Look for the Penguins

by | Oct 30, 2014 | games, positions, ruminations

Here’s the finish of one of my games from the recent Western States Open in Reno. It was round three, and I was White against Ganesh Murugappan, the #43 12-year-old in the country. FEN: 6k1/2p1rr1p/P2p4/1PnPpBP1/2n1P3/2B5/4K2R/7R w – – 0 81 Position...

Reno Odds and Ends

by | Oct 22, 2014 | current news, openings, ruminations, tournaments

A few final thoughts about the Reno tournament… (1) The ratings went up today and I was surprised to see that my rating didn’t go up as much as I thought it would. Only from 2164 to 2182. This means that if I had won my last-round game against GM Sergey...

How Could I Be So Blind?

by | Oct 18, 2014 | current news, positions, tournaments

This is a lament that every chess player utters at some point… some of us more often than others. My turn to utter it was yesterday. FEN: 7k/7p/P2R2p1/5p2/2p5/1K6/6rP/8 w – – 0 48 Position after 47. … c4+. White to move. Round one of the...

Millionaire Tournament Results

by | Oct 14, 2014 | current news, people, tournaments

So So wasn’t so-so! (Sorry, I couldn’t resist!) I tried to look up the winner of the Millionaire Open in Las Vegas this morning, and it wasn’t as easy as I expected to find out who won. When I went to chessbase.com, usually my first source, there was...