Look, Ma, A Tactic!

It’s a Wacky Wednesday, indeed, when your humble blogger pulls off a combined discovered-attack-fork-pin

When we learn about chess, we learn about tactics, don’t we kids? Those great maneuvers like forks, pins, skewers, and discovered attacks that not only win material but are jolly-good fun to spring on our opponents.

The trouble is, those of us at the subterranean levels of chess skill seldom get to use those tactics, because our “board vision” is poor, and we can’t see the tactical patterns in our games. That’s certainly one of my biggest problems.

By some miracle, however, I saw one good tactic in this five-minute blitz game, which I won on time. It came to me like a bolt from the blue, possibly through the grace of Caissa.

Not that it was great game; it wasn’t. Getting pawn-forked with 11. e5 was unfortunate, to be sure. And of course I should have played 8. … Nxc4, instead of castling. Duh.

But forget about all of that. Look at 13. … Nxe3!!! Okay, maybe two exclamation points would have sufficed. But look what happens. White can’t castle out of this pickle because the knight attacks both castling paths. Is there any way to save White’s queen? (Killjoys: Bring it on.) 14. Nf3 doesn’t help. 14. … Nxf7+ forks the White king and rook and unleashes a discovered attack on the queen. The queen can’t capture the forking knight because she’s pinned to the king by the rook. She can’t capture the rook because the king is in check from the knight. It’s a double attack, the king must move, and the queen is lost. Rooks are exchanged, and although the Black knight is later lost a White bishop is captured in the course of that sequence as Black exchanges down to an endgame where White is just about out of pieces. (And yes, yes, yes, I know: she would have been even further bereft of pieces had I played 23. … Rxe1, leading to mate in two. You think I don’t see that, Liquid Egg Product? I mean c’mon.)

Sometimes chess is fun even for those of us who aren’t very good at it.

Oppenheimer Bombs vs. Einstein

Though Albert Einstein and J. Robert Oppenheimer played this game back in 1933, somehow I wasn’t notified about it until Susan Polgar posted it on her blog last week. The members of the Castle Kimbark staff who were responsible for this oversight have been sacked.

The father of the atom bomb was clearly outclassed here, though Einstein seems to have known his way around the Ruy Lopez pretty well.

Game history downloaded from ChessGames.com.

Wacky Enough?

I wondered if this game was wacky enough for Wacky Wednesday, but at least it has the virtue of being short, and when one is on a self-imposed deadline one relaxes one's standards.

Black ran out of time here, but according to the Crafty chess engine, even with time on the clock, White wins with 19. . . . Rxe1+ (probably the only move that can prevent 20. Qxh7#) 20. Rxe1 Qxf2 21. Kxf2 Rd8 22. Qxh7+ Kf8 23. Qxf7#.

P.S. For more Wednesday wackiness, don't miss That 70s Show at Polly's blog.

Missed It By That Much

Finally, as long promised, I give you a Wacky Wednesday game in which I am on the losing side. This one is a classic example of the WW genre, if it be understood as a game that ends suddenly and catastrophically because of a single bonheaded blunder that would be unforgivable in a rank beginner. Never mind the fact that I am a rank beginner and will be for life.

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 Bc5 4.Nd3 Bb6 5.e5 Ne4 6.f3 Bf2+ 7.Nxf2 Nxf2 8.Kxf2

The game started out simply enough. Petroff’s Defense. Black attacks the weak f2 square but not very effectively. White king captures bishop and exchanges the ability to castle to go up a piece. A small sacrifice with better-than-ample compensation, I think. Then:

8. … Qh4+

Not a particularly threatening move, really. 9. g3 shoos the Black queen away and maybe even gains a tempo for White, though I’ll leave it to you real chess players to decide that. The game not only remains playable for White, but he may even have the advantage.

Ah, but alas, that move was not to be. When in the throes of a major brain cramp, extreme time pressure, or whatever affliction it is that can explain the next move, one falls back on the most elementary, formulaic, and generic chess wisdom. One hesitates to alter one’s pawn wall and longs instead to swaddle the sovereign within its warm-and-comfy confines. Hence the worst possible move in this position:

9. Kg1

As with our previous game on the Fried Liver Attack, sometimes all of those things you learned about where to put the king don’t apply. Sometimes to place him behind a phalanx of pawns is to entomb him there:

9. … Qd4# 0-1

No ecstacy here; only agony.

Don’t Be a Quitter

Do as I say, kids, not as I do. I admit that I have resigned many a chess game sooner than I should have because I couldn’t (or simply didn’t want to) face the humiliation and discomfort of playing out a losing position. But that doesn’t mean you should. Every generation wants the next one to have it better than it did, and that’s what I want for you. So for this week’s Wacky Wednesday game, I’ve selected a mercifully short object lesson in why you shouldn’t quit a game until it is truly lost.

Here’s the game.

Black resigns after 11. Bxc3+.

Notice that with 9. Rd1 I contrive to set up a simple discovered check, which my worthy opponent obligingly walks right into. He (or she) takes my knight, and in recapturing with my bishop I also put the king in check with the rook.

Black then resigns. Why? Well, I can only imagine she (or he) thinks she’s about to lose a piece. She has to get out of check, and if she moves her king White captures the bishop on the next move (12. fxg4) and Black is down in material. Some people find the loss of a piece dispiriting and resign.

But it doesn’t have to be. Black can get out of check and pull his (or her) bishop to safety with the same move: 11. ... Bd7. He probably didn’t see this move.

Here’s one possible continuation, courtesy of the Crafty chess engine: 12. Bc4 Ke7 13. Bxf7 Be6 14. Bxe6 Kxe6 15. 0-0 Rad8 16. Kf2 Rhf8 17. Kg3. White probably has a bit of an advantage, but the game is far from lost for Black.

Moral of the story: if you’re in a spot, especially some kind of double attack, look for a move that will deal with both threats. You won’t always find one, but sometimes you will.

Don’t forget to check in with Polly for more Wacky Wednesday action.

Wacky Wednesday: Philidor Kerfuffle

Wacky Wednesday always rolls around sooner than expected, and with it comes pressure to find a suitably goofy game for the occasion. This week I didn’t have time to root around in my database, so I went online and played some two-minute bullet games in the hope of getting something fresh. It’s a high-percentage strategy for producing weird games, since as likely as not I will blunder idiotically and lose quickly under such absurd time controls, or, with any luck, some hapless opponent will do so first.

Mirabile dictu, this time it was the latter.

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 Bg4 4.dxe5 Bxf3 5.Qxf3 f6 6.exd6 Qxd6 7.Qd3
Not the best move, I’m sure, though it’s a developing move for me if we exchange queens (8. Qxd3 Bxd3), and if Black doesn’t take the bait we stare down each other with delicious “tension” in the position.

7. . . . Qc5 8.Be3 Qe5 9.Nc3 Nc6 10.Nd5 O-O-O 11.O-O-O Nb4 12.Qd4 Qe6
This person really doesn’t want to exchange queens. What brilliant tactical maneuver does he have in mind for his?

13.Qxa7 Qe5 14.Bb5
I can’t honestly claim that this move was part of my ultimate mating attack. Here I just wanted to develop the bishop and unite the rooks.

14. . . . Qxb2+
I don’t know much about chess, but this doesn’t strike me as very good move. Did Black think his queen was protected here? I’ve made that mistake.

15.Kxb2 Nxd5 16.Qa8# 1-0

Fried Liver on Toast

I’ll keep this short. Maybe if I hurry I can get my Wacky Wednesday post up before Polly, who, like many an active chess player, seems to be luxuriating in the warm afterglow of last weekend’s amateur tournaments.

I like playing the Fried Liver Attack as White whenever my opponent obliges. Here is the critical position in the opening (which is arrived at in part because Black played 5. … Nxd5 rather than 5. … Na5, which computers and those who know about chess say is better.) Black to move, of course, since she’s in check.

The best move in this position is Ke6, which protects the knight on d5. (Of course, by bringing the king farther out toward the center it also leads to a sharp, highly tactical, and dangerous game, which is what makes the Fried Liver Attack so much fun.) There may be other playable moves, but the one that is instantly disastrous for Black is the one my opponent played in the game below.

Yes, 7. ... Kg8??? spells doom. Don’t let it happen to you.

Don't Get Smart!

Eat your peas, control the center, develop your pieces, and don’t get too fancy

It’s Wacky Wednesday, kids, the day that by common agreement has been set aside for chess bloggers to come clean and publish their quickest and most humiliating losses. Because I’ve demonstrated my willingness to do this in the past and promise to do so again in the future, I hope my colleagues will forgive me for bending the rules a bit today and showcasing not one of my own horrendous losses, but that of a worthy opponent I played in an online blitz game early this morning.

I think I can justify the transgression based on the instructiveness of the game itself and its value as an object lesson in what not to do.

As you can see from the classification above, Black’s defense is called the Grob—the macho variation to be specific. It involves opening with flank pawns, flouting most chess wisdom. As I understand it this is a tack taken frequently by chess hustlers who know how to use the approach to catch novices unawares. Among the many virtues of Paul Hoffman’s excellent King’s Gambit is a thorough review of the Grob and its history.

The thing is, this is unsound chess and should not be attempted by players who don’t know what they’re doing, as my opponent clearly did not. Among other faults, he or she did not develop his or her pieces, and this led to an early checkmate because his or her king was trapped. Don’t let it happen to you—whether you be a she or a he. Open with your center pawns, develop your pieces rapidly, and if you want to play an offbeat opening, try to make sure you know what you’re doing.

End of lecture. Now go have fun, and as Bruce Pandolfini says, be brilliant.

And as Chessdad64 says, Kumbaya.

Game viewer: ChessVideos.tv

Blunder and Win

Patzer vs. Patzer

Kids, take note: Just because you make mistakes, it doesn’t mean you lose. I made plenty of blunders and weak moves in this online blitz game (like not playing 11. Bxb7 - ?), but my opponent made more of them.



To err is human, so whenever you’re playing one you can expect some errors. When you make one yourself, just take a deep breath, move on, and wait for your adversary to make the next one. (Oh, yes, and don’t make any more of them yourself.)

Comments on the game welcome, though please don’t be too unkind.

Sevan at the Reti

I suppose I should issue a bad-pun alert before posting a headline like that, but be that as it may, here’s an interesting game from Sunday’s simul at the Illinois Chess Association banquet. IM Angelo Young played all diners, taking the Black pieces in every game, and in this one he and Sevan Muradian agreed to a draw after move 33. To the best of my knowledge it was the only draw of the afternoon; Angelo beat everyone else. Comments or annotations, anyone?

Sevan during Sunday’s game

Chess viewer by ChessVideos.tv

Searching for Jonathan Poe

In the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer, you may recall, the main character, Josh Waitzkin, has a rival for the national chess championship: a brooding, solitary kid named Jonathan Poe. Jonathan is so single-minded about chess that he doesn’t even go to school; he spends all his time playing and studying the game under the grinding tutelage of a glib and supercilious coach, a Svengali for whom Jonathan is less a human being than a lump of clay to be molded and shaped into a champion whose triumph, the coach apparently believes, will redound to his own good fortune as much as to Jonathan’s.

It’s a disturbing image, but it’s not a Hollywood fabrication: there really was such a kid in Josh’s life. His real name was Jeff Sarwer. In the book on which the movie was based Josh’s father Fred Waitzkin had this to say about Jeff:

“Little Jeff studied and played chess from morning until night. He was
insatiable about the game, happy when he was moving pieces and restless when
there was no opponent to crush. ‘Kill, kill, kill,’ he sometimes said with
an impish grin as he launched his attacks.”

Apart from the fact that the coach was actually Jeff’s father, “an undiagnosed manic depressive,” the story of Jonathan/Jeff as told in the movie is mostly true. Jeff and his sister Julia, who was also a chess prodigy, had a bizarre childhood, and thanks to the eagle eye of Michael Goeller at the Kenilworthian, we now know about their Web site, which describes their lives today and their efforts to recover.

There was at least one other fact on which the film diverged from reality. Josh didn’t actually win that big game at the end of the movie; it ended in a draw. Here it is:

The best way to see the game, though, is here, with Michael Goeller’s annotations. Batgirl adds some intriguing information about Jeff’s recent comeback over at Chess.com.

Chess on the Boulevard

For the second time this summer The Chicago Reader has published a substantial article on the local chess scene. First it was Ted Cox’s excellent piece on the North Avenue Chess Pavilion, and now, in this week’s issue, Gus Garcia-Roberts trains his spotlight on Cecil Locke, proprietor of the portable “Touch & Go” chess tables on Michigan Avenue.

You may have seen Mr. Locke and his rickety tables at the corner of Monroe and Michigan, though not lately because, as the article reports, the City Council “clamped down” on street performers in that area last winter. Mr. Locke and his chess tables have been exiled to the southeast corner of Michigan and Jackson, where they can be found today. Fortunately, he says, business is good in the new location.

As one who has played on Mr. Locke’s boards many times, I think what he has done is simply ingenious. It’s hard to get people to go out of their way for chess, but bring it to them—set it up anywhere there’s a crowd—and you’ll always find a few who will step up and play strangers. It never fails. Mr. Locke's enterprise trades brilliantly on that recently coined aphorism, “Chess is like ginger ale. No one thinks about bringing it, but people love it when someone remembers it.” (Hat tip: Boylston)

You’ll find players of all strengths at Touch and Go. Here’s an exciting game in which an unknown opponent played Life Master Len Weber to a draw with the Queen’s Gambit Accepted:



“Good old fashioned street chess,” Len called it. “The game is flawed, gritty, like Chicago itself.” The game was originally published in the Illinois Chess Bulletin. To get the newsletter, with many other annotated games by local masters as well as chess news from Chicago and around the state, join the Illinois Chess Association.

Chess viewer by ChessVideos.tv

Now He Tells Me

Michael Goeller is a chess blogger par excellence; it’s hard to think of anyone who plies the craft with more finesse and sophistication. While the rest of us fill our columns with the usual fluff— gossip, cross tables, the odd grip-and-grin photo, and our failures to scale Mt. De la Maza,—Michael’s blog the Kenilworthian is full of real chess, analyses and annotations of important games, openings, variations, novelties and so on. I picture him laboring for hours and even days over pithy posts like “Urusov Analysis - 3...Nxe4 4.dxe5 Qh4,” and “Refuting 5...Nxe4 in the Scotch Four Knights.”

Michael’s latest contribution to high-end content aggregation is a collection of sources and links on the Traxler/Wilkes Barre counter attack, some of which he gets from Dennis Monokroussos.

It’s great stuff; I only wish he’d published it before FM Aleksandar Stamnov sprang the Traxler on me in this game at the North Avenue Chess Pavilion earlier in the summer:



Yes, I know: serves me right for playing the Fried Liver Attack against a master. Notice that every move White (moi) made beginning with 7. Ke2 was not only wrong but probably the worst one possible in each position. Anyone can blunder, even Kramnik, but to do so repeatedly and spectacularly takes a special gift, you must admit.

Thanks, Professor Goeller. I will attend to the lesson promptly.

Vicary is Brilliant

Best game in women’s championship wins prize

You don’t hear the word “brilliancy” in everyday usage, but in chess the word has a popular and specific meaning, referring to a game that is, well . . . brilliant. International Master Jeremy Silman defines brilliancy as “A game that contains a very deep strategic concept, a beautiful combination or an original plan.” Grandmaster Yasser Seirawan has published an entire book of brilliancies, plural.

And sometimes, when you play a brilliancy, your achievement is duly recognized, as it was for Woman FIDE Master Elizabeth Vicary, a competitor in the recently concluded U.S. Women’s Championship in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Elizabeth didn’t win the tournament—Irina Krush did that—but thanks to a special prize from the Web site Goddesschess.com, Ms. Vicary won $300 for a thrilling game against Woman Grandmaster Camilla Baginskaite, in which she defeated the higher rated player with the black pieces, playing the Bogo-Indian Defense. (I confess I don’t know that opening well, though I have always liked the sound of it. It’s named for the late Grandmaster Efim Bogoljubov, who played it frequently.)

It was an exciting game. One commenter on Mig Greengard’s Daily Dirt blog called it “a kitchen-sink attack . . . Thrilling to watch - I was on edge for the final 10 moves or more.”

Sacking the Exchange
I haven’t seen the game annotated anywhere, but Elizabeth herself comments on it in a blog post at the USCF site. Note that she likes “sacking the exchange,” as she does with 21...Rxb4, allowing her rook to be captured, for which she gets only a knight and a pawn in return. The term refers to giving up your rook for a minor piece, the intention being to get some kind of compensation for the sacrifice, such as a positional advantage or a better attack. See what GM Robert Byrne had to say about it 20 years ago.

As you may know, great chess players are not compensated the way rock stars and major-league ballplayers are. The figure above is not a typo; $300 is what you get for a brilliant chess game. Barely enough to make a dent in Elizabeth’s stay at the Stillwater Quality Inn during the tournament, though I guess it’s better than a poke in the eye with a stick.

Play through the game, and enjoy. Congratulations, Elizabeth.

Endgame: Congratulations to Eric Rosen for winning the recent blitz tournament at Evanston Chess and to Vince Hart for taking first place in the club’s “economy open.” Vince blogs about his chess adventures occasionally (hat tip: Chessdad64), so maybe we can expect some commentary on this tournament, if he is so moved. . . . Congratulations to Ron Washington and the other woodpushers at the North Avenue Chess Pavilion, who got some high-profile coverage last week from the Chicago Reader, in addition to our recent post. The Reader's Ted Cox did a nice job on the article, despite having run smack up against the pavilion's top two players in his first encounter with chess in many years.

A Miniature

Here's an online game I won recently on Yahoo! -- without playing particularly well, I might add. Kids and parents: please analyze and post your observations in a comment below. What did Black do wrong? What did White do wrong?

Have you played any interesting games lately? Did you record the game? If so send us the move history and we'll publish it.