Woo for medals! Nice job and don't feel a bit bad. I'm sure none of them won every game.

Brag: Played in a G/30 quad last night and beat a 2015 on the white side of a Benko, the opening I enjoy least.

Beat: Followed that up by losing to a 1731 in a rook endgame when I was up two pawns (connected passers at that) because I got careless, stopped paying attention, and moved too quickly.

Variance: Because of the loss, my rating will now decrease by 1 point instead of going up by 29. Sweet.

1 point is a small price to pay for such a fantastic lesson in focus, Tex!

Brag: I got a ton of studying time in this weekend. A ton of book work, a ton of master games, my full tactics training time every day. Plus I got to watch all the Bilbao action on Saturday.

Beat: I realized I hadn't actually played a slow game in all that time, it had been since Friday.

Variance: My "slow game" tonight was over in 30 minutes because I wasted my opponent with a classic bishop sacrifice on move 13.

Variance on the variance: The line I had in line after the bishop sacrifice was only advantageous but unclear. There was a winning line, but I hadn't seen it yet when he resigned.

1994 ICC45, No. 4 in the pool, gives me a gift blunder.

That's the second No. 4/near-2000 guy I've knocked off in the last week or so.

http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50907

do you really refuse to play 1.d4?

Yes. I mean, I'm not saying I never, ever would for the rest of my life. But it's not in my current repertoire and I have no intention of adding it.

Brag: Scored 5/7 in weekend tourney just finished, including wins against a 2150 & a 2200 . Also picked up =7th prize!
Beat: =7th Prize was $15 ($60 entry) & of course there was no under 2000 divisional prize either (divisional prozes started at under 1800)
Variance: Played the Modern three times as black scoring 1/3 ... one crushing positional win, one crushing tactical loss & one cramped grovelling loss ...

Games to be posted (most likely as videos) on my blog in the coming days (have a brief text report up at the moment) melbournegamescoach.blogspot.com

Looking forward to the videos!

Brotip for Kyle: Don't put your knights on b6 unless it's necessary. Never put your knight on b6 in a King's Indian Defence (unless it's a white knight). Play 8. ...Nc5 and after white defends the e4-pawn, go a5. For a KID player these moves should be automatic in positions like this. White has to spend a lot of time then to make b4 work (usually at least b3, only then (work out why!) a3 and Rb1). After he plays b4, you exchange and drop the knight back to a6 or d7 and he has to spend more time to prepare c5.

Good game as it was, congrats to the win.

Huh. I could have sworn Nb6 was book, but I looked it up and you are of course right.

Even if you somehow think that Nb6 is "book", you should ask yourself what the move does for you. In this position it serves only to accelerate white's queenside pawn attack. You probably wanted to develop your Bc8, but that bishop doesn't have a better square than c8 anyway at the moment, so just leave it there.

As an aspiring King's Indian player, you should acquaint yourself with the work of the dynamic school of chess that emerged in the soviet union after WW2. Look how guys like Bronstein, Geller, Boleslavsky or Tal (not sure about him tbh) handled the KID, sometimes even blowing people like Botvinnik off the board. One point is that you often don't actually have to develop the Q-side by moving the pieces. The Ra8 is already on a good square in many positions after ...a5 and also the Bc8 does a good job by constantly threatening to sac itself on h3 or g4.

Thanks for the thoughts!

Not that I doubt you are right, but my thinking was that Nc5 just invited b4 with tempo, while Nb6 puts some pressure on c4, thus encouraging the slower expansion of b3.

My d4 defensive repertoire could use a *ton* of work, I know. I'm hoping in two months the games that I play now look alien to me.

I don't have much to add, just want to second everything Noir_Desir has said, all really good stuff.

I'm not big on general rules in chess because each position is so specific, but I'm confident enough to say this one. Never play ...Nb6 (as black of course ) in the opening or early middlegame in the KID.

Also, as Noir mentioned, definitely worth trying to figure out why white has to play b3, and only then a3 and b4. That theme arises in other openings and positions and is a useful trick to know.

If you do get around to reading Zurich 1953, your KID will vastly improve, since Bronstein plays it several times himself as do many of the other players.

well c4 is defended while e4 is not, so y u no attack that pawn?

Don't worry too much about the repertoire, try to find ressources and decent master games in the systems you play and related ones. Verbal explanation of general concepts is also very important. Below master level opening inaccuracies are seldom exploited, while the lack of a game plan and putting pieces on wrong squares is.

y no? Umm ... cuz?

"Repertoire" is just me trying to sound fancy. Right now, I'm playing a King's Indian setup against everything that isn't e4. Just because it always gets me something playable-ish and I haven't had to put any thought into it.

All my work has been in e4 lately, and that's about to switch over in both books and master games, so I'm hoping for my understanding of closed games goes up dramatically.

Related brag: My tour of every Fischer white game in the chessgames.com database is complete.

Fischer was a KID player.

Even Fischer couldn't play the KID as white

Oh man, I remember why I've been playing Nb6. Because I got in the habit from playing the c5 variations rather than the e5 variations.

Yet another great example of why it's bad to play openings from memory without understanding why you are making the moves.

2/3rds of a chapter into the Queen's Gambit Declined chapter in MaCO2, already throwing in the towel (temporarily.) Going to go straight to the King's Indian Defense chapter, then come back and do the others. I promise I'll do the others! Really!

Next tour of master games decided on: Kasparov as black in the KID. Chessgames.com has 165 games, so that should be a relatively quick little tour.

For those who want the advance preview of my games from the weekend just past, I have put them on chessvideos.tv
I'm hoping to get the videos done in the next week & suspect it will probably end up being 1 game per video.
Time control was 60 minutes + 10 seconds per move (Fischer)
Round 1:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50952
Round 2:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50958
Round 3:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50955
Round 4:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50954
Round 5:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50953
Round 6:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50957
Round 7:
http://www.chessvideos.tv/chess-game...r.php?id=50956
This game is incomplete as I stopped recording in the time scramble to finish (had about 2 minutes left on my clock.

Hey no 2.f3 in the later round, maybe you've finally come to your senses I'm somewhat surprised that you didn't play h4 in the opening in the second game, why? Always thought it's an integral part of Black's strategy

I generally leave 2.f3 for the under 2000 crowd ... and yes, I got lazy with my move order in the second game & should have played h4 before worrying about my knights ... and of course when you stuff up like that against an IM, chances are you wont get a second chance!

There's nobody around, right? It's Saturday night, people have lives and stuff, right?


Okay. Good.


...

...

...

(i think i kind of like d4 games now that I understand them better)

How long until you open with the queen's pawn?

And not all of us have lives College football + chess = ideal weekend

Stay away from the dark side.

d4 is the path to the dark side. d4 leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.