Sunday, April 17, 2005

Round 1: Loss

Here's my first-round game from last weekend, a loss to IM Jay Bonin, I've played Jay...13 times, says my database, since 1978. Once in a while I nick him for a draw.

Normally, I'd clean up a game before posting it, but this time I wanted to give an idea of what my post-game analysis looks like, in case anyone cares. This is about 5 hours worth of work; I'll try to go back and do another couple of hours on it after I finish with the other games.

There's a couple of things to notice about this game. First, I had plenty of chances to get an equal or superior position, and missed them. Bonin just hung in there, kept playing decent moves, and waited for his chances to come--and they did. This is the same thing I did to Ali in my first post. In short, he outplayed me.

The other thing is that the main reasons for my loss were _not_ tactical. Yes, I missed a simple tactic (the decoy-and-fork at moves 30-31), and a tactic I probably wouldn't have spotted in Black's best line at move 29 means that I would have been struggling for the draw even without that one, but more important were psychological errors (I wanted to simplify the game, so I offered the exchange of Queens with 24...Qxe5, instead of the superior 24...Bxe5; exchanged on d4 before playing e5--thus freeing his QB--instead of playing ...e5 immediately; and avoided the complicated line starting with 18...Bxf2) and dogmatism (trying immediate action in the center with 6...Ne4 when I should have been developing instead, because acting in the center is "what you do" when the opponent starts a wing advance).

Analysing my two wins should take less time, and I expect to do them this week.


Comments:
I cant seem to play thru the game. Does it work on your browser?
 
Yes, it does--I've tried IE and Firefox 1.0.1 on Windows. What browser are you using, and what happens when you try? Can you see the game score in the right-hand pane? Do the earlier games work?

Thanks for the report.
 
I use opera. I also tried IE, but it doest seem to work also, but the PGN files automatically downloaded from your site. Must be something to do with the firewall we are using.
 
Interesting. I tried Opera and indeed it doesn't work, for any of the games I've posted. I assume JavaScript boards on other sites work for you?

I'll write to LT-Pgn-Viewer's author and see if he has any ideas. He's been very helpful in the past.

IE deciding to download the PGN files I really don't understand. Maybe you're right that it's a firewall thing.
 
As I expected, Lutz was very helpful. Turns out I hadn't read the documentation carefulle enough, and now I think things are fixed on the JavaScript boards..

Next I'll try to make the overall format look better. I don't understand why the links column gets pushed to the bottom like that.
 
The board is now moving. how did you manage to imbed the board in your post?
 
I learned a few tricks from your game with ali. Particularly, The Kh7, Bh6 manuever. whered you get that stuff? Havent seen it from any of my books.
 
For embedding the board in my posts, the short answer is that I use the LT-PGN-Viewer package (URL in my links list) to display the pgn file; the package and the game file are on a remote website, the post contains and iframe pointing to teh pgn viewer on that website.

The long answer is, well, long. I'll write a little post about it later today.
 
I'm glad you found something useful in the Ali game. The Kh7/Bh6 idea is a standard King's Indian thing. I know there's a specific game I first picked it up from, and I'll see if I can look it up later; but if you play over a lot of King's Indian and Modern Defence games--compete games, not just openings--you see that there are a bunch of ways to get rid of or activate the "bad" King's Bishop (besides Kh7/Bh6 after castling, there's h5/Bh6 before castling, or Bh6 with the Knight still on g8, and so on). These turn out to be generally useful in positions with a fianchettoed Bishop that's blocked by his own Pawns.

One thing to keep in mind is that all these maneuvers cost a couple of tempi, so you can only use them when you can afford the time, usually when the position is blocked.
 
i have spent hours and hours to get my viewer to where it is now. sad, but true. would it offend you if i asked you if there was any way that you could or would send me the html for what you have here, that is to say, so that i can sub in my own game and notes but use this game as my chassis so i know what i start with works?

it might not matter, but Mark Weeks has me as one of the top 21 chess blogs, but i am not an html programer. but i am a very close friend of GM Seirawans, and promise to act with full integrity.

David K Seattle
transformation at cable speed [this is one word] dot com. i hope you are not offended, but what you have is for me to die for!
 
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