Winning a drawn game

In the following game, I could have played a promising exchange sac on move 11, and could have won a clear pawn on move 12. Instead, I played several inferior moves, giving White close to a winning position by move 18. White in turn played some inferior moves, allowing me to escape into what should have been a dead-drawn ending with rook and three pawns against rook and three pawns on the same same of the board. Oh well, beats a loss, right? But much to my surprise, White played extremely passively and I was able to eke out a win. I'm now 87-0-0 on GameKnot, though as I keep saying, my perfect score will come to an end soon. (This was one of the games that was supposed to end it.)

My opponent was no GM, to be sure, but even the best players can screw up simple rook endings. GM Alex Onischuk (in)famously lost a "dead drawn" 3 pawns versus 2 pawns ending at last year's Olympiad, and even then-World Champion Kasparov once lost a 4 pawns versus 3 pawns ending, another easy theoretical draw. On Facebook, NM Gopal Menon recently annotated his game against GM Alex Shabalov. After a long fight, Shabalov accepted Gopal's draw offer. When Gopal later analyzed the game, he was shocked to realize that Shabalov was completely winning in the final position! Chess is a hard game.

Reeling in the big fish

Many have tried; few have succeeded.

Our own Carl Boor took down former U.S. Champion Alexander Shabalov last weekend:

Equalizing is only the beginnning

NM Sam Schmakel of Whitney Young High School reaches a completely equal middlegame against former US Champion Alexander Shabalov. Sam tries for a little bit more than equality, and gets punished...this time.

Sam Schmakel equal third at Denker

Our high school representative, Sam Schmakel of Whitney Young, also did Illinois proud.  The final crosstable is here, and Chess Life Online has a nice feature on the winners of the Denker and the Barber.

Sam has a perfect score in the early rounds of the U.S. Open (six-day schedule), and will be playing "behind the ropes" against GM Alexander Shabalov.  You should be able to follow the action at monroi.com: action begins at noon Pacific, 2 p.m. Chicago time.

Both Sam and Sean Vibbert of Indiana (who also had a great event) came out swinging in the following game from Round 5. As often happens in Golden Gloves, they neutralized each other without doing damage.

GM Karsten Müller annotates endings from Chicago Open

Good stuff on ChessBase.  Don't miss the endgame between GMs Shabalov and Sargissian, beginning at move 75.  (It's hard to win clear first in the Chicago Open unless you win at least one drawn ending!)

I'd just happened to see GM Yermolinsky's instructive comments on the Shabalov-Sargissian game on ICC this past Sunday.  It's the June 3rd entry in Yermo's "Every Russian Schoolboy Knows" series, "Bishop vs. Knight - Part 1."

Lotsa Latvian

If the Latvian Gambit is unsound, then why doesn't four-time U.S. Champion Alexander Shabalov refute it? OK, Shabalov may be an ethnic Russian, but he was born and raised in Latvia, and was a student of Tal.

The Grandmaster escapes with the full point.

Brilliant win by Dmitry Gurevich

If you play either side of the Catalan, you should pay attention to this game!  The main line of the Open Catalan begins with 7.Qc2.  Black's reply 7...b5!? has been played before, but it's been considered an unimportant sideline.  In almost every previous game, Black met 8.a4 with 8...c6, with less-than-satisfactory results.

As Eric Rosen explained to me a couple weeks ago, Alexander Shabalov revived 7...b5!? against Sam Shankland in this year's U.S. Championship.  Shabalov's primary contribution seems to be the realization that after 8.a4, the critical move is 8...b4!

Dmitry is Eric's teacher, so I suspect the two of them have been working on this line together.  The engines tell me that in yesterday's game against six-time Dutch champion Loek Van Wely, Gurevich was better after 14 moves and simply winning after 16...Bf6!  Dmitry finished the game in style with a bishop sac and a rook sac. Impressive preparation and play against a super GM!

World Open: A cute mate

Eric Rosen drew GM Ray Robson in Round One last night.  Alexander Shabalov broke down Eric's Sicilian in Round Two, however:

You can follow top board action at monroi.com: Mesgen Amanov is playing an interesting double-rook ending right now.

GM Mesgen Amanov wins Midwest Class

This was not your typical weekend Swiss: in the last three rounds, Mesgen had to beat current Illinois State Champion GM Dmitry Gurevich and four-time U.S. Champion GM Alexander Shabalov, then draw Filipino GM Mark Paragua.

95-year-old Erik Karklins tied for second in the Expert section and gained an estimated 21 rating points, for a net gain of 85 points this decade. 

10-year-old Warren Scholar Conrad Oberhaus won the Class B section with a perfect 5-0 score and is now an A player!  Warren Scholar James Wei (age 10) and grizzled veteran Zachary Holecek (age 11 or 12?) scored 3½ in the Class A section: both gained a bucket of ELO.

Crosstable here!  (USCF hasn't rated yet: I'll edit the post to add when it does.)

Ashley & Shahade on yesterday's action

Great coverage!