Jeopardy, Fischer, anthropology, phone-a-friend

Random links....

Stanley Fish discusses Hubert Dreyfus's critique of AI.  And Kasparov opines...

White to play

Can you evaluate this position more accurately than Rybka?

If so, why?

Sevan Muradian told me that Robert R. Desjarlais's Counterplay: An Anthropologist at the Chessboard looks like interesting reading.

Garry Kasparov reviews Frank Brady's Endgame.  Mig discusses that review, too.


And guess who was on the Georgian version of Who Wants to Be A Millionaire?

2011 Warren Scholars announced

Warren Junior Program director Andi Rosen (who's been busy this week!) announces the 2011 awards on the ICA website.

First Illinois Elementary School Association championship results!

Mike Zacate reports at the Illinois Chess Association website!

Forty-three teams at the U.S. Cellular Coliseum in Bloomington

U.S. Amateur Team North results!

Andi Rosen reports at Chess Life Online.

 The uchicago.edu team finished 2nd on tiebreaks

Next year, why not "Straight outta Quadrangle"?

Here's the list of prizewinners and here are the MSA results by player.

Beginners' trap?

Local Class A player Dean Arond plays many objectively dubious openings.  But he knows them very well, he has fun playing these sharp lines, and more than one master has fallen into his snare.  In the following game, Dean equalizes against Whitney Young's Sam Schmakel with an opening best known as a beginners' trap.

White to play

Sam Schmakel-Dean Arond, Skokie 2011

I thought the ending was interesting, too!  You can play through the game on the interactive board below:

"Chess crown eludes Niles North"

Michael Chinitz of Niles North

Brad Rosen reports at SkokiePatch.

"Lufei Ruan to Appear at North Shore Center"

See Sevan Muradian's article at Chess Life Online!

"Secrets of a Mind-Gamer"

Essential reading: the section on techniques for breaking through plateaus is of particular interest to chess players.

Santarius wins Blitz, Angelo Young wins title

NM Erik Santarius won the ICA Blitz Championship with an excellent 9-1 score against very tough competition.    As Erik is a Wisconsin resident, the second-place finisher, IM Angelo Young, adds the title of 2011 Illinois Blitz Champion to his five "slow" titles.  Anglelo scored 7½-2½.  Two-time US Game/30 champion Michael Auger, NM Eric Rosen, NM Atulya Shetty, and Matthew Wilber tied for third with 7-3.

NM Gopal Menon, who's one of the strongest "bullet" (one-minute game) players on the Internet Chess Club, didn't win a prize this year, nor did NMs Stamnov or Karagianis.

Results are here!

Frank Brady on CSPAN2 tonight

Mr. Brady will be discussing Endgame at 7:15 Central Time.  The interview is about 40 minutes.  (Hat tip to Ken Marshall for the heads-up.)

1001 Deadly Checkmates

I recently got John Nunn's new book 1001 Deadly Checkmates. It's a collection of (you guessed it) 1001 positions from actual play (mostly in the last few years) where the player on move can checkmate by force in a few moves. It is a great book, which I think will be useful to a wide range of players, say from 1400 to 2400. I'm 2200 OTB and can solve most of the problems pretty quickly (197 out of the first 200), but still find them useful for honing my tactical skills. They should be even more useful for lower-rated players, who will find a lot of mating ideas that are new to them. Chess is largely a matter of pattern recognition, so exercises like these are useful to everyone. It's reasonably priced, too - only $15.75 at Amazon.com.

Here is a position, from Kotrotsos-Stiri, Iraklion 2005 (No. 640 in Nunn's book) that surprised me. I solved it quickly enough, but might not have if I hadn't known that there was a mate to be found. White, on move, must force mate.

A trap in the Slav

This trap is similar to several others where a player plays B-KN5 (i.e. Bg5 or Bg4, depending on color), then follows it up with P-K3 (e3 or e6), allowing the opponent to win the unprotected bishop with Q-R4+ (Qa5+ or Qa4+). These include (a) the notorious 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 c6 3.e3?? Qa5+ 0-1, Z. Đorđević-M. Kovačević, Bela Crkva 1984; (b) 1.Nf3 d5 2.g3 c6 3.Bg2 Bg4 4.c4 e6 5.cxd5 cxd5?? 6.Qa4+ Bachler-Van Meter, Midwest Masters 1985; and (c) 1.g4? d5 2.Bg2 Bxg4 3.c4 c6 4.Qb3 e6 5.cxd5 cxd5?? 6.Qa4+ Van der Heijden-Van Ranwooy, Walwijk 1978. These games offer further evidence for GM John Nunn's "LPDO" (Loose Pieces Drop Off) principle.

Evanston Chess Club email cut & paste

Levy Senior Center, 300 Dodge Ave, Evanston, IL 60202

Evanston Chess Presents:

Feb 22, 2011

7:15pm - 8:15 pm

Lecture: Taking It Up a Level

Our Evanston Chess Club simuls in September and December left some of our players asking, "How can I play better chess?" By popular demand, NM Jon Burgess will give an informal lecture on a variety of ways club players can improve their games. The lecture is free and open to those who are high school age and older.

Coming Events:
--Feb 22, 2011, Lecture: Taking It Up a Level
--Mar 05, 2011, 3SS G/65 Three x Three
--May 14, 2011, 4SS G/45 Tri-Level

See http://evanstonchess.org/ for details.

North Shore Chess Club tournament tomorrow

Another cut-and-paste from my email:

Game-45 Sunday Afternoon Tournament 2/20

We have our monthly Game-45 tournament on Sunday afternoon February 20 @ 1pm.
North Shore Chess Center G/45 - 4R-SS G/45 + 10/sec increment. North Shore Chess Center, 5500 West Touhy Ave Suite A, Skokie, IL 60077. 847.423.8626. EF: $20 for non-members of the chess center, $15 for members of the chess center received by 2/19. All $5 more onsite. Onsite registration - up to 15 minutes prior to round 1 or round 2. If registering prior to round 2, you will receive a half-point bye for round 1. Round times: 1pm for round one and then 15 minutes after final game from previous round completed. Half-point byes available in any round. Prizes: Book prizes for top three finishers. Biggest upset (150+ points): Free entry to following month G/45 + book prize.Parking: Free self-parking. Mail entries with registration information to: North American Chess Association (make checks payable to), 4957 Oakton Street Suite 113, Skokie, IL 60077. Online registration preferred. Additional questions email to: sevan@nachess.org. USCF rated. For online registration and list of more events please visit http://www.nachess.org/events 

View the pre-registration list by clicking here.

State Blitz Championship tomorrow night!

Begins at 8 p.m. tomorrow in Northbrook!  Instead of watching a movie, play ten blitz games!

More info here!

Register here!

ICA STATE BLITZ CHAMPIONSHIP
FEBRUARY 19, 2011

Crowne Plaza, 2875 N Milwaukee, Northbrook, Illinois 60062, (847) 298-2525,

$79 Room Rate (single, double, triple, quad) Includes FREE Breakfast Buffet!.

$79 Hotel Room Rates - Free Breakfast Buffet with room - And More...

Bring Sets, Boards, & Clocks

$500 b/30

1st: $150 & Title (determined by tiebreaks)

2nd: $125

3rd: $50

U2200: $47

U2000: $46

U1800: $45

U1600: $44

U1400: $43

UN can win top prizes only

ENTRY FEES & info

$25 received by 2/16 USPS

$25 on-line by 2/18, 6 PM

$30 at the site

5 Rounds

2 Games with each opponent

Round 1: 8 pm

(and as available after that)

Byes Round 1 only

Chess Party of the Year starts tonight / tomorrow!

You still have a few hours to put together a team for the U.S. Amateur Team North (Crowne Plaza, 2875 N. Milwaukee, Northbrook).  Seriously....there's a split first round: if you can't play tonight at 7 p.m., your team can begin play tomorrow a.m.

Enter here!

Read all about it here!

Andi Rosen tells us that there's a Wisconsin team with GM Friedel on first board and former Wisconsin champion Alex Betaneli on third board!

not directly about chess....

...but chess players who have experienced the amazing capacities and surprising limitations of chess engines can probably relate to IBM's Watson project better than most of the general public.

I've lived in Chicago all my adult life, and I'd always assumed that Midway Airport was named after the Midway Plaisance.  Oops!

P.S.  Others are seeing the relevance to chess, too: here, Kasparov is invoked to argue for human-cylon collaboration.

Scholastic national events coming up!

Our Twin Cities friend Mark Nibbelin reminds us to register for nationals. (pdf)

• 2011 K-9 Championship,  April 15 - 17,  Columbus Ohio
  
• 2011 National High School K-12 Championships,  April 29 - May 1,  Nashville, TN 
• 2011 National Elementary K-6 Championships,  May 6 - 8,  Dallas TX 

"Music Box Acquires Sundance's 'Bobby Fischer'"

Cool Chicago connection: Music Box Films, which just acquired the documentary "Bobby Fischer Against the Rest of the World" is owned by the same corporation that owns my favorite Chicago art house.

Story here!

Joel Benjamin wrote up his Sundance visit on Chess Life Online.

Whitney Young team featured on WGN TV