by scribe | Jan 4, 2019 | current news, games, openings, positions, tournaments
For those who have never heard it, the phrase in the title apparently comes from Edward Lasker in 1913, but it has bounced around from one chess writer to another for the last century. It seems like an appropriate description of what happened to me in the San...
by scribe | Dec 19, 2018 | games, people, positions, tournaments
For the Bay Area International I am preparing in two different ways. I am doing tactics puzzles at chess.com, and I am studying games by Baadur Jobava. The puzzles are (for the most part) Tactics Lite, where the answers are short and clear-cut. Jobava’s games...
by scribe | Dec 6, 2018 | games, people, positions
Here’s a question for my esteemed readers. What sub-2700 player do you consider to be the best for an amateur to study? Why? Well, for any player the answer is “Study your own games.” But we’re not allowing that answer. The reason I’m...
by scribe | Nov 3, 2018 | 2018 world championship, chess clubs, current news, endings, positions, tournaments
As many of you know, I had a disappointing tournament in Reno last month, and I plan to write at least two or three posts trying to understand the reasons for my failure. But I’d like to start with a “failure” that really wasn’t — it was...
by scribe | Oct 19, 2018 | current news, games, positions, tournaments
This weekend I’m in Reno to play in my second chess tournament of the year, the Western States Open. When I got up this morning I wanted to wash my hair, but I couldn’t find the complimentary bottle of shampoo provided by the hotel. I looked high, I looked...
by scribe | Oct 2, 2018 | chess clubs, games, people, positions
At Mike Splane’s latest chess party this weekend, some of the usual faces were missing, including Gjon Feinstein, who had another commitment. Because he wasn’t there, I thought it would be a fun time to dust off the very first game I ever played against...
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