{"id":5810,"date":"2019-04-05T12:58:12","date_gmt":"2019-04-05T20:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.danamackenzie.com\/blog\/?p=5810"},"modified":"2019-04-05T13:06:57","modified_gmt":"2019-04-05T21:06:57","slug":"two-landmarks-for-mike-splane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/?p=5810","title":{"rendered":"Two Landmarks for Mike Splane"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mike Splane, one of my regular readers and the inspiration for\ncountless posts on this blog, has often asked why I often identify my younger\nopponents as, \u201cJohn Doe, the #17 14-year-old in the country.\u201d Why don\u2019t I refer\nto older players like him the same way? Well, there are three reasons. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. It recognizes the accomplishments of these kids, and subtly advertises how great the chess scene in the Bay Area is to produce such accomplished kids.<\/li>
  2. It gives me an excuse for losing to them or drawing them. (The real reason!)<\/li>
  3. The information is available. The USCF has a list of top 100 players for every age up through 18.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    However, Mike correctly pointed out that the USCF also has a top-100 list for players 50 and older, and another one for players 65 and older, and those lists include the player’s age. So you can tell who is the top of any age group over 50. And that is the background for my main announcement in this post. Mike has reached a certain age, and I hereby introduce him to you as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike Splane, the #1 65-year-old in the country!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Let me just say that I think it is amazing to be #1 in the country on ANY list or sub-list, so congratulations to Mike! Here is an honor roll of the top US players over 65, by age group, as of March 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
    \n Age\n <\/td>\n Name(s)\n <\/td>\n Rating\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 65\n <\/td>\n Mike Splane\n <\/td>\n 2212\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 66\n <\/td>\n Eugene Meyer\n <\/td>\n 2417\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 67\n <\/td>\n James Tarjan\n <\/td>\n 2469\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 68\n <\/td>\n Jack Peters\n <\/td>\n 2431\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 69\n <\/td>\n William Kelleher\n <\/td>\n 2296\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 70\n <\/td>\n Steven Barry\n <\/td>\n 2213\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 71\n <\/td>\n Igor Foygel\n <\/td>\n 2466\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 72\n <\/td>\n Fred Wilson\n <\/td>\n 2207\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 73\n <\/td> Sergey Berchenko
    and Nachum Salman <\/td>    		\n 2200\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 74\n <\/td>\n William Maillard\n <\/td>\n 2220\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 75\n <\/td>\n Lonnie Kwartler\n <\/td>\n 2211\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 76\n <\/td>\n Asa Hoffman\n <\/td>\n 2304\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 77\n <\/td>\n Gary Simms\n <\/td>\n 2221\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 78\n <\/td>\n Robert Giaffone\n <\/td>\n 2100\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 79\n <\/td>\n Unknown\n <\/td>\n (< 2032)\n <\/td><\/tr>
    \n 80+\n <\/td>\n Anthony Saidy\n <\/td>\n 2207\n <\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>\n\n\n\n

    There is no one of age 79 on the top-100 list, so I can\u2019t tell you who is the #1 79-year-old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike also mentioned at his last chess party that he was\napproaching another milestone, which he has probably already passed by now:\n1000 rated tournament games. I\u2019m ahead of him there, because I\u2019ve played 1210\nthat I know about. However, he is catching up to me! He has played 95 rated\ngames since January 2016, and I\u2019ve played only 27. Of course, we are both miles\nbehind the leader, Jay Bonin, who has played 14,836 rated games since 1991 and\npresumably at least 25,000 overall. (The USCF\u2019s online records only go back to\n1991.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    To celebrate Mike\u2019s 1000 games and his promotion to #1, I\u2019d like to show you what he calls his best game so far this year. I have to agree, it\u2019s a cool game. It\u2019s especially interesting, in view of my recent post on Long Marches<\/a> (voluntary transfers of the king from one side of the board to the other) that this game features a Semi-Long March (or Short March?) where Mike marches his king to e4, which turns out to be the safest place for him!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike Splane (2205) \u2013\nSanat Singhal (2019)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    US Amateur Team West,\n2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    1. Nf3 Nf6 2. g3 g6\n3. Bg2 Bg7 4. O-O O-O<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Sigh. Old man chess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    5. c4 d6 6. d4 Nc6 7.\nNc3 e5 8. d5 Nb8 9. h3 a5 10. Be3 \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike decided to try a plan where he refrains from playing\ne2-e4. A nice thing about this plan is that it leaves the e4 square available\nfor his pieces. Also, it makes the position a little bit different from what\nhis opponent is used to. Jesse Kraai used to call King\u2019s Indian players \u201ctrained\nmonkeys,\u201d because they only know how to do one thing \u2013 push their pawns to e5,\nf4, g4, etc. But that may not be best in this position.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    10. \u2026 Na6 11. Rc1 Nh5 12. Qd2 f5<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"
    Position after 12. \u2026 f5. White to move.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    FEN: r1bq1rk1\/1pp3bp\/n2p2p1\/p2Ppp1n\/2P5\/2N1BNPP\/PP1QPPB1\/2R2RK1 w – – 0 13<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike makes an interesting comment here: \u201cA positional mistake, because it creates a huge target square on e6\u2026 If Black wanted to play \u2026 f5, he had to play \u2026 h6 first.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    I don\u2019t entirely agree, although I would personally play \u2026 h6 first, so in that we do agree. Mike said that as soon as he saw this move, he \u201cknew right away that the key to the game was posting a knight [on e6].\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    This is an interesting case of the Mike Splane Question: How\nam I going to win this game? Mike says, by placing a knight on e6. Objectively\nspeaking, that should not win the game, as I will explain below. Nevertheless,\nas I have said many times, the Mike Splane Question gives you a destination to\naim for, and it is amazing how often your intuition will turn out to be right!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    13. Bg5 \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    An interesting maneuver. Mike is really aiming for h6, but he plays this move first in order to enable the knight to follow the bishop to g5. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    13. \u2026 Qe8 14. Bh6\nf4?!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Black commits a failure of imagination. He only knows one plan, and he doesn\u2019t stop and think how the position is different without a White pawn on e4. Thus, he fails to realize that \u2026 f4 will hand over the beautiful square e4 to White\u2019s pieces. He also fails to realize the latent power of White\u2019s bishop on g2, or to grasp the importance of blocking that bishop\u2019s diagonal while simultaneously unleashing his own bishop on g7.  For all these reasons, I consider 14. \u2026 e4! to be the most powerful, principled move and the way to really query whether White has ceded too much control over the center. Note that White\u2019s plan of playing Ng5 is ruined, and also 15. Bxg7? is bad because of 15. \u2026 ef! 16. Bxf8 fg! Of course White can play 15. Nd4, but after 15. \u2026 Qe5 we get to a position I would love to play as Black.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    15. Bxg7 Nxg7 16. Ng5\nNc5?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"
    Position after 16. … Nc5. White to move.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    FEN: r1b1qrk1\/1pp3np\/3p2p1\/p1nPp1N1\/2P2p2\/2N3PP\/PP1QPPB1\/2R2RK1 w – – 0 17<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cA good move,\u201d writes Mike. I disagree. It was a bad move, because Black got his move order wrong. He should have played 16. \u2026 h6 first. Mike writes, \u201cI thought I was clearly better after 16. \u2026 h6 17. Ne6 Nxe6 18. de Bxe6 19 Bxb7 \u2026\u201d and I\u2019ll skip the rest of the analysis because Mike has gone off the rails After 16. \u2026 h6! 17. Ne6? Nxe6 (by the way, Rybka actually prefers 17. \u2026 Bxe6, but this is a somewhat non-human move) 18. de Nc5! White is very hard pressed to justify the forced loss of the e6 pawn. 19. e7 Qxe7 20 Nd5 Qf7 gives him nothing. The Black queen and king look vulnerable but there is no way for White to magically sink his bishop on d5. Likewise, 19. Nd5 Nxe6 gives White nothing. The only thing I could come up with here was a crazy, far-out piece sac with 20. Nxc7 Nxc7 21. Qxd6. This is indeed awkward for Black, until you realize that Black can comfortably give away a second pawn for the piece and still be in the driver\u2019s seat. I like the crazy idea 21. \u2026 Rf7!?, with the point that if White tries to win a third pawn for the piece with 22. Qxg6+ Rg7 23. Qxh6, his queen gets trapped in highly unusual fashion with with 23. \u2026 Ra6 24. Qh4 (forced) Rh7 25. Qg5+ (forced) Rg6!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    But this is all fantasy chess. The point is that the pawn\nsac with 17. Ne6 just doesn\u2019t work. However, White still has a small but solid\nadvantage after 16. \u2026 h6 17. Nge4. Rybka says it\u2019s +0.4 for White.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    From here on, though, I have nothing but praise for Mike\u2019s\nplay and nothing but agreement with his annotations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    17. g4! \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cThe best move of the game,\u201d Mike writes. Well, I love 29. Ke4, too, but this is certainly deeper. \u201cThe plan if he remains passive is exactly what I played in the game, Bf3, Kg2, Rh1, and push the h-pawn.\u201d But what\u2019s really great about 17. g4 is that it\u2019s a pawn sacrifice, and it\u2019s concealed so that Black actually thinks that he\u2019s winning a pawn. I think that Mike is good at these psychological tricks. I\u2019ve written before about his theory that people tend to underrate \u201cforced moves\u201d by their opponent, thinking that if the move was forced it can\u2019t be dangerous. People also tend to overrate winning material if it seems to be won through their own cleverness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike felt that if Black takes the bait and wins a pawn,\nWhite will have Benko-like compensation because the g- and h-files will be open\nfor his rooks. The game proves him to be totally right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    17. \u2026 h5?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The bait attracts a nibble!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    18. Bf3 Qe7 19. Nce4\nNxe4 20. Nxe4 Qh4<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Black wins a pawn. All part of White’s master plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    21. Kg2 hg 22. hg Bxg4\n23. Rh1 Bxf3+ 24. Kxf3! \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike\u2019s first deviation from the plan, and I like it! The\nking gets out of the way of both rooks. White\u2019s attack is too sudden for Black\nto take advantage of White\u2019s king being in the center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    24. \u2026 Qe7 25. Rcg1\nKf7<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Maybe he has some thoughts of running, but Mike\u2019s next move\nputs the kibosh on that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    26. Ng5+! Kg8<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"
    Position after 26. … Kg8. White to move.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    FEN: r4rk1\/1pp1q1n1\/3p2p1\/p2Pp1N1\/2P2p2\/5K2\/PP1QPP2\/6RR w – – 0 27 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    If Black goes back to home base with 26. \u2026 Ke8, then 27. Rh7 followed by 28. Ne6 (remember the Mike Splane Question!) is overwhelming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cWith the Black king back on g8, the key issue is how to get\nthe queen into the attack as quickly as possible,\u201d Mike writes. \u201cOne route is\nQd1-f1-h3. The problem with this idea is it allows him to play \u2026 e4+ with\ncheck. Here I came up with the wonderful idea of using my king as a blockader in\nthe center of the board, so my plan is Qd3, Ke4, Qh3. It still takes my queen\nthree moves to get to h3, but now \u2026 e4 is stopped and he will be helpless to\ndefend his king.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    All I can say is, bravo!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    27. Qd3! Nf5 28. Ne6!\n\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Move order is critical! It was still possible for White to\nscrew up with 28. Ke4?? Ng3+! 29. fg Qg5 30. gf Qf4 mate! This is the sort of\nthing you would usually expect when moving your king to e4. It\u2019s impressive\nthat Mike saw this line but was still confident enough to move his king to e4\none move later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    28. \u2026 Rf6 29. Ke4! \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \u201cI don\u2019t know if you can give a 3-move maneuver an\nexclamation mark,\u201d Mike writes. Yes you can, I reply. You give an exclamation\nmark to each move.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    29. \u2026 f3<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mike says he completely missed this idea. Well, of course\nBlack is trying to set up some kind of mating net, along the lines of what we\nsaw in the previous note. But this move ends up making absolutely zero\ndifference to the outcome of the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    30. Qxf3 Nd4 31. Qh3\nNxe6 32. Qh8+ Kf7 33. Rh7+ Black resigns<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Beautiful and original chess. Yes, ma, there is still life\nafter 64!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Mike Splane, one of my regular readers and the inspiration for countless posts on this blog, has often asked why I often identify my younger opponents as, \u201cJohn Doe, the #17 14-year-old in the country.\u201d Why don\u2019t I refer to older players like him the same way? Well, there are three reasons. It recognizes the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1363,11,25],"tags":[4326,4327,3938,2932,3896,3676,1232,1106,177,85,2927],"class_list":["post-5810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-news","category-games","category-people","tag-failure-of-imagination","tag-honor-roll","tag-kings-indian","tag-long-diagonal","tag-long-march","tag-mike-splane-question","tag-move-order","tag-pawn-sac","tag-psychology","tag-ratings","tag-top-100"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/80"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5810"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5817,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5810\/revisions\/5817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/danamackenzie.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}