Recent Elephant Gambit game

I ran the engine match below for my upcoming submission to the UON.  I believe this game shows how tactical the opening can get in the elephant gambit.  White wins here and it was beautifully done.  Basically, what NOT to do with Black.

(1) Fritz 11 - Strelka 2.0 B [C40]

 Elephant Gambit Bd6b Baltimore (1.1), 15.10.2008

[1.26;0.92]

Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz 3192 MHz W=14.7 ply; 937kN/s; 3 TBAs B=12. 9 ply; 837kN/s 4.Nc3   1.26/14 10 4...Nf6   0.92/13 11 5.Bc4   1.14/14 8 5...c6 (0-0)   0.81/12 6 6.0-0 (Qe2)   0.84/14 9 6...b5 (0-0)   0.46/13 5 7.Bb3 (Be2)   0.23/14 8 7...b4   0.76/12 6 8.d4   0.83/14 14 8...e4   0.87/13 12 9.Nxe4   0.67/16 12 9...Nxe4   0.65/13 5 10.Re1   0.89/15 6 10...cxd5   0.97/13 6 11.Bxd5   0.89/14 4 11...Bxh2+   0.85/14 8 12.Kxh2   0.42/16 10 12...Qxd5   0.86/14 8 13.Ng5   0.72/15 5 13...f5   0.63/13 5 14.Qh5+   0.41/14 4 14...g6   0.67/14 8 15.Nxe4   0.61/15 7 15...0-0   0.71/13 5 16.Qg5   0.44/15 5 16...Nd7 (Qxd4)   0.88/13 9 17.Nc5   0.97/14 9 17...Nxc5   0.88/12 1 18.dxc5   0.96/14 3 18...Bb7   1.07/13 11 19.Be3   1.11/14 6 19...Rae8   1.39/12 17 20.f3   1.08/13 5 20...Bc6 (Qc4)   1.40/12 5 21.Rad1 (Qf4)   1.06/14 6 21...Qe5+   1.34/12 4 22.f4   1.07/16 5 22...Qe7 (Qf6)   1.46/13 6 23.Qg3 (Rd6)   1.12/13 5 23...Qf7 (Qc7)   1.06/12 3 24.b3 (Rd6)   1.14/14 7 24...Qc7 (Re6)   1.07/12 6 25.Rd6   1.46/16 6 25...Rd8   1.06/13 4 26.Bd4   1.19/15 3 26...Rxd6   1.15/14 4 27.Be5   1.49/14 3 27...Qd7   1.56/13 16 28.cxd6   1.57/13 1 28...Rc8 (Be4)   1.59/12 3 29.Qh4 (Rc1)   1.74/14 4 29...Rf8 (Qf7)   1.88/13 11 30.Re3 (c4)   1.95/14 4 30...Qd8   1.88/13 10 31.Qh6 (Qf2)   2.30/15 4 31...Rf7   1.99/12 2 32.c4   2.48/16 9 32...bxc3 (Rd7)   2.11/12 2 33.Rxc3   2.54/16 4 33...Qc8   2.14/12 3 34.Qh3 (Qh4)   2.67/16 4 34...Qb7 (Qe8)   2.36/12 3 35.Rc5 (Qd3)   2.99/15 3 35...Qb6   2.52/11 2 36.Qc3 (b4)   3.08/14 1 36...Bd7   3.14/13 6 37.Rc7   3.68/15 5 37...Qb8 (Be6)   3.32/13 3 38.Qc4   3.61/14 1 38...Qe8   3.41/13 3 39.Bc3   3.79/15 2 39...h6   3.56/12 3 40.Rxa7   3.81/15 2 40...g5   3.93/12 4 41.a4   3.84/15 3 41...Qe6   4.29/12 2 42.Ra8+   4.11/15 3 42...Kh7   3.98/12 2 43.a5 (Qd4)   4.60/15 3 43...Qxc4   4.31/13 2 44.bxc4   4.36/15 0 44...Bc6   5.48/16 23 45.Ra6   5.67/15 2 45...Bd7   5.62/15 1 46.c5   6.22/16 2 46...gxf4 (Kg6)   5.80/14 2 47.Rb6 (c6)   6.72/14 1 47...f3   8.76/16 13 48.gxf3   7.83/15 1 48...Kg6   12.06/18 12 49.c6 (a6)   10.00/15 1 49...Bxc6   7.46/12 0 50.Rxc6   11.12/15 0 50...Kg5   12.75/13 1 51.a6   11.21/14 1 51...h5 (Rd7)   15.99/15 6 52.Rc7   14.69/12 0 52...Rf8   18.36/13 1 53.a7 (d7)   17.51/13 0 53...h4 (Rd8)   18.36/12 1 54.d7   21.94/14 1 54...Rd8   #9/12 2 55.Rc8   #12/13 0 55...Rxd7   0.01/5 0 56.a8Q   #11/9 0 56...Rd8 (Re7)   #5/6 0 57.Rxd8   #4/7 0 57...Kh5 (Kf4)   0.01/4 0 58.Qc6   #3/7 0 58...Kg5 (h3)   0.01/2 0 59.Bd2+   #2/7 0 59...Kh5   0.01/1 0 60.Rh8#   #1/7 0 1-0

Current Project...

I  haven't posted in a while and wanted to post this to get me back in the habit.  So much has been going on with my life and chess.  I'm currently working on a big project that I hope will be accepted into the Unorthodox Opening Newsletter.  It revolves around the elephant gambit and its variations.  I'm having a lot of fun analyzing this gambit with Fritz 11.  Thought I'd take a break from all the different UCOs and focus on just one at a time.  To be honest it is more fun than a learning experience... I still can't play the gambit right!  I guess its because I'm not used to holding onto the initiative.  Maybe this will teach me?  Anyways.. I'll post more later.  I plan on finishing the project by the end of next week.

Bird's Opening - Batavo Polish Attack

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1.f4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.b4?!

I first came across this opening when I was flipping through Schiller's Unorthodox Chess Openings book. If I recall correctly, Eric said to just take a pawn and smile. I'll have to see though because this opening isn't as bad as it looks. It was brought to my attention recently in The Gambit Gang's group forum on chess.com by a member named Birdbrain. What interested me initially is the fact that its a Bird and Orangatang opening all mixed up. Of course you'll worry about your pawns being all scattered about but it does have some advantages. In a hypermodern way it controls the center from the outside, a Bishop will soon be deployed to b2, and a timely push by the f4 pawn to f5 can create some very interesting positions. This was the reason this line was brought up by Birdbrain. I had initially posted about a crazy/unsound opening that I was using in Blitz games: 1.f4 g6 2.f5?? . In 1 min games this opening gets wild and although I scored well I wanted to see how the computer would defend against it. Of course the computer stuck to sound opening principle and out of 20 some games only 1 was won by white. In response to the Batavo-Polish Attack, Birdbrain suggested f4 Nf6 Nf3 g6 d4 Bg7 c4 0-0 Nc3 d6 f5! . This appears to be a very solid line. I wanted to see what the computer would do against the BPA.

Of course the engines would not move the Knight to d5. They would first develope the Bishop to g7. The white Knight would then come to c3. Seems pretty even to me. See for yourself in the PGNs.

Fritz 11 6.5 Fruit 2.3.1 3.5

White Wins 5 Draws 1 Black Wins 4

PGN Viewer and Download

Sicilian Defense - Halasz Gambit

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1.e4 c5 2.d4 cxd4 3. Bd3

An interesting line. Clyde Nakamura said that he is currently playing this line. As I do not play 1.e4 I will probably not use this line. The games were still interesting to analyse though. I enjoy going over crazy positions. One word of advice that I took from Mr. Nakamura is that he says he likes to change his opening repertoire every 6 months to throw off his opponents. I recently changed up my repertoire online and have had great success. I changed from 1.Nf3 lines to 1.f4 lines. My ususal opponents were definitely caught off guard.

Fritz 4.0 Fruit 3.0 Rybka 2.0 HIARCS 1.0

White wins 1 (10%) Draws 3 (30%) Black wins 6 (60%)

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PGN Viewer and Download

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The Computer Rules, Why? Rules 5, 6, & 7

The Computer Rules, Why? - Rule 4
1. "A solid center is FIRST priority."
2. "Trade on your terms, not your opponents".
3. "Protect your pieces with aggressive/attacking pieces."
4. "There is an inbetween move 90% of the time"

Rule #5 - "Keep all pieces safe at ALL times."

Many times the opponent will attack a piece, and in fear of losing a tempo, I leave the piece there where it gets traded off. So the piece was protected and there was no loss in points BUT now your army is missing a major player, be it a pawn or minor piece.... or whatever. While watching the computer I've noticed that it doesn't trade off pieces lightly. If a piece is attacked it simply moves it, and it moves it to a sometimes better position. So although a tempo may be lost, you can gain it back later by more active pieces. Pieces are very important to the computer.

Rule #6 - "Your king is a reliable and ACTIVE piece."

The computer always uses the King when the time comes. It is not scared or worried about an open King. In fact, it seems like the computer just treats the King as a pawn on steroids. It backs up other pieces and craftly moves across the board. Of course I haven't seen the King come out in the early game but once there only a couple of minor pieces left.. the King WILL move.

Rule #7 - "Its OK to give a piece back."

I have seen this many many times. The computer will totally sneak a piece and the score jumps from an almost even -.35 to a 2.10! The computers battle it out and then out of nowhere the computer that is up a point or so will totally Sac a piece for a gain in a different area of the game. Whether it be for tempo, space, initiative, or whatever. The computer seems crazy. This is almost opposite of rule #5. I guess its ok to give a piece back, just when is the real question.

Set back.

Well I guess I reached my 100mb limit with my provider. I can't post any more content for now. Posting up all the games to my engine tournaments was the best part of starting this blog. I loved coming here and just going over the games. It looks like now I'm going to have to cut back a lot of the games and limit each opening to only 5 games. I think you'll get a good overview of the opening. Of course there will still be PGN viewers to make games easier to go over but the whole PGNs will have to be downloaded from the Unorthodox Opening Group at yahoogroups.com (dare I say egroups.com!). Whenever possible I will also try to link you to other great site like Clyde Nakamura's Opening pages at Chessville.com.

I will work on cutting back the content tonight or tomorrow as I have many great openings still to publish. Sorry for the setback.

Polish Defense w/ c4 :: 1.c4 b5??

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195 Games w/ 1 1 time control

White wins 98 (50%) Draws 39 (20%) Black wins 58 (30%)

Yeah, don't use this opening. Its kinda like 1.e4 b5, you give up the pawn for virtually nothing. The main idea is rapid development of the c8 Bishop. As you can see in the games, Black doesn't follow up with Bb7 immediately. The Bishop does come out but at a cost, White ends up developing a huge center. It does score 30% but I think most of these are in the endings. I will use this in rapid games 'rarely'.

Engine Notes: Fruit didn't win this time. Sad cause I was beginning to favor it but it does show the power of Rybka. I have Fritz 11 at work now so look forward to some great games. Tournament details looked like this:

c4b5 2008
1 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 45.5/65

2 HIARCS 11.1 UCI 39.0/65

3 Fritz 9 33.5/65

4 Fruit 2.3.1 33.0/65

5 Naum 2.0 22.5/65

6 Deep Shredder 10 UCI 21.5/65

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Polish Defense w/ 1.d4

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60 Games w/ 1 1 Time Control

White wins 28 (47%) Draws 16 (26%) Black wins 16 (27%)

Inspired by the last tournament I decided to run 1.d4 b5. Black wins are close to 30% and I have been faring well with it in bullet games. Very well actually. Many sneaky traps in the opening. It would be worth it to go through these games or download the PGN and create an opening tree to run in chessbase or Fritz. Definitely a deceptive opening.

I ran a 6 engine tournament and Fruit 2.3.1 came in first. I can't wait to throw this up against Fritz 11. The results were as such:

d4b5 2008
1 Fruit 2.3.1 **** 1½10 ½001 10½0 111½ 1111 13.0/20

2 HIARCS 11.1 UCI 0½01 **** 10½½ 0111 1½½0 1½½1 11.5/20

3 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit ½110 01½½ **** 0½01 101½ 0011 10.5/20

4 Deep Shredder 10 UCI 01½1 1000 1½10 **** 10½1 ½½00 9.5/20

5 Naum 2.0 000½ 0½½1 010½ 01½0 **** 1½01 8.0/20

6 Fritz 9 0000 0½½0 1100 ½½11 0½10 **** 7.5/20
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PGN Viewer and Download

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Polish Defense after Nf3 :: 1.Nf3 b5?

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90 Games w/ 2 1 Time control
White wins 44 (49%) Draws 25 (29%) Black wins 20 (22%)

Again I ran a tournament because I was a bit stumped in a couple of 1 min matches on Chess.com. Although I held off in a few games, the guy still got me a couple of times. The tournament was run so I can see the good defense. I was mistakingly following up b5 w/ e4 and that usually left my pawn structure messed up or some piece running around the board all crazy like. It seems e3 or a kingside fianchetto is the appropriate defense. Suprisingly, the move ...Bb7 wasn't used right away by Black. Well, now I like this defense. It adds some 'flava' to the opening and I can usually throw off the opponent and in some cases win the h1 Rook. Kinda like how the h8 rook can drop in the Orangatang when the beginning is played horribly wrong. Also, since this opening is way below 30% for Black, I'm gonna stick to the good'ol Nf6... for now.


Engine note: So I ran this tournament with a bunch of engines. I downloaded some new ones too and my new favorite 'free' engine is Fruit 2.3.1. That engine is baaaaaad. I haven't squared it off against Fritz 11 because my laptop went out at home and my Fritz cd is stuck inside. I didn't have a chance to bring it to work. Still, Rybka would beat out Fritz a bunch and now Fruit is giving Rybka a run for its money. Naum 2.0 is good but I'd like to see 3.o. Now to the details:


nf3b5 2008
1 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit ** 11 ½½ ½0 1 11 ½1 ½1 1½ 11 13.0/17
2 Fruit 2.3.1 00 ** 01 1½ 01 11 10 1½ ½1 11 11.5/18
3 Naum 2.0 ½½ 10 ** 11 ½0 00 11 ½½ ½1 1½ 10.5/18 90.25
4 HIARCS 11.1 UCI ½1 0½ 00 ** 1½ ½1 1½ ½0 1½ 11 10.5/18 86.25
5 Fritz 9 0 10 ½1 0½ ** 10 11 01 ½½ ½1 9.5/17
6 Twisted Logic 20080620 00 00 11 ½0 01 ** 0½ 11 1½ 00 7.5/18 63.25
7 Deep Shredder 10 UCI ½0 01 00 0½ 00 1½ ** 11 01 10 7.5/18 60.50
8 Glaurung 2.1 (JA) ½0 0½ ½½ ½1 10 00 00 ** 10 ½1 7.0/18
9 Alaric 707 0½ ½0 ½0 0½ ½½ 0½ 10 01 ** 01 6.5/18
10 Aristarch 4.50 00 00 0½ 00 ½0 11 01 ½0 10 ** 5.5/18
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PGN Viewer and Download

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Nimzovitch Defense :: Wheeler Gambit

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1.e4 Nc6 2.b4!

White wins 17 (35%) Draws 7 (14%) Black wins 25 (51%)

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Now I liked this opening from the very beginning . White gives up the b pawn in order to develope a big center. I enjoy playing the Orangutang in bullet games so I thought this would be nice to add to the repertoire, or maybe find some crazy lines in there. I was disappointed by the wins by White but what I've been learning with a lot of these gambits is that if you win by 30% or more then the opening is very playable. Especially since I'm at a low level I enjoy throwing slightly higher players off by taking them into uncharted waters. I did a big tournament with 10 engines. I was looking into the best free engines. Some are really good. 49 Games in all. The results looked like this:

wheeler 2008
1 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit * 1 0 1 1 1 1 ½ 1 ½ 7.0/10 32.75

2 Deep Shredder 10 UCI 0 * 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 7.0/10 27.50

3 Fritz 11 1 0 * 0 1 ½ 0 1 1 1 6.5/10

4 HIARCS 11.1 UCI 0 0 1 * 0 1 1 1 1 1 6.0/9

5 Gambit Fruit 1.0 Beta 4bx 0 0 0 1 * ½ 1 0 ½ 1 5.0/10

6 Naum 2.0 0 1 ½ 0 ½ * 1 0 ½ 1 4.5/10 20.25

7 Toga II 1.4 beta5c 0 1 1 0 0 0 * ½ 1 1 4.5/10 20.00

8 LoopMP 12.32 ½ 0 0 0 1 1 ½ * 1 0 4.0/9

9 Glaurung 1.2.1 0 0 0 0 ½ ½ 0 0 * 1 3.0/10

10 Zappa Mexico ½ 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 * 1.5/10

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Jerome Gambit

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White wins 239 (31%) Draws 76 (10%) Black wins 450 (59%)

The classic bishop sacrifice at f7. I ran a 765 game tournament but am publishing only the white wins here. It seems to be what most people are looking for. I can provide all the games at your request. Suprisingly Rybka was the loser of all the games where White won. Something fishy is going on here. Very unlike Rybka, maybe its book learning was off. Even its score was really bad.

What I have gathered is that in order to win with White in the Jerome Gambit is an extremely active Queen. As I replayed a bunch of these games the Queen was jumping all over the board in the late beginning , early middlegame. I have recently started experimenting with sacs at f7 and f3, so I found a bunch of these games very enjoyable.

jeromegambit 2008
HIARCS 11.1 UCI 43.5 - 36.573.5 - 6.5** 117.0/160

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 36.5 - 43.578.0 - 1.0 ** 114.5/159

Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 6.5 - 73.51.0 - 78.0 ** 7.5/159

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Nimzovitch Defense :: Lean Variation

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White wins 27 (45%) Draws 16 (27%) Black wins 17 (28%)

60 Games w/ 2 1 time control.

lean2 2008
Fritz 11 20.5/30

Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 17.5/30

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 13.0/30

HIARCS 11.1 UCI 9.0/30
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PGN Viewer and Download

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Dutch Defense :: Korchnoi Attack

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42 Games w/ 2 0 time control

White wins 20 (48%) Draws 11 (26%) Black wins 11 (26%)

korchnoi 2008
Fritz 11 ******* 10½½½11 101½10½ 110111½ 14.0/21

Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 01½½½00 ******* 111½110 11½1½01 13.0/21
HIARCS 11.1 UCI 010½01½ 000½001 ******* 00½½111 8.5/21

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 001000½ 00½0½10 11½½000 ******* 6.5/21

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Bird's Opening :: Sturm Gambit

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White wins 10 (33%) Draws 6 (20%) Black Wins 14 (47%)

PGN Viewer and PGN Download

I was a bit shocked by these numbers. I felt this gambit is very playable for white and I have had great results in 1 min games on chess.com. To be honest though, a bunch of the wins for Black weren't in the opening. Some very strange positions came from this gambit. Think of a cross between the Queen's Gambit Declined and the Bird Formation I posted a few posts back. Very interesting stuff.

I ran the tournament with 4 engines at their max elo. Rybka won over Fritz 11. After getting Fritz 11 I figured it would tear through all these other engines. I figured wrong. Rybka and HIARC still far very well. There were 30 games with a 4 2 time control. All games can be viewed online by click the link at the top. The results were:

sturm1 2008
Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit ***** 00½1½ 11010 111½1 9.5/152

Fritz 11 11½0½ ***** ½0½10 111½0 8.5/153

HIARCS 11.1 UCI 00101 ½1½01 ***** 00001 6.0/15 50.504

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 000½0 000½1 11110 ***** 6.0/15 41.50

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Bird’s Opening – Hobb’s Gambit :: 1.f4 g5!?

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White wins 23 (46%) Draws 11 ( 22%) Black wins 16 (32%)

After running an engine match for From’s Gambit (1.f4 e5!?) I decided to check out Hobb’s Gambit ,(1.f4 g5!?) . Of course this weakens the Kingside but it immediately challenges White and offers dynamic play. Of all the games 2.fxg5 was played and there followed 4 main replies: h6, Nc6, d5, and Bg7.

..h6 – This is the only move that directly attacks the misplaced pawn. The plan is to open up lanes for the rook and develop the bishop to the ideal square at g7. Usually White just ignores this pawn and opts for central control with d4 or e4.

Nc6, d5, and Bg7 – These moves ignore the exiled pawn and opt for central control. A plan that works well throughout the games.

All in all, this opening isn’t all that bad for Black. There are some interesting lines in there. All games can be viewed with the PGN viewer by following the link below and the PGN can be downloaded there as well.

hobbs 2008
1 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 9.5/13
2 Fritz 11 9.0/13
3 HIARCS 11.1 UCI 5.5/14
4 Deep Shredder 10 UCI 5.5/14
5 LoopMP 12.32 4.5/14

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PGN Viewer and Download

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Bird's Opening :: 1.f4 e5

White wins 56 (47%)

Draws 38 (31%)

Black wins 26 (22%)

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Another reason I was researching the Bird's Opening was because a post in the Unorthodox Opening group on Yahoo. They were discussing From's gambit. I wanted to see if the computer would play the From. It did in some games but the results were varied. As you can see in the stats, White can hold after this gambit. What suprised me the most was that the engines would constantly move the King after a Queen exchange in order to get a Pawn in the center (see rule #1). Even after giving up the right to castle white still has a decent game. Although the position was a bit 'different' I started to see common themes and formations. The King came out often and Black castled Queenside. This was an engine match between Rybka 2.3.1 and HIARC 11.1. Rybka won with : +46 -36 =38 . This is a position that is common in the late opening.

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White has given up the right to castle and Black has just castled Queenside. Despite the looks of the position, White seems to be better. All 120 games and the PGN can be found below.

PGN Viewer and Download

f4! :: Bird's Opening

White wins 28 (47%)
Draws 11 (18%)
Black wins 21 (35%)

With the recent release of the book Play...f4!, I decided to research the Bird opening. Although common in certain circles it is still somewhat Unorthodox. Basically you open with moving your King's bishop's pawn to f4! Opening up a weakness but taking a command of the e5 square. After I ran the small tournament (w/adjusted ratings) I found a common theme in most of the opening formations and it looked like this:
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After noticing this formation I tried to achieve this in some rapid games and had some great results. Once I realised what the 'plan' was I quickly overcame my opponents. Suprising what one little thing like a formation can do for your game. Of course I followed sound opening principles like key squares and opening tactics. It was great.

So the tournament went good and I was able to use my recently acquired FRITZ 11. Wow, this program is great, it looks great and runs even better. The results looked like this:

f41 2008
Fritz 11 ***** 0½1½½ 11111 111½0 11111 16.0/20

Rybka 2.3 LK 32-bit 1½0½½ ***** 110½0 1½110 11011 12.5/20

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 00000 001½1 ***** 10101 10111 9.5/20

HIARCS 11.1 UCI 000½1 0½001 01010 ***** 1½½10 8.0/20

LoopMP 12.32 00000 00100 01000 0½½01 ***** 4.0/20

Fritz won! I was happy about this since all the engines were running at their max elo ratings. With the help of Chessbase Lite, I can now publish the games in HTML format in a easy to use PGN viewer. The PGN can also be downloaded there. Click the link below:

PGN Viewer and Download

The Computer Rules, Why? - Rule 4

1. "A solid center is FIRST priority."
2. "Trade on your terms, not your opponents".
3. "Protect your pieces with aggressive/attacking pieces."

Rule # 4

"There is an inbetween move 90% of the time"

Another thing that fascinates me about watching the computers play is that they always find the inbetween move. There will be a piece right in front of them and instead of taking it they will check the king or threaten a piece. All the time bettering their position or cramping the enemies, same thing I guess. After they threaten or 'bother' the opponent, then they take the piece. If they have the opportunity for an inbetween move, THEY TAKE IT. I noticed this last night and am now using it in my games. Its a bit harder for me to do it in 1 min games but 5 or more is good. Its kinda like getting more bang for your bills, and I'm a cheap bastard.

AWESOME.

I've been running all my engines at default. So their ratings have been between 1400 and 1900. Which is somewhat interesting because the lower rated engines were fairing pretty well. With this new developement I'm going to run some old tournaments that I'm really interested in. Mainly the Mokele Mbembe and some of the Nh6 tourneys.

The Computer Rules, Why?

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Now that I've been able to work my Computer Chess Engines pretty effectively, I've been watching many games by the computers and have started to notice some 'rules' that the computer uses. These are probably well known but since I'm a beginner I'm going to write down these rules and continue to add on to it as I watch more and more games.

RULES

1. Despite gambits and suprises in the opening, the computer constantly opts to challenge the center at all times. Even if with another gambit. "A solid center is FIRST priority." A good example of attacking the center instead of destroying a postion is this Senechaud Gambit from the Dutch opening. 1.d4 e6 2.Bf4 f5 3.g4!? fxg4 4.h3 c5!
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As a patzer I would take the h pawn here and then protect my King. I'd be happy with the destruction of the Kingside and confident I could fend off any attacks. Instead the computer here likes c5! Immediately attacking the center. Of course the enemy protects d4 and then the queen comes out to c6. Black takes a spot in the center and then builds on it. Who says two enemy cities can't share the same wall?

2. "Trade on your terms, not your opponents". When the opponents offer up a trade of pieces, even if it is beneficial to you, make sure it is on your terms. If they move a rook to instigate the trade, if you want to trade, trade but remember you don't have to trade on that square. Move it up to where you capture back with a pawn bringing it toward the center.

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Not exactly the position I wanted to show. But in the above position the Knight at e6 has captured another Knight and is expecting the trade at e6. Here instead of Qxe6, Qe7+ is played! Moving the King to a more cramped position. after Kg6 then Qxe6. Trading pieces on his terms. There is a tactic here, I forgot the name. But my point is that the computer never compromises. Everything is done on their terms, there is no Synergy. Only a selfish desire to win at all costs.

3. Whenever possible, protect an attacked piece with another piece that will attack an enemy piece once the trade has occured. "Protect your pieces with aggressive/attacking pieces."

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I created the above postition and it sucks. No white King and the Black bishop is en prise since it is Whites turn to move. Just as an example though, White wishes to protect the Bishop at c5 from capture by the Bishop on f8. He has three options. c4, Rc1, or Ne4. At a quick look of the position and in a quick game I would probably play c4 protecting the bishop or Rook to c1. But as with the 3rd rule the computer would play e4 because if the bishops were traded off then the N at e4 would fork the king and queen! This diagram is messed up and simple but it shows how to protect a piece and to look for tactics even with expected trades.

I will continue to post more rules as I see them.

Unicorn Defense 1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3. Bd3 f7?

The completely unorthodox gem was dug up from the depths of the Unorthodox Openings Newsletter #18. Black completely ignores the center and in a hypermodern way attacks it from a fianchettoed Queen's bishop. After a Bishop move by White, Black moves the King's Knight pawn up to f7!!?? This of course is the weakest square in the Black camp. This breaks all opening rules and after computer analysis, it would be shown that this defense is totally unsound. Well, suprise suprise, it isn't. After running an 96 1 min game engine tournament with 4 engines it seems the odds aren't 'too' bad. The final score was 60 wins for White, 3 Draws, and 33 wins for Black. Not too shabby for a defense that uses the move f7! Some suprising points to me, being a patzer and all, emerged from these games.

1. The Knights seem to dominate the minor pieces in the wins with black. They dominate until they are traded off. Many fancy sacrifices with the Knights were seen too.

2. f7, although the weak square a lot of times became the base of a pawn chain directly attacking the king side.

3. With a Kingside attack coming the King is either used very aggresively in this attack or is tucked away safely by a Queenside castle. When it is in the attack is usually because it has moved because of the weakness at f7. Which is funny because the weak square forces the King to join in the fight on the Kingside.

4. And a great suprise for me is that the computers often ignore the weak square and instead opt for rapid development and then attack that weak square. By that time though Black has usually build up defenses around that weak square or has prep'd a Queenside castle or Kingside attack.

I was shocked by this opening and then bewildered by its ability to fight for the win. I suggest reading the UON # 18 for the full analysis by a master. The PGN for the games can be found here: unicorn defense.

.

The results were:

.

unicorn2 Ballmer 2008
Rybka 2.3 LK 32-bit 18.0/28 226.50

HIARCS 11.1 UCI 18.0/28 219.00

Deep Shredder 10 UCI 10.5/29 155.25

Fritz 9 10.5/29 147.75
.

These are the 3 final wins by Black.

.

[Event "unicorn2"]

[Site "Ballmer"]

[Date "2008.07.01"]

[Round "15.2"]

[White "Rybka 2.3 LK 32-bit"]

[Black "HIARCS 11.1 UCI"]

[Result "0-1"]

[SetUp "1"]

[FEN "rn1qkbnr/pbppp1pp/1p3p2/8/3PP3/3B4/PPP2PPP/RNBQK1NR w KQkq - 0 1"]

[PlyCount "144"]

[EventDate "2008.07.01"]

[EventType "tourn"]

[Source "Dozer"]
1. Nc3 e6 2. Nf3 Bb4 3. Bd2 Ne7 4. a3 Bxc3 5. Bxc3 O-O 6. O-O f5 7. exf5 Nxf58. Qe2 Nc6 9. g3 Qe7 10. Rad1 a5 11. Qe4 Rae8 12. g4 Nd8 13. Qe2 Nh6 14. Nd2Ndf7 15. f3 Ng5 16. Ne4 Nh3+ 17. Kh1 Nf4 18. Qe3 d5 19. Nf2 e5 20. Rde1 Qh4 21.Bb5 c6 22. Ba4 Ba6 23. Rg1 Ne2 24. dxe5 Nxg1 25. Kxg1 b5 26. Bb3 a4 27. Ba2 Bc828. Bb4 Rf7 29. Qc3 Bb7 30. Re2 Re6 31. Ne4 Nxg4 32. fxg4 Qxg4+ 33. Ng3 h5 34.h3 Qxh3 35. Rg2 Rg6 36. Qd3 Qg4 37. e6 Qxe6 38. Qe2 h4 39. Qxe6 Rxe6 40. Nf1Bc8 41. Ba5 h3 42. Rg3 Re2 43. Ne3 h2+ 44. Kh1 Rff2 45. Bc3 Bf5 46. Rxg7+ Kf847. Ng2 Be4 48. Kxh2 Rxg2+ 49. Rxg2 Rxg2+ 50. Kh3 Rxc2 51. Be5 Rc1 52. b3 Re153. Bd6+ Kf7 54. bxa4 bxa4 55. Bc5 Ke6 56. Kg3 Re2 57. Bb1 Bxb1 58. Kf3 Rc2 59.Bb4 c5 60. Ba5 d4 61. Bb6 Kd5 62. Bd8 Ra2 63. Kf4 d3 64. Ba5 d2 65. Bxd2 Rxd266. Kg5 Ra2 67. Kf6 Rxa3 68. Kg5 Ke5 69. Kg4 Bf5+ 70. Kg5 Rg3+ 71. Kh6 Kf6 72.Kh5 Rh3# 0-1

[Event "unicorn2"]

[Site "Ballmer"]

[Date "2008.07.01"]

[Round "15.3"]

[White "HIARCS 11.1 UCI"]

[Black "Deep Shredder 10 UCI"]

[Result "0-1"]

[SetUp "1"]

[FEN "rn1qkbnr/pbppp1pp/1p3p2/8/3PP3/3B4/PPP2PPP/RNBQK1NR w KQkq - 0 1"]

[PlyCount "128"]

[EventDate "2008.07.01"]

[EventType "tourn"]

[Source "Dozer"]
1. Nc3 e6 2. Qg4 Nc6 3. Nf3 Nb4 4. O-O Ne7 5. Be3 Nxd3 6. cxd3 Ba6 7. Rfd1 h58. Qg3 g5 9. a4 h4 10. Qh3 Bg7 11. e5 Nf5 12. exf6 Bxf6 13. Ne4 Bb7 14. Qg4 h315. g3 Qe7 16. Nxf6+ Qxf6 17. Qxg5 Rh6 18. Qxf6 Rxf6 19. Ng5 Bg2 20. Re1 c6 21.g4 Nxe3 22. Rxe3 Rf4 23. f3 Rxd4 24. Kf2 Ke7 25. Kg3 Rh8 26. b3 a5 27. Rae1 Rb428. Rb1 b5 29. Re4 bxa4 30. Rxb4 axb4 31. bxa4 c5 32. d4 d6 33. dxc5 dxc5 34.Re1 Rb8 35. a5 c4 36. a6 b3 37. Nxe6 Kd6 38. Nd4 Kc5 39. Ne2 Ra8 40. g5 Rxa641. Rb1 Rg6 42. Kg4 Rg8 43. Nf4 Kd4 44. g6 Ke3 45. Re1+ Kd2 46. Re2+ Kd1 47.Rb2 Kc1 48. Re2 c3 49. Re3 Kd2 50. Re2+ Kd1 51. Kg3 b2 52. Kf2 b1=Q 53. Re1+Kc2 54. Rxb1 Kxb1 55. Nd3 c2 56. g7 Rxg7 57. Ke2 Rd7 58. Ne5 Re7 59. Kd3 c1=Q60. Kd4 Qb2+ 61. Kc5 Qxe5+ 62. Kb6 Re6+ 63. Kb7 Qg7+ 64. Kc8 Re8# 0-1

[Event "unicorn2"]

[Site "Ballmer"]

[Date "2008.07.01"]

[Round "16.2"]

[White "HIARCS 11.1 UCI"]

[Black "Rybka 2.3 LK 32-bit"]

[Result "0-1"]

[SetUp "1"]

[FEN "rn1qkbnr/pbppp1pp/1p3p2/8/3PP3/3B4/PPP2PPP/RNBQK1NR w KQkq - 0 1"]

[PlyCount "184"]

[EventDate "2008.07.01"]

[EventType "tourn"]

[Source "Dozer"]
1. Nc3 e6 2. Qg4 Ne7 3. Nf3 Nbc6 4. a3 h5 5. Qg3 h4 6. Qg4 d5 7. exd5 exd5 8.Bg6+ Nxg6 9. Qxg6+ Kd7 10. Qf5+ Ke8 11. O-O Qd7 12. Qxd5 Qxd5 13. Nxd5 Bd6 14.Bf4 Nd8 15. Rae1+ Kd7 16. Bxd6 Bxd5 17. Bb4 Nc6 18. Re3 h3 19. gxh3 Rae8 20.Bc3 Rxh3 21. Ne5+ Nxe5 22. Rxh3 Nf3+ 23. Rxf3 Bxf3 24. Re1 Be4 25. Rc1 Rh8 26.f4 Kd6 27. Be1 Kd5 28. Bf2 c6 29. c4+ Ke6 30. Rd1 Rd8 31. Be3 Rh8 32. Bf2 Rd833. Be3 Rh8 34. b4 Kf5 35. c5 Rh3 36. Re1 b5 37. Re2 Bd5 38. Re1 a6 39. Re2 Rf340. Re1 Ke4 41. Bc1+ Kxd4 42. Re7 Kc3 43. Re2 Kc4 44. Re1 Rc3 45. Kf2 Rc2+ 46.Kg3 Rg2+ 47. Kh3 g6 48. Re3 Rf2 49. Re1 Ra2 50. Re3 Kd4 51. Re1 Kd3 52. Rg1 Kc253. Kh4 Bf7 54. Re1 Ra1 55. Bd2 Rxa3 56. Re7 Bb3 57. Be1 Bd5 58. h3 Kd3 59. Rg7Be4 60. Rf7 Ke2 61. Bg3 Rb3 62. Rxf6 Rxb4 63. Kg4 a5 64. Re6 a4 65. Re8 a3 66.Bh4 a2 67. Bf6 Ra4 68. Ba1 Kd3 69. h4 b4 70. Kg3 b3 71. Rb8 Bd5 72. Kg4 Re4 73.Kg5 Re1 74. Bf6 Rg1+ 75. Kh6 Kc2 76. Kg7 a1=Q 77. Bxa1 Rxa1 78. Kxg6 b2 79.Rxb2+ Kxb2 80. Kf6 Rc1 81. f5 Rxc5 82. Kg7 Ra5 83. f6 c5 84. Kg6 c4 85. h5 c386. h6 c2 87. h7 Be4+ 88. Kf7 c1=Q 89. Kf8 Qc7 90. f7 Ra8+ 91. Kg7 Qe5+ 92. Kh6Ra6# 0-1

1. c4 Nh6?

As usual my curiosity for Knight openings and defenses sent me to the little gem 1. c4 Nh6? . I believe they refer to a Knight on the rim in the opening to be a Drunken Knight. A past UON stirred the interest of this opening for me. What's interesting is yes the Knight is on a typically bad square, yes it will be threatened with capture from the c1 Bishop, and yes it will have to move before or at the beginning of the middlegame. These are all usually bad things, right? For below 2000 ranked players, I don't think so. In fact I think this Knight offers some very interesting ideas.

1. With a Knight on h6 it can ,at some point in the game, post out to f5. Penetrating deep into the enemy center, attacking e3 and d4. I like how in hypermodern openings the Knights attack the center with out actually occupying it. What's interesting to me, is that a Knight at f5 does the same thing but penetrates deeper. Maybe not sound for the opening but may make for interesting play in the middlegame.

2. With the push of the pawn from f7 to f6, a nice little nook can be made for the Knight at h6. From here it influences a good section of the center, doesn't allow a capture or trade of the Knight and keeps it more toward the 'action'. This has been played many times before and usually follows the kingside fianchetto. Although the pawn blocks the Bishop at g7, with the right tactics many possibilities can occur. Discovered attacks with the Bishop maybe?

3. After 1... Nh6 2... g7, the Knight is protected by the Bishop at f8. So if there is a trade with the Bishop at c1 then there is no loss. You gain the Bishop pair, develope a piece, and attack a central diagonal. Sounds ok to me.

With the knowledge of these positions I will test it out at chess.com in their live room. I don't encounter c4 that much in the opening so I'm going to run another engine tournament tonight with 1.e4 2. Nh6. They'll be 1 min games since I'm interested in the openings and how the final games look as the engines do their 'book learning'. Maybe do a 1.d4 tournament tomorrow.

The tournament I ran over the weekend saw 288 5 min games by three engines in a round robin tournament. The PGN for all 288 games can be found here: http://www.lockism.com/engine/c4Nh6.pgn . The results looks as such:
.
c4nh601 2008
Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 60.0 - 36.063.0 - 33.0** 123.0/192
HIARCS 11.1 UCI 36.0 - 60.057.0 - 39.0 ** 93.0/192
Deep Shredder 10 UCI 33.0 - 63.039.0 - 57.0 ** 72.0/192
.
Below are final three wins for Black in the tournament.
.
[Event "c4nh601"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2008.06.29"]
[Round "92.3"]
[White "Deep Shredder 10 UCI"]
[Black "Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit"]
[Result "0-1"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqkb1r/pppppppp/7n/8/2P5/8/PP1PPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]
[PlyCount "142"]
[EventDate "2008.06.27"]
[EventType "tourn"]
[Source "Doezer"]

1. d4 g6 2. e4 Bg7 3. Nc3 O-O 4. h4 d6 5. h5 Ng4 6. Be2 Nf6 7. Be3 Nc6 8. Qd2Ng4 9. Bxg4 Bxg4 10. f3 Bd7 11. Bh6 Bxd4 12. Nge2 Be5 13. Bxf8 Qxf8 14. hxg6fxg6 15. O-O-O Qf7 16. Nd5 a5 17. Kb1 Rc8 18. Rdf1 a4 19. f4 Bg7 20. Qd3 e6 21.Ne3 Nb4 22. Qd2 Na6 23. e5 a3 24. b3 Bc6 25. Nc3 Nc5 26. Qe2 Rf8 27. Qc2 Qe728. Ng4 b6 29. b4 Nd7 30. b5 Bb7 31. c5 Nxc5 32. Ka1 Nd7 33. Nh6+ Bxh6 34. Rxh6dxe5 35. g3 Nc5 36. Qc1 Nd3 37. Qc2 e4 38. Rfh1 Rf7 39. Qa4 e3 40. R1h2 Qc5 41.Rc2 Nb4 42. Rhh2 Nxc2+ 43. Rxc2 Rd7 44. Nb1 Qf5 45. Nc3 Qd3 46. Rc1 e2 47. Nxe2Qxe2 48. Qxa3 Qxb5 49. Qc3 Qa4 50. Qb3 Qd4+ 51. Qb2 Qxb2+ 52. Kxb2 Rd2+ 53. Rc2Rxc2+ 54. Kxc2 Bd5 55. Kc3 Bxa2 56. Kb2 Bd5 57. Ka3 e5 58. fxe5 h5 59. Kb4 g560. Kc3 h4 61. gxh4 gxh4 62. Kd3 h3 63. e6 h2 64. e7 Kf7 65. Kc3 Kxe7 66. Kd3h1=Q 67. Kd2 Qf3 68. Kc2 Qe3 69. Kb2 Qd2+ 70. Kb1 b5 71. Ka1 Qc1# 0-1

[Event "c4nh601"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2008.06.29"]
[Round "96.1"]
[White "Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit"]
[Black "HIARCS 11.1 UCI"]
[Result "0-1"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqkb1r/pppppppp/7n/8/2P5/8/PP1PPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]
[PlyCount "186"]
[EventDate "2008.06.27"]
[EventType "tourn"]
[Source "Doezer"]

1. Nc3 e5 2. d4 exd4 3. Qxd4 Nc6 4. Qe4+ Qe7 5. Qf4 Nb4 6. Kd1 c6 7. Nf3 d5 8.a3 Ng4 9. Be3 Nxe3+ 10. fxe3 Na6 11. cxd5 cxd5 12. g3 Nc7 13. Rc1 g6 14. Nd4Bg7 15. Bg2 Be5 16. Qh6 Be6 17. Nf3 f6 18. Nxe5 fxe5 19. Rf1 O-O-O 20. Ke1 Kb821. Qh4 Qxh4 22. gxh4 Rd6 23. Rf6 Rhd8 24. Rd1 a6 25. Kf2 Ka8 26. Kg3 Ka7 27.h3 Rb6 28. b4 Rbd6 29. Rd2 Ka8 30. Rf1 R6d7 31. Na4 Re7 32. Nc5 Bg8 33. a4 Bf734. Nd3 Be8 35. a5 Ka7 36. Nc5 Bb5 37. Rf6 Bc4 38. Rc2 Nb5 39. Kf2 Rc8 40. e4Nd4 41. Rc1 Rc6 42. Rf8 Nxe2 43. Rxc4 dxc4 44. Kxe2 b6 45. Na4 bxa5 46. bxa5 c347. Kd1 Rd7+ 48. Kc1 Rd2 49. Rf7+ Kb8 50. Bf3 Ra2 51. Rf8+ Kc7 52. Nb6 Kd6 53.Rd8+ Ke6 54. Bg4+ Kf7 55. Rd7+ Kf8 56. Rd5 Kg7 57. Nd7 Rc4 58. Nxe5 Rxe4 59.Bd1 Re1 60. Rd7+ Kf6 61. Nd3 Ra1+ 62. Kc2 Rexd1 63. Rd6+ Kf5 64. Rxa6 Rh1 65.Kxc3 Rxh3 66. Kc4 Rxh4+ 67. Kb5 Rd4 68. Nc5 Rd8 69. Nb7 Rb1+ 70. Kc6 Rc1+ 71.Kb5 Rb8 72. Rb6 h5 73. Nd6+ Ke6 74. Rxb8 Rb1+ 75. Kc6 Rxb8 76. Ne4 Kf5 77. Nd6+Kf4 78. a6 h4 79. a7 Ra8 80. Nf7 Rxa7 81. Nd8 Ra6+ 82. Kb5 Rf6 83. Nb7 h3 84.Nc5 h2 85. Nd3+ Kg3 86. Kb4 h1=Q 87. Kc5 Rc6+ 88. Kd4 Qh4+ 89. Ke3 Qg5+ 90. Kd4Qd8+ 91. Ke4 Re6+ 92. Ne5 Qd6 93. Ke3 Rxe5# 0-1

[Event "c4nh601"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2008.06.29"]
[Round "96.3"]
[White "Deep Shredder 10 UCI"]
[Black "Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit"]
[Result "0-1"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqkb1r/pppppppp/7n/8/2P5/8/PP1PPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]
[PlyCount "146"]
[EventDate "2008.06.27"]
[EventType "tourn"]
[Source "Doezer"]

1. d4 g6 2. Nc3 Bg7 3. e4 d6 4. Nf3 O-O 5. Be2 Nc6 6. d5 Nb4 7. O-O Ng4 8. Ng5Nf6 9. Be3 c6 10. Rb1 Na6 11. b4 h6 12. Nf3 Ng4 13. Bd4 cxd5 14. cxd5 Bd7 15.Qd2 h5 16. Bxg7 Kxg7 17. a4 Rc8 18. Nd4 h4 19. Ndb5 h3 20. gxh3 Nf6 21. Nxa7Ra8 22. Nab5 Bxh3 23. Rfc1 Rh8 24. a5 b6 25. Nd4 bxa5 26. Nc6 Qd7 27. bxa5 Nc528. Qe3 Ng4 29. Qd4+ f6 30. Na4 Nxa4 31. Qxa4 Nxh2 32. f3 Rh5 33. a6 Qe8 34.Rb7 Rg5+ 35. Kf2 Qh8 36. Rxe7+ Kf8 37. Qa1 Qh4+ 38. Ke3 Rg3 39. Qb2 Qg5+ 40.Kd3 Nxf3 41. Rc3 Bc8 42. Bxf3 Rxf3+ 43. Kc4 Bxa6+ 44. Kb3 Qf4 45. Re6 Bd3 46.Nb4 Bxe4 47. Rxf3 Qxf3+ 48. Kc4 Bxd5+ 49. Nxd5 Qg4+ 50. Kd3 Qxe6 51. Qxf6+ Qxf652. Nxf6 Kf7 53. Nd5 g5 54. Ke2 g4 55. Kf1 Ra3 56. Nb4 Rb3 57. Nc6 Rb2 58. Kg1Ke6 59. Nd8+ Kf5 60. Nc6 d5 61. Nd4+ Ke4 62. Ne6 d4 63. Ng5+ Kf4 64. Ne6+ Ke365. Ng5 d3 66. Kh1 d2 67. Kg2 d1=Q+ 68. Kg3 Qg1+ 69. Kh4 Rh2+ 70. Nh3 gxh3 71.Kh5 Qg7 72. Kh4 Kf4 73. Kh5 Qg5# 0-1

Alekhine Defense : Krejcik Gambit w Bxf7

Alright, I ran the engine tournament and was suprised that Deep Shredder 10 won. Rybka has been the reigning champion. I was very pleased with this engine tournament. The path to victory for Black is clear now. Although the king has moved and unable to castle, Black still has an advantage in the opening. This is probably due to the advanced pawns and the fact that you gain tempos by attacking the queen. In the games, if the queens can be traded off early then Black gains the big center and more active pieces. I'm ready for this attack now and will gladly accept the gambit. Here are the results:

...

krejcikBxf7 2008
Deep Shredder 10 UCI 22.5 - 9.526.5 - 5.5** 49.0/642

Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 9.5 - 22.516.0 - 16.0 ** 25.5/643

HIARCS 11.1 UCI 5.5 - 26.516.0 - 16.0 ** 21.5/64

...

The 96 game PGN can be found here: http://www.lockism.com/engine/KrejcikBxf7.pgn

Here is a sample game of how Black can gain a good center and even destroy the Whites pawn structure.

.

[Event "krejcikBxf7"]

[Site "?"]

[Date "2008.06.25"]

[Round "5.1"]

[White "HIARCS 11.1 UCI"]

[Black "Deep Shredder 10 UCI"]

[Result "0-1"]

[PlyCount "111"]

[EventDate "2008.06.25"]

[EventType "tourn"]

1. e4 Nf6 2. Bc4 Nxe4 3. Bxf7 Kxf7 4. Qh5+ Kg8 5. Qd5+ e6 6. Qxe4 d5 7. Qe3 d4 8. Qe2 d3 9. Qxd3 Qxd310. cxd3 Nc6 11. Na3 e5 12. Nf3 Bg4 13. Nc2 Bxf3 14. gxf3 Kf7 15. b3 Bc5 16.Bb2 Rad8 17. Ke2 Rhe8 18. Rac1 a5 19. Rhg1 g6 20. Rg4 h6 21. h4 b6 22. Rcg1 Re623. Bc3 b5 24. Re4 b4 25. Bb2 Rde8 26. Rc1 R8e7 27. Rc4 Bb6 28. Re4 Rd6 29. Ne3 Bd4 30. Nc4 Rf6 31. Bxd4 exd4 32. Re1 Rfe6 33. Kd1 Kf6 34. Kc2 Kf7 35. h5 gxh5 36. Rh1 Kg6 37. Reh4 Re1 38. R1h3 Rf1 39. Rxh5 Ree1 40. Rxh6+ Kf7 41. Rh7+ Ke842. Rh8+ Kd7 43. a4 Rb1 44. R3h7+ Ne7 45. Rh1 Rxh1 46. Rxh1 Rxh1 47. Nxa5 Nc648. Nc4 Ke6 49. f4 Kf5 50. Kb2 Kxf4 51. Kc2 Ne5 52. Na5 Kf3 53. Nc4 Nxc4 54.dxc4 Ke2 55. d3 Rd1 56. a5 Rxd3 57. a6 Rc3+ 58. Kb2 d3 0-1

Alekhine Defense : Krejcik Gambit

1. e4 Nf6 2. Bc4!? An interesting line with only one real trap to it. I was caught by this in a 1 min blitz game and wanted to see what the refutations were. There were many interesting games. Rybka won again. I really need some new engines. Something to give Rybka a run for its money. I'm going to run a tournament between Rybka, Hiarcs, and Deep Shredder 10 for the line 1. e4 Nf6 2. Bc4 Nxe4 3. Bxf7+ . This was the line that kinda threw me and in the tournament there were only a couple of games that ran this line. I will post the results when the games finish. I'd like to do a 40-60 game tournament with the 3 engines. The results to the initial Krejcik Gambit tournament with 5 engines and 40 games was as follows:

krejcik 2008

1 Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 6.0/8

2 HIARCS 11.1 UCI 4.5/8

3 Deep Shredder 10 UCI 3.5/8 13.50

4 Fritz 9 3.5/8 13.25

5 Shredder 10 UCI 2.5/8

The PGN can be downloaded here: http://www.lockism.com/engine/Krejcik.pgn

My 1 min game complex

I can't get away from 1 min games. I think its because I've been focusing a bunch on Unorthodox Openings. Its so much fun pretending I'm Hikaru Nakamura. I'm still an amateur and don't know good time management, when I get into a long game I rush it and lose quickly. I win a bunch but its really not the type of wins I want. Dan Heisman says its better to lose a well thought out game than it is to win a rushed, sloppy game. (Not his exact words but you get the breeze.) Here is an example of a won game but in a BAD way. It was supposed to be a Larsen's Opening gambit but turned into a Bird.

[Event "1 min blitz"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2008.06.25"]
[Round "?"]
[White "boogaloo"]
[Black "kevin235"]
[Result "1-0"]

1. b3 e6 2. f4 Be7 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. e3 O-O5. Be2 Re8 6. Bb2 d6 7. d4 Nc6 8. Nbd2 b69. Bd3 Bb7 10. Qe2 Qd7 11. O-O-O Bd8 12. g4 Be713. g5 Nh5 14. Qg2 f6 15. h4 fxg5 16. hxg5 g617. d5 Nd8 18. Rxh5 gxh5 19. Rh1 Bf8 20. Rxh5 Bg721. Rxh7 Bxb2+ 22. Kxb2 Qxh7 23. Bxh7+ Kxh7 24. Qh3+ Kg725. Qh6+ Kf7 26. Qh7+ Kf8 27. g6 Re7 28. g7+ Ke829. g8=Q+ Kd7 30. Qxe6+ Ke8 31. Qhxe7#

Mokele Mbembe Engine tournament

I ran an engine tournament for the Mokele Mbembe Variation of the Alekhine defense. There were 420 games total. The result looked like this:

Mokele 2008

Rybka 2.3.1 32-bit 91.5
HIARCS 11.1 UCI 79.5
Shredder 10 UCI 69.5
Deep Shredder 10 UCI 67.5
Naum 2.0 57.5
Aristarch 4.50 32.5
Ruffian 1.0.1 22.0

The PGN file can be located here http://www.lockism.com/engine/MokeleEngine.pgn

Alekhine Brooklyn Variation

1. e4 Nf6 2. e5 Ng8!

The Brooklyn Variation of the Alekhine Defense. I ran across this variation on the Unorthodox Chess Openings yahoogroups. They constantly talk about new and interesting openings. This one is 'somewhat' interesting. Its more for the shock value than anything else. I viewed a couple of games they posted and wanted to view more. Following Clyde Nakamura's lead I decided to run a chess engine mini-tournament. There were 12 games in all and they were very interesting. Not suprising though was the fact that black only won one of the games. There were many draws and many wins. While watching some of these games though I realized that for lower rated players (like me) could easily equalize and stun the opponents. Most likely in a 2 or 1 min game. I have come across these positions before so I will try this opening soon. The resulting over extended center kinda reminds me of positions I've reached with the Nimzovitch defense. I will post more about that after I practice this Brooklyn Variation. The games can be found here: http://www.lockism.com/engine/ The file name is Brooklyn_Variation and the results of the games were as so:

Oh.. and this was my first Chess Engine Tournament. I think I could have tweaked it more but am pleased with the results. My analysis can only get better from here on out.

The Tango!

I've been trying a bunch of different openings now that I can play quick live games at work. Today I realized that I haven't been playing the Two Knights Tango. I bought a Tango book years ago but never really studied it and it has been sitting on my shelf. I took it out yesterday and didn't really ready but just skimmed through it. I was very interested in this opening because it is hypermodern to the extreme. Black developes his knights hopeing white will over extend his pawn thus turning them from assets to targets. I luv it. Well today I played one quick game of it and it went well but since it was a 1 min game i lost on time. :( But its ok.. there are many many more 1 min games. Below is the pgn with Fritz 9 blunder check.

[Event "1 min match"]
[Site "Chess.com Live Room"]
[Date "2008.06.18"]
[Round "1"]
[White "dalmatinac"]
[Black "boogaloo"]
[Result "1-0"][ECO "A50"]
[Annotator "Doezer,Jonathan"]
[PlyCount "50"]
[EventDate "2008.06.18"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 Nc6 3. Nc3 e5 4. d5 Ne7 5. e4 Ng6 {last book move} 6. Bg5 Bc57. Nge2 d6 ({-0.30 Fritz 9:} 7... Bxf2+ 8. Kd2 h6 9. Bxf6 Qxf6 10. Kc2 O-O 11.d6 cxd6 12. Qd3 Bc5 13. Rd1 Nf4 {[%eval -179,12]}) 8. Qd2 a6 9. O-O-O b5 ({0.01 Fritz 9:} 9... Bxf2 10. Ng3 Bxg3 11. hxg3 h6 12. Be3 Ng4 13. Be2 Nxe3 14.Qxe3 Qg5 15. Qxg5 hxg5 16. Bh5 {[%eval -87,12]}) 10. cxb5 axb5 11. Nxb5 Bd7 ({0.02 Fritz 9:} 11... Rxa2 12. Bxf6 gxf6 13. Ng3 O-O 14. Nc3 Ra8 15. Bb5 Bg4 16.f3 Ra1+ 17. Kc2 {[%eval -97,10]}) 12. Nbc3 Bb4 13. Ng3 Rxa2 14. Kb1 Qa8 15. Kc2Ba4+ 16. Kd3 Qa6+ 17. Ke3 Qb6+ 18. Kf3 Bxd1+ 19. Qxd1 Bxc3 20. Qb3 Qxb3 21.bxc3 Qxc3+ 22. Be3 Rxf2+ 23. Kxf2 Nh4 ({-10.75 Fritz 9:} 23... Ng4+ 24. Ke2Qxe3+ 25. Kd1 Qd4+ 26. Ke2 h5 27. Nxh5 Rxh5 28. h4 Qb2+ {[%eval -32754,10]})24. Be2 Qd2 ({3.66 Fritz 9:} 24... Qb4 25. Ra1 O-O 26. Rc1 Nxe4+ 27. Nxe4 Qxe428. Bf3 {[%eval -1100,12]}) 25. Bxd2 Nxe4+ ({5.70 Fritz 9:} 25... h6 26. Rc1Kd8 27. Ba5 Ne8 28. Bb5 Ng6 29. Bxe8 Kxe8 30. Nf5 {[%eval 344,12]}) 1-0

Oh god...

My new fav hiphop track is: I Run This - Birdman & Little Wayne

A lot of new Hiphop is trash. This song might be as well, but its catchy and definitely a club banger. I haven't been listening to a lot of hiphop lately. Just my regular Gypsy Jazz and Bluegrass. I recently 'acquired' some flamenco and really like Paco DeLucia. Good stuff.

So..... I witnessed a store robbery last night. I'll post more later.

hassleme.co.uk

Well I just found an excellent site. Its called HassleMe. You go to the website and set up a reminder for yourself. Basically write a message and then set it up for how ever many days you want the reminder to come. I just used it to : "Play a game of Blindfold chess on ICC!!" I hope this will help me remember this. Although I think GMail can do this as well, I think its an interesting site and will support it. Anyways, I need to be 'nagged' to do things sometimes. The more reminders the better!

A Polish Feast

----------------
Mmmm. Yummy Cabbage!
Quickly I will devour thee.
Polish food is good.
----------------

Yesterday I had the privilege to attend the Annual Polish Festival in Patterson Park. It was all weekend but my girlfriend and I only attended the last day. We also only attended for a couple of hours but I accomplished what I went there to do... EAT. My girlfriend and I enjoy making and eating traditional ethnic foods. Hearing there was a Polish Festival right down the street we made it a point to go and sample the local fare. First entering the festival we tried some handmade Pierogi's. Pierogi's are basically like dumplings, pasta outer coverings with ingredients in the middle. Pierogi's are famous in Poland but they are common in all 'Slavic' regions of Europe. They advertised two flavors. The first was a sauerkraut/mushroom pierogi and the second a cheese/mash potato pierogi. We wanted to try all of them but unfortunately they only had the sauerkraut and mushroom one. It was great but I was looking forward to the cheese one. The sauerkraut really took over the flavoring the the aftertaste of the pierogi was amazing. Well worth the buy. Next we tried a local Baltimore's take on a spicy polish sausage. It was great. I had it on bread covered in onions and bell peppers. Although it was a 'polish' sausage it was still just a regular sausage you buy at any festival. Flavors were good but nothing I didn't have before. After the sausage we went to a little family owned stand and go the 'Polish Dish'. It was mash potatoes, pickles, fried pork chops, and some cabbage on the side. Everything was basic except for the cabbage. It totally made up for the $6 price and the instant mashed potatoes. This cabbage was almost a soup, relatively thick, with meat stock to it. Absolutely amazing. I need to find the recipe. Actually, I WILL find the recipe. That was too good to not have again.

There was also a Filipino stand there and they were selling the regular pinoy booth food. Rice, Pork bbq, chicken, and lumpia. What they had that really made my day though was the cantaloupe juice. MMMMMmmmmm. So good. The juice caught my eye and I had to have some. That's the first time I've had that since the old Fil-Am meetings in Italy. If you've never had it I suggest you go get some NOW.

After that we watched some polka bands, bought a belt and then left. I got a cool blue and black cowboy belt. I'll post some pics later.. or not. Whatev.

Sunday Games 5/25/08

This event was horrible for me. To be honest, I didn't even want to go. I pushed myself to go and really wasn't prepared for it. One, I went in there hungover BADLY. Two, I didn't study at all the night before and play a bunch of quick games. Three, I didn't study tactics for two hours before the games. I felt like shit and played anyways. As you will see in my brief comments all of this didn't matter. I won one game, messed up one, and threw away the last two.

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.25"]
[White "Tipton, Randy"]
[Black "Best, Jordan"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]
1. Nf3 e5 2. Nxe5 Qf6 3. d4 c5 4. c3 cxd4 5. cxd4 Nh6 6. e4 Bb4+ 7. Nc3 d6 8. Qa4+ Bd7 9. Nxd7 Nxd7 10. Qxb4 Ng4 11. Be3 h5 12. Nd5 Qh4 13. g3 Qd8 14. Qxd6 f6 15. Nc7+ Kf7 16. Bc4+ Kg6 17. Nxa8 Qxa8 18. Qxd7 Rd8 19. Qf5# *

This game was versus a 6 year old boy. My only win of the day. Suprisingly he was pretty good. His day was there and he seemed like a regular. The kid will be great one day. I didn't run this game through the engine as I am focusing on my losses.

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.25"]
[White "Vasyl Polishchuk"]
[Black "Tipton, Randy"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]
1. e4 Nc6 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. e5 Ng4 4. d4 d6 5. h3 Nh6 6. Bxh6 gxh6 7. Bb5 Bd7 8. Bc4 e6 9. c3 Qe7 10. Nbd2 d5 11. Bd3 O-O-O 12. Qc2 f6 13. a4 f5 14. a5 a6 15. b4 Na7 16. Nb3 Qg7 17. Rg1 Be7 18. Nc5 Bxc5 19. bxc5 c6 20. Rb1 Nb5 21. Qb3 Rhg8 22. c4 dxc4 23. Bxc4 Qe7 24. g3 Rg6 25. Nh4 Rg7 26. Ng2 Be8 27. Bxe6+ Kb8 1-0*

I ran out of time in this game. Vasyl had an old analog clock and it was hard for me to tell how much time I had left. I ended up losing by time in a game that I could have won or at least draw. I need to learn how to convert these types of games.

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.25"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Brown , Wilbert"]
[Black "Tipton, Randy"]
[Result "1-0"]
[WhiteElo "2021"]
[BlackElo "1414"]
[PlyCount "35"]
[EventDate "2008.05.25"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]

1. e4 Nf6 2. e5 Nd5 3. d4 d6 4. c4 Nb6 5. Nf3 dxe5 6. Nxe5 g6 7. c5 Nd5 8. Bc4c6 9. Nc3 Bg7 10. f4 Nd7 11. O-O Nxe5 12. fxe5 e6 13. Ne4 O-O 14. Bxd5 cxd5 15.Nf6+ Kh8 16. Qf3 Bxf6 17. exf6 Qc7 18. Qe3 1-0

I'll be honest. I was a bit nervous to play Wilbert. He runs the place and I really wanted to show him I could play, so I played defensively. This was the totally wrong approach. I ended up in a cramped position. All my pieces were inactive while all of his were very active. He only played one game in the tournament and it was against me. I hope he wasn't trying to test my skills, because if it was a test. I failed horribly.

Unfortunately I haven't converted the 4th game yet. I somehow managed to mess up my notation. I'm very upset with this game because I was winning the game and managed to get checkmated. The game was mine but I threw it away.

Eh. There will always be another tournament. I know I have to get beat up before I get good.

A not so Memorial Day Weekend Pt.1

---------------------------
WHAT? Twenty Dollars??
I'm not on the reduced list?
*sigh* Two tickets then.
---------------------------

I'm gonna have to break up my Memorial Day weekend into a couple of parts. A bunch of things happened and I don't have the time or the resources for each part. Mainly the second part being the chess part and my games are still at the house being analyzed. I can put them up when I get home tonight.

The first part of my weekend started with a visit from Lunee on Friday and an adventure to the old stand by club, Scuzz. I mean, Buzz. Buzz has been the party kid party for almost two decades and its current location is the 4th that I know of. The best thing about Buzz is that you can always count on dark corners, people doing shenanigans everywhere, crazy dancing, drunken debauchery, and everyone getting along (somewhat). Well, the 'new' buzz is none of that. Its located in a part of the city that is designed for middle class to upper middle class people to go party. The whole area is designed for big clubs with expensive drinks, the decor is nice and everyone is looking for someone to hook up with, but not really. As we roll up to the club there are many many nicely dressed patrons waiting outside in the various lines for the many clubs. My first reaction was, 'I'm not dressed for this club.' and I did vocalize that point. Luckily for me, Buzz is located in an alley with a back door entrance. I don't know if they did this purposely so itd seem 'cool'. Like, 'This is the back entrance where all the real clubbin' goes down.' Hahahaha.. that's hilarious but I remember Whitey doing that pre-1964 all over America and it wasn't because it was 'cool'. (Maybe a bad reference but I watched The Great Debaters last night and it was really good) Of course, in order to find this back entrance you had to walk along all the very very very long lines for the other clubs. Of course I pre-gamed and really didn't give a f*ck but all I could imagine was that one young Kandy Kid trying to get in and all the 'pretty' people mocking them and judging them from a far. Buzz used to be the place where that out of place person could go to find refuge. Where being different was welcome and expressing yourself was obligatory. All backgrounds, all demographics welcome. NOT ANYMORE. I'll get more into that in a minute. SO, we find the entrance and they search and card us. We get inside and the girl checks for our names to get on the 'reduced' list. And , ta daaa, they're not. I brought $40 with me under the assumption that it was 10$ to get in. I told Dan I'd pay for him since he hasn't been out in a while. Well, both of us are not on the reduced list and there goes all my money. Mike wanted to go but everyone was inside. I throw down the money and we venture into the mysterious raghall.

Well I will say this, the club is nice. The lights were almost gone and the dancefloor was 'kinda' packed. Lighting was great and nobody was fighting. The only problem was everyone was dressed too nice and nobody was really going off. Baggy pants were replaced with 200$ jeans and pacifiers for expensive lipstick. The vibe was definitely not there and the look in the eyes of the few party kids that were there expressed an 'emptiness'. Not only had the vibe escaped the whole dancefloor, the whole club, the whole area... it seemed to escape the most sacred of spots, the party kid. The scene that made this party and progressed a whole culture. The people that fought Fox 5 and rallied on Captiol Hill. People that have given all of themselves are now getting nothing in return. Buzz has turned into the one thing that every Party Kid was afraid of. A Sell Out. An old giant clawing its way through the club industry just trying to grasp onto anything it can. Its f*ckin' sad is what it is.

I say take whatever bit of dignity and integrity you have left and find that dirty spot where everyone can get down again. Where the spirit runs free and the altered mind allowed to wander. A place where those of us can go to get away from spots like FUR. A place where even if we're getting away from it all, we're still going home.

I'll will post more on the events of the evening. Some of my most favorite people came out and that was nice.

The Chigorin Defense

Although I'm researching Gambit lines right now I've decided to keep with my 'uncommon' approach to openings and start studying the Chigorin (1.d4 d5 2.c4 Nc6). After my loss to J.Martinez (2012), I've felt that a need for a more solid defense with black is needed. Of course I could study standard Queen's Gambit Declined/Accepted Lines or the Nimzo-Indian but I try to follow the road less traveled. Sticking with my old stand by, 'All warfare is based on Deception.' My first choice to battle 1.d4 was the Dutch Defence, as it is reliable up to 2200 players and definitely is not standard movement. Unfortunately, I got dissed by a book seller on Amazon and have yet to receive the book. I have instead decided to study the Chigorin since I already have the book, it throws people off, and I believe former world champion Kramnik uses it frequently. I look forward to studying this opening and using it in the future.

PT Gardener

In between chess studies I like to tend a small container garden I have on my deck here in Baltimore. Although I'm not a real gardener by any means I still enjoy buying some cheap plants at Home Depot and Walmart throwing them into pots full of Miracle grow soil. My friend Dan would cringe at this since most of his plants come from nurseries, mixes his own soil, and fertilizes it himself. Well the plants in one of my containers are turning yellow at the bottom! I don't know if its because its been raining so much or there is a disease. My roommate Sean's plants are doing extremely well despite the fact that their in indoor pots outside and sit in water for days at a time. I even drain the water for him when I'm up there! I wish my plants were like his. :( Hahahah... I really just want to eat the juicy fruits they birth into this world. *slurp*

That free Haiku thing..

I love the 'free haiku for u' widget I have on my blog. Its to the left of here. Most of the posts on here are of chess and Baltimore life. This post is about that wonderful little devil, free haiku 4 u. Whenever I check my blog I read that predictably chaotic thing and it brings me much joy. I even like to write some of my own... I know this is lame but here are the latest few:

Throwing my hammer
I examined the pollen
Upon your blossom

Behind the curtain
Paris resigned finally
Lindsay stopped breathing

Ouch! The poison spine
Oh no! A loss of thinking
Love, has won again

Hahahaha... I know I know.. so lame. Oh well, off to my chess studies!

Sunday Games 5.18.08 - I won one!!!!

So I had better success this past weekend than my first tournament. I walked away with one victory and on draw. I was able to beat Mr. Robertson in the endgame with both of us only having about 4 seconds on the clock. My draw was with Mr. Amos and it should have been a win for me but he caught my king in the corner and a repetitive check. Last week I learned about the clock and this week I learned about draws. One step at a time though. I thought I'd be slick and take on Jorge Martinez with the Budapest Gambit but he quickly refuted the gambit in the first few moves. I'll have to go back and study those vids again. We ended up in an endgame where he was up 2 pawn and all my pieces were cramped. I don't know what happened with my game against Mr. Campbell. I had the more active position, control of the only open file, both bishops and a passed pawn. I have the analysis of that game at home and will definitely go over it today. Great tournament, I couldn't be happier. Below are my games, one game is annotated by Fritz. You'll have to weed through the comments. I'll post up a better copy tonight.


[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.18"]
[White "Randy Tipton"]
[Black "Sidney Robertson"]
[Round "1"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. g3 b6 3. Bg2 Bb7 4. O-O d6 5. c4 e5 6. d3 Be7 7. Nc3 O-O 8. b3 Nbd7 9. Bb2 Nc5 10. e4 Ne6 11. Ne2 c5 12. Ne1 Nd4 13. f4 Ng4 14. Nxd4 Ne3 15. Qe2 Nxf1 16. Ndf3 Nxg3 17. hxg3 exf4 18. gxf4 Bf6 19. Rb1 Bxb2 20. Rxb2 Re8 21. Nc2 Qf6 22. Ne3 Qxf4 23. Nd5 Qc1+ 24. Kf2 Bxd5 25. cxd5 f5 26. Qd2 Qxd2+ 27. Nxd2 1-0

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.18"]
[White "Jorge Martinez"]
[Black "Randy Tipton"]
[Round "2"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e5 3. dxe5 Ng4 4. Bf4 Nc6 5. Nf3 Bc5 6. e3 d6 7. Nc3 Be6 8. exd6 Bxd6 9. Bxd6 Qxd6 10. Qxd6 cxd6 11. h3 Nf6 12. Rd1 Rd8 13. a3 a6 14. Nd5 O-O 15. Nxf6+ gxf6 16. Be2 Kh8 17. O-O Rg8 18. Kh2 Ne5 19. Rd4 Ng6 20. Rfd1 Rd7 21. Rxd6 Rgd8 22. Rxd7 Rxd7 23. Rxd7 Bxd7 24. b4 b6 25. c5 bxc5 26. bxc5 1-0

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.18"]
[White "Randy Tipton"]
[Black "Jay Campbell"]
[Round "3"]
[Result "0-1"]
[TimeControl "25 5"]

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. g3 d5 3. Bg2 e6 4. b3 Be7 5. Bb2 O-O 6. O-O c5 7. d3 Nc6 8. Nbd2 Qc7 9. c4 d4 10. a3 e5 11. Re1 Re8 12. e3 h6 13. exd4 cxd4 14. b4 Bf5 15. Nb3 Bg4 16. Qd2 Bxf3 17. Bxf3 Bf8 18. Qc2 Rad8 19. Re2 b6 20. Rae1 Qd7 21. b5 Nb8 22. Rxe5 Rxe5 23. Rxe5 Bd6 24. Re2 Bc5 25. Nxc5 bxc5 26. a4 Qf5 27. Bg2 Ng4 28. Re7 Qh5 29. h3 Ne5 30. Kf1 Nbd7 31. Qe2 Qg5 32. Rxe5 Qxe5 33. Be4 Qe6 34. Kg2 Nf6 0-1

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.18"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Randy Tipton"]
[Black "Roland Amos"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[Annotator "Fritz 9 (30s)"]
[PlyCount "52"]

{A04: Unusual lines after 1 Nf3 and King's Indian Attack} 1. Nf3 Nc6 2. g3 e53. d3 Be7 4. Bg2 Nf6 5. Nbd2 (5. c4 d5 $11) 5... d5 $15 6. O-O O-O 7. b3 (7. e4dxe4 8. Nxe4 Nxe4 9. dxe4 Qd7 $15) 7... Bd7 {White has a cramped position} (7... e4 8. Ne1 $17) 8. Bb2 $15 {White threatens to win material: Bb2xe5} Bd6 9.Re1 Qe7 (9... a5 10. a3 $15) 10. c4 {White has a cramped position} Nb4 (10...d4 $5 $15) 11. a3 $14 {White threatens to win material: a3xb4} Nc6 12. cxd5Nxd5 {White has a cramped position} 13. Nc4 f5 $2 (13... Nb6 14. Nfd2 $14) 14.Nfd2 {Black has a very active position} (14. Nfxe5 $142 $5 Nxe5 15. Bxd5+ Be616. e4 (16. Bxe5 $6 Bxd5 17. Bxd6 cxd6 $16) (16. Bxb7 $143 Rab8 17. Bxe5 Bxe518. Nxe5 Rxb7 $16) 16... Nxc4 17. dxc4 $18 (17. Bxc4 $6 Bxc4 18. dxc4 f4 $16))14... Nf6 (14... Be6 15. e3 $11) 15. e3 {Black has an active position} (15. Rc1Rac8 $14) 15... Ng4 (15... b5 16. Nxd6 cxd6 17. f4 $14) 16. f4 (16. f3 Nf6 $16)16... b5 (16... exf4 17. exf4 Be6 18. Bxc6 bxc6 19. Nf3 $16) 17. Nxd6 (17. Nxe5$142 $5 Ngxe5 18. fxe5 Nxe5 19. Bxa8 Rxa8 20. b4 $16) 17... cxd6 $14 {White has the pair of bishops} (17... Qxd6 $2 18. h3 Nf6 19. Rc1 exf4 20. gxf4$16) 18. Rc1 {White threatens to win material: Rc1xc6} Rac8 19. Qe2 (19. Bd5+Kh8 $14) 19... a6 (19... Qe6 20. h3 Nf6 21. Rf1 $14) 20. b4 Qf6 (20... Nf6 21.Rf1 $14) 21. Ba1 (21. Bd5+ $142 $5 Kh8 22. h3 $16) 21... Qh6 {Black threatens to win material: Qh6xh2} 22. Bf3 (22. h3 Nf6 $14) 22... Qg6 (22... Qe6 23. h3 Nf6 24. Bg2 $14) 23. Bxg4 (23. h3 $5 {must definitely be considered} Nf6 24. Qg2 $16) 23... fxg4 $11 (23... Qxg4 $224. Qxg4 fxg4 25. Ne4 exf4 26. gxf4 $18) 24. Nb3 (24. Ne4 Rfe8 $11) 24... Rcd8(24... Qe6 25. Qb2 $15) 25. Qd2 (25. fxe5 $142 dxe5 26. Qc2 $11) 25... e4 $4 {letting the wind out of his own sails} (25... Qf7 $142 {and Black can hope to live} 26. Rc3 Rc8 $15) 26. d4 $4 {White lets it slip away} (26. dxe4 $142 Rfe8 27. Qd5+ Be6 28. Qxc6 Bxb3 29. f5 $16 (29. Qxa6 $6 Qxe430. Qa7 Re7 $14)) 26... d5 (26... Rf5 $5 $17) 1/2-1/2

Games from Sun 5/11/08

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.11"]
[White "Randy Tipton"]
[Black "Sidney Robertson"]
[Result "0-1"]
[TimeControl "25+5"]

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. g3 e6 3. Bg2 Nc6 4. O-O b6 5. c4 Bb7
6. Nc3 Bb4 7. Qc2 h6 8. d3 O-O 9. b3 Bc5 10. a3 Nd4
11. Nxd4 Bxg2 12. Kxg2 Bxd4 13. Bb2 Re8 14. Rad1 Ng4 15. Ne4 Bxf2
16. Qc3 e5 17. Rxf2 Ne3+ 18. Kg1 Nxd1 19. Qc1 Nxf2 20. Kxf2 f5
21. Nd2 Qg5 22. Qd1 c6 23. Nf3 Qf6 24. Qa1 d6 25. Qb1 b5
26. Ba1 a5 27. e3 g5 0-1


[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.11"]
[White "Nelson Gonzalez]
[Black "Randy Tipton"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25+5"]

1. e4 Nc6 2. d4 d5 3. exd5 Qxd5 4. Nf3 Bg4 5. Nc3 Qd7
6. Be3 Nf6 7. Be2 O-O-O 8. O-O Bxf3 9. Bxf3 Nxd4 10. Bd5 Nxd5
11. Qxd4 Nxe3 12. Qxe3 Kb8 13. a4 c6 14. Qf4+ e5 15. Qxe5+ Qd6
16. Qh5 g6 17. Qf3 f5 18. Rad1 Qc7 19. Qe3 Bg7 20. Qc5 Rhe8
21. Rxd8+ Rxd8 22. Re1 Bf8 23. Qe3 Qd7 24. g3 Bg7 25. Rd1 Qc7
26. Re1 Bd4 27. Qf3 Qb6 28. b3 Qc5 29. Rd1 Re8 30. Ne2 Qxc2
31. Nxd4 Qe4 32. Qxe4 fxe4 33. Nc2 Kc7 1-0


[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.11"]
[White "Richard Adams"]
[Black "Randy Tipton"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "25+5"]

1. e4 Nc6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 f6 4. exf6 Nxf6 5. Bf4 Bf5
6. c3 g6 7. Bd3 Qd7 8. Nf3 Bg7 9. O-O O-O-O 10. Qc2 e6
11. Nbd2 Rde8 12. b4 Nh5 13. Be3 e5 14. dxe5 Bxd3 15. Qxd3 Bxe5
16. b5 Na5 17. Nxe5 Rxe5 18. Bd4 Nf4 19. Qb1 Ne2+ 20. Kh1 Nxd4
21. cxd4 Re2 22. Qb4 b6 23. Nf3 Nc4 24. a4 Rhe8 25. Rae1 Qe7
26. Qc3 Nd6 27. Ne5 Qe6
*

THE CLOCK!!!! (my first tourney)

[Event "Sunday Quick"]
[Site "Fells Point Chess Club"]
[Date "2008.05.11"]
[White "Randy Tipton"]
[Black "Jay Campbell"]
[Result "0-1"]
[TimeControl "25+5"]

1.Nf3 d5 2.g3 c6 3.Bg2 Nf6 4.O-O Qc7 5.d3 e5 6.Nbd2 Be7 7.b3 O-O 8.Bb2 Bd6 9.c4 d4 10.Ng5 h6 11.Nge4 Nxe4 12.Nxe4 Be7 13.Re1 c5 14.e3 Nc6 15.a3 Bf5 16.exd4 exd4 17.Bc1 Rfe8 18.Bf4 Qd7 19.Ra2 Bg4 20.Qc1 Bf8 21.Bxh6 0-1

I finally did it. I bought my USCF rating and I went to the Fells Point Chess Club for my very first tournament. As expected, I got my ass stomped. As expected everyone was around 1700+, and as expected, I had a great time. I was proud of my play yesterday. I held out in the opening in all games, resigned two, and lost by time on two. Time control is way different OTB (over the board) than it is online. 25 5 games go by quick! Online when you move the time automatically moves for you, OTB you have to hit your clock and record your moves. I have all my games in PGN and will post them for analysis soon, but I really wanted to show this game. I made a great tactical shot but was so excited I forgot to hit the clock and my time went down 10 mins! Then time control got to my head and I lost it all. First valuable lesson is always watch your clock and always hit the clock after every move!! Hahahah. Oh well. I still had fun and the guys there are really nice. I can't wait for the next tournament. I definitely addicted.

Baltimore Roller Derby 5.3.08

I'm a bit late for this post but wanted to share my experiences at the recent Roller Derby in Canton, Baltimore. A friend of mine at work told about it and although she didn't make it out, I went with my Blabes and my roommate. We had a blast. The beer was $3 a pop and the Roller Derby was fantastic. I used to watch the professionals do it late night (3am) on the sports channel. Although this league wasn't as professional as those girls there was still a lot of elbow throwing and body slamming! The rules are crazy, each team has to play offense and defense at the same time, each team has one point scorer a piece, the point scorer has to loop the track once and all opposing members she passes on the second loop count as one point a piece. I'd go more into it but it took me 30 mins just to figure it out myself. The Mobtown Mods won for the second year in a row and they were fantastic. I'm glad I checked it out and it made a wonderful Saturday evening out. There is boxing Friday the 16th and I might check that out as well.

1600 !!!!!!

I finally made it to 1600 at Gameknot.com. To be honest I never thought I'd reach this level. If you look at the graph, the point where my rating starts to shoot up is where I started to study tactics, tactics, and tactics. Unfortunately, I haven't been studying tactics as of late and some of my games are reflecting this. I recently Blundered my queen and fairly equal game.

In other news I finally got my USCF rating! The first available tournament for me will be in two Sundays. I sure am nervous, but I need to compete if I want that 'Expert' title. If you're on the USCF page look me up!

Hypermodern. Deception at it's finest?

I got pretty stiff last night and have the headache to show for it. Since I've been porky about my blogs I figured I'd push through and post some thoughts about Hypermodern theory. One its good to put my ideas out there for criticism and two I figure writing helps with your speech. I will probably revise this a few times but my initial thoughts will follow. So here goes.

Hypermodern theory in chess is the idea that you control the center of the board with pieces instead of centralized pawns. Pawns should be used as an aid to developement and not a part of developement. Pawns in the center become targets. This allows you to develope your whole army and allow the opponent a chance to over-extend his own pawns. Thus becoming targets for your already developed pieces.

Many players are allured to the Hypermodern openings because it developes positional play and prevents the immediate tactics of 1.e4 and 1.d4. When a game is drawn into positional play subtle moves become important and to most aggressive players it's very dull. 1.e4 allows the opening of the bishop and queen allowing many sharp lines. No wonder this is the most popular opening. You start your attack from the very beginning! Its also no wonder that 1.e4 is the most studied move as well. Many openings and theories come from just this one single move. 1.e4 is the most popular with d4,c4,and nf3 to follow.

Many positional players use Hypermodern openings. But not only is there a postional advantage, there is another deeper advantage to this opening thought. Since 1.e4 is the standard opening move for most games the usual reply is 1.. c5 or 1.. e5. White has obviously studied 1.e4 immensely so he is expecting c5 or e5. So why not open up with something off the wall that will throw off their game!? Something like 1..Nf6 (Alekhine) or 1.. Nc6 (Nimzovich). Both hypermodern openings, both with sound replies and most of the time the opponent doesn't expect these defenses and loses on different levels. One they enter territory unknown to them , two they lose on time, and three you immediately take control of the game.

Ask any of the of the cats I hang out with what my motto is and they will reply,'All warfare is based on deception.' I believe Hypermodern theory to be not only viable in positional views but also in the ideas that you can deceive someone into parts of the game they are unfamiliar and uncomfortable with. In turn giving you an immediate advantage.