Not so good night

After playing well in chess club my last two times, I guess I was due for an off night. I was in the top quad with Juande Perea and Dan Burkhard (who are both playing in the Santa Cruz Cup) and Steve Sullivan. First round was a lifeless draw as Black against Juande....

Listener games — great stuff!

Last week ChessLecture announced my new series, “Learn from Your Fellow Amateurs,” in which I will pick one listener-submitted game each month and lecture about it. So far I’ve gotten twelve submissions, which I think is a pretty good number —...

Russian Superfinals

A couple weeks ago the Russian Superfinals finished. It was a wonderfully hard-fought tournament, with fewer than 50% draws in the men’s bracket and an even smaller percentage on the women’s side. Alexander Morozevich won the men’s tournament with a...

Admitting mistakes

Last weekend I watched the latest debate between the Democratic presidential candidates — Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Bill Richardson. I deliberately avoided paying attention to politics during 2007, but now 2008 is here, the year of the...