The people who came to the chess salon were Gjon Feinstein, Thadeus Frei (who, as some of you might have noticed, has recently written a few comments on this blog), Cole Ryan, and Dan Burkhard. I invited Juande Perea, too, but his wife is expected to give birth any day now — her due date is\u00c2\u00a0tomorrow –\u00c2\u00a0so he decided it was too big of a gamble for him to come. Or maybe his wife decided for him! I don’t know.<\/p>\n
I’m not sure whether\u00c2\u00a0I\u00c2\u00a0have mentioned Gjon\u00c2\u00a0previously in this blog, but if not I should have. He is one of the people who keeps the Santa Cruz chess scene going. He’s a national master who has not played tournament chess in about 15 years, in part (I think) because it doesn’t agree with his nerves, but more importantly because he has dedicated himself to a career as a chess coach.<\/p>\n
Making a living off of chess is a hard, hard road to travel, but Gjon makes it work somehow. He teaches chess\u00c2\u00a0at several local schools, gives private lessons, and also runs a few scholastic tournaments every year. I think he does a few things on the side to supplement his income, such as pet-sitting, but basically he is a chess coach. If you’re a young player in the Santa Cruz area and you’re looking to improve, he is the go-to guy.<\/p>\n
Although Gjon doesn’t play tournament chess any more, he loves to play blitz. I would guess that his strength at 5-minute chess is probably at least 2400. He grew up in the Northeast and played a lot at Washington Square Park in New York, where you had to move fast and be good at tactics if you wanted to hang onto your money. So he’s got an extremely high level of tactical alertness, and he’s impossible to outrace in a time scramble. If\u00c2\u00a0we have an even position, but\u00c2\u00a0he has\u00c2\u00a010 seconds left and\u00c2\u00a0I have 20 or 30,\u00c2\u00a0then I might as well resign. He can play 20 moves in those 10 seconds and they will be good, strong moves with no obvious blunders. I can’t possibly play 20 good moves in 20 seconds. Somehow he has an algorithm for understanding what is going on really fast, and I don’t.<\/p>\n
My wife noticed it, too. She commented this morning, “Gjon’s got a lot between his ears.”\u00c2\u00a0She noticed it because in some of our team games last night we decided to allow discussion between teammates. While Dan and Thadeus and Cole and I would say, “I like move x because it threatens y,” in the same amount of time Gjon would say “I like move\u00c2\u00a0a followed by b, c, d, e.” He would be looking five ply ahead in the time it took us to look two. He would also have sound strategic reasons for his moves, too — it wasn’t all tactics. It seems to me that he is fluent in chess, while I stumble along as if\u00c2\u00a0it were my second language.<\/p>\n
To be more precise: I think that Gjon’s tactical fluency probably developed from playing a lot, with fast time controls,\u00c2\u00a0and against tough opposition as a kid or as\u00c2\u00a0a teenager. I think that his strategical soundness has come later, through study and\u00c2\u00a0hard work as a chess coach. Coaching or teaching force you to put your chess under a microscope and confront the things you don’t understand.<\/p>\n
So, I’m sure it will come as no surprise when I tell you that the star move of the night was Gjon’s. In one of our team games, Gjon and Dan Burkhard versus me and Thadeus Frei, we got to this position:<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/07\/salon.jpg\")
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