Ra6+ Ke5
1/2-1/2

I don't think there was a win there in the endgame, but there might have been.

I'm not sure 11...Bc5 is better than ...Nb4, because after Bc5 he can play Nd5 immediately, with the idea of meeting Nb4 with a3 (or with dc Rxd5 a3) or Bb4 with Bb4 with Nx and a3. After 11...Nb4 in the game, assuming you mean 13. gf is the best way for White to win material, you can still try Rxd4 axb4 Qxb4 Rxa7 (Nb5? Bh4+ wins for Black) Bh4+ Kf1 Qxc5 with excellent swindling chances. Objectively I'm sure White is winning and Qa5+ was probably a big mistake, but you can give him chances to go wrong.

Hoping for winning chances in the diagrammed rook ending is optimistic imo, his pieces are far too active. The question is whether White can win. Probably it is a draw though: 26. c6 doesn't seem to work as per the game and 26. d5 doesn't look any better: Kf8 Re2 (d6 cd cd Ke8 should be enough) Re8 Rb2 Re3 and Black is active as well, it should be a draw.

actually I think 12. a3 is a mistake for White, at least in practical terms. He should just play 0-0 with an enormous lead in development and threats against a5, b4, g4 and f7. So 11...Nb4 isn't any better after all.

Thanks so much! I've got to get it through my head that rook activity is the dominant factor in these endgames, not pawn structure or an extra pawn.

An IM was giving a 15 15 simul over at ICC. He does this quite a bit and I've played him a few times for funsies. Last night, I think he wasn't playing his best for whatever reason. He was +6-2=2 when I left, way below his normal score, and I had this game as black:


http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=39026

I ended up in a rook and pawn endgame that "should" have been drawn but lost it, though as is often the case playing higher-level players, I'm not entirely sure where it went wrong.

My thoughts:

8. ... Na6 feels pretty dubious in retrospect. I was thinking that I needed to open up some space, that the queenside was my best place to do that, and therefore I'd eventually play c5 and therefore my knight would have a nice spot on b4.

By move 10 or 12, my d-pawn is just ugly. I want to be able to play d5 safely, but pretty much every piece he has out there is pointing at that square.

After move 16, I can finally play that d5 and my position doesn't seem that bad.

The idea of 22. ... Rd3 is that I don't want to get tied down defending the d-pawn. I'd rather lose it and get my rooks to active squares like e2.

After 31. it feels drawish but with white having the winning chances. By move 38 I'm lost.

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 exd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 Be7
6. Bf4 Bd7 7. Qd2 O-O 8. O-O-O Na6 9. Kb1 c5 10. Nf5 Bxf5
11. exf5 Qc7 12. Bc4 Rad8 13. Nd5 Nxd5 14. Qxd5 Nb4 15. Qf3 Qc6
16. Qg3 d5 17. Be2 Bd6 18. Bxd6 Qxd6 19. Qxd6 Rxd6 20. c3 Nc6
21. Bf3 d4 22. Rd2 Re8 23. Rhd1 Kf8 24. Bxc6 bxc6 25. cxd4 Rxd4
26. Rxd4 cxd4 27. Rxd4 Re2 28. Rc4 Rxf2 29. Rxc6 Rxg2 30. Ra6 Rxh2
31. Rxa7 h5 32. a4 Rf2 33. Ra8+ Ke7 34. a5 Rxf5 35. a6 Ra5
36. Kc2 h4 37. b4 Ra4 38. b5 h3 39. Rh8 Ra5 40. Kc3 Rxb5
41. a7 Ra5 42. a8=Q Rxa8 43. Rxa8 g5 44. Kd4 Kf6 45. Ke4 Kg6
46. Rg8+ Kh5 47. Kf3 f5 48. Kg3 g4 49. Kf4 Kh6 50. Kxf5 Kh7
51. Rxg4 h2 52. Rh4+
1-0

two questions about the opening: 1. Why 6.-Bd7? 2. He could grab the d-pawn safely on move 12 right?

On the first question, I don't really have a great reason other than I didn't like g4 for the bishop and there didn't seem to be anywhere else to put it.

On the second, yes. I remember wondering why he didn't.

The first is actually an important point about openings imo: Is the Bishop even that much better on d7 than on c8? Usually it's best to make the obvious development moves first (in this case castling) and delay developing the pieces that can stay put for the time being

That doesn't really answer why you felt you had to move the bishop at all. If you didn't know where it was to go, then you'd have been better off waiting until it became clear and using this time to move a piece that you knew where you wanted it.

Thanks to both of you! Honestly, I didn't even consider that as one of my problem moves in the old "how did I get into a bad position" check after the game.

I just pulled off a combo that was too good not to share (chess.com, tourney game from a themed two-knights-defense tourney):

[Event "Two Knights defense - Round 1"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2010.12.21"]
[White "kng"]
[Black "BobJoeJim"]
[Result "0-1"]
[WhiteElo "1743"]
[BlackElo "1709"]
[TimeControl "1 in 3 days"]
[Termination "BobJoeJim won by resignation"]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 {Thematic Game - This is the starting position.}
5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5+ c6 7.dxc6 bxc6 8.Be2 h6 9.Nh3 Bd6 10.d3 O-O
11.Nc3 Re8 12.Ng1 e4 13.dxe4 Nxe4 14.Nxe4 Rxe4 15.Be3 Nc4 16.Bxc4 Rxc4 17.Nf3 Bf5 18.c3 Rb8 19.Qd2 Rcb4 20.b3 Qf6
21.O-O Re4 22.Rad1 Bc7 23.c4 Qg6 24.Nh4 Rxh4 25.g3 Be4 26.Qd7 Bf3 27.Qxc7 Rxh2 28.Qxb8+ Kh7 0-1

If he doesn't resign I get to sac two rooks and a bishop for the mate! (And I'm pretty sure if he doesn't fall for the forced mate after Qxc7 that I'm still in good shape)

lol @ 24. Nh4

Nice mate BobJoeJim, I like the quiet state of the mate threat as it's "forced" but he's not in check.