Eric scored a perfect 12-0 in Saturday's simul to publicize the return of the Illinois Chess Tour. Having been paid appropriate hush money, we withhold the names of all victims. Thanks to Mike Cardinale for organizing and for treating seven of us to a wonderful breakfast at Yolk (I hadn't seen Captain Streeter's statue before!), to the kind folks at Marbles for a very nice venue, for Grandmaster Dmitry Gurevich for stopping by to give Eric his good wishes, and to Eric for his volunteer service.
This was the first game to finish, if only because a player with chess culture knows when to resign:
And here's the finale of the last game. Black outplayed Eric in the middlegame. A pawn up, our brave N.N. quite correctly turned down a perpetual check to press Eric for the win. But it's hard to win a queen ending against a 2400, and no one has had more heartbreaking losses than Nomen Nescio:
P.S. Wow, what a boo-boo I made above! Pattern recognition is not the best substitute for thinking....
3 comments:
Dude, your analysis is unsound! After 1...Qb6+! 2.Kh1 Nf2+ 3.Kg1??, Black should play simply 3...Nxd1+ with an extra queen. Your recommendation 3...Nh3+?? 4.Kh1 Qg1+?? would be met by 5.Nxg1! and Black stands up.
In 1973 or so, when I was rated around 1400 and playing the Petroff against David Axinn (1688), he made such a blunder against me. He played Qg8+, I believe supported by a bishop, so that ...Kxg8 was impossible. He had a knight on e5 ready to deliver smothered mate on f7. I was shocked for a few seconds and then saw, and played, ...Nxg8! rather than ...Rxg8 falling into smothered mate. I thought the poor guy was going to pass out.
In the queen ending, the position of Black's king is so awkward that I doubt that he has any way to play for a win. 1...Qd4 allows a perpetual check: 2.Qc6+ Qb6 3.Qc8+ Qb7 4.Qe6+ etc.
Re megablunder: I never said I was good at this game!
Understood that position #2 was hopelessly drawn in the diagrammed, but Black had good chances earlier.
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