World Senior Championships - 3 Irish players

EnPassant

The World Senior Championship is starting today.

There are 3 Irish players, 2 in the over-50 competition and 1 in the over-65.

The first round results are:-

Over 50:-
Evgenij Kalegin IM (Russia) 2420 1-0 Peter Cafolla
Giorgi Bagaturov GM (Georgia) 2410 1-0 Anthony Fox

Over 65:-
Tim Harding 1-0 David Dvorsky (Israel) 1594

Website is at http://www.wscc2016.net/
Perhaps we will get some reports …

sodacat11

I have played in Marienbad a number of times before . It is a very quiet and very beautiful spa town with a rich chess history. This is the first time that the world senior championship has been held there and such was the huge entry that a number of extra hotels have had to be employed.
My first game was against a strong Russian I.M.,it was broadcast live along with many other games. I felt that I acquitted myself pretty well since it was my first game in about eight months but the way that he kept probing and then concluded with a nice mating attack was very instructive. The tournament is being split between two hotels and the top half of the boards is in by far the nicer venue so my target for the next ten days is to play most of my games in that hotel.
Anthony Fox is in the same tournament but he suffered a similar fate to me. Tim Harding kept the flag flying with a win in the geriatric event

Tim Harding

Yeah the guys in the babies' event had really tough pairings yesterday (especially as they had Black) but hopefully they can bounce back today.

My Israeli (ex-Russian) opponent was over 2200 in the 1970s according to one chess website so proved tougher to beat than his rating might suggest. He clearly hasn't played much under new rules as he brought his phone to the board and wrote moves down before playing them, so a Ukrainian arbiter had to be summoned to explain things.

Fortunately he cracked in the ending and I was able to deliver a checkmate just before the time control.

So I get "promoted" to the main hotel for our tournament (NOT "geriatrics" please!) and hope I can stay there, although it's up a steep hill from the one where I'm staying.

sodacat11

Anthony won today and I don't know how Tim got on against a guy called Furman. I presume that it is the well known player of that name but I'm not sure.
I was playing a very low rated guy who didn't seem to have much of a clue. I blizted out the opening,won a pawn and had a huge advantage before inventing my own version of kamikaze chess and completely self destructing. Luckily the game was not broadcast live as it was an embarrassment. I knew that I was rusty coming into the event but even so this was something else. Oh well, at least Chelsea won and are top of the league !!!

Tim Harding

Sorry to hear that, sodacat. Better luck tomorrow.

I also lost, to FIDE Master Boris Furman. I think he may be related to the better-known Semyon Furman but I'm not sure. He was a difficult opponent to get with Black early on as he
plays regularly, not only in Senior tournaments, and has a very stable opening repertoire that he knows well.
My pawn sac in the opening (a Nick Pert idea) was probably not played by me in the right way and I never really recovered, though I came close to a back rank swindle near the end.

However 1/2 is a normal score because of the rating mismatches you often get early on. There are still nine rounds to go.

sodacat11

After recovering from the shock and then reviewing my game yesterday with Fritz I have had to change my opinion about it. My position, even when a pawn up was never winning and in fact I never held more than a small advantage.My moves and plans that I thought were errors were,in fact,actually quite good and the moves which I had considered to be almost forced turned out to be the mistakes and even they apart from one weren't all that bad which suggests that my opponent was better than I gave him credit for. One thing that strikes me from the game is that I fell into an old recurring mistake of mine (especially after a long lay off from the game) where I play lazily and according to generalities instead of doing enough concrete analysis of variations.
Here is the game for anyone that's interested. http://www.viewchess.com/cbreader/2016/11/21/Game150630687.html
It is not one that will be appearing in my best games collection when I get around to publishing it

Tim Harding

All games are being posted online eventually, even those not on live boards.

http://www.wscc2016.net/games/archive/

I guess this will be updated each morning after the rounds. Please ignore my games!

Posting of all games was done in 2014 (Greece - where every game was "live") but not in 2015 (Italy) so this is a good sign of quality organisation.

One disappointment is that Filipino GM Eugenio Torre (gold medal on board 3 in the Baku olympiad) did not come despite sending in his entry, for the second year in succession.

The main issue here is the division of tournaments between different hotels and the rather cramped conditions because of the very large entry, which is probably in part due to the central and easily accessible venue in the Czech Republic.

So you may not get to see people you would like to talk to, and it is nearly impossible to spectate games.

If I ever finish a game early I might go to see the 50+ tournament but first it would be a walk of about 600 metres down a steep hill (to where the lower boards of both Opens are being played) and then another 600 metres or so on fairly flat ground to the hotel where the high boards of 50+ and the women are in action.

Senior tournaments are becoming increasingly popular and FIDE in future must assess more rigorously the capability of proposed venues to handle this kind of numbers.

Anyway good luck today to Anthony and to Peter who I haven't seen yet.

sodacat11

You are right Tim about the popularity of senior tournaments, there really is a demand for this type of event. I hope that we start to see a few more of them at home, I have no doubt that they would bring back a lot of players who don't attend tournaments any more.

sodacat11

Today's game was the kind of mess that I enjoy most,win or lose
http://www.viewchess.com/cbreader/2016/11/21/Game192945093.html

Tim Harding

sodacat11 wrote: »

Today's game was the kind of mess that I enjoy most,win or lose
http://www.viewchess.com/cbreader/2016/11/21/Game192945093.html

Well done! I drew today against a boring Czech opponent who tried to swap everything off from the early opening. I obtained a small edge but he saved the ending/or I missed something.

I see Anthony Fox drew today with Black against a 2200+ opponent so we all scored something. He has White against an IM in round 4.

Chess24 has a small report on the start of the championships with a picture of the opera singers who performed at the opening ceremony:

https://chess24.com/en/read/news/world-senior-gets-underway

sodacat11

I have my third black in four games tomorrow and against a lower rated player. Should the higher rated player not get the colour he is due in these situations?

Tim Harding

sodacat11 wrote: »

I have my third black in four games tomorrow and against a lower rated player. Should the higher rated player not get the colour he is due in these situations?

Your opponent De Meester had Black in both rounds 2 and 3. Avoiding three consecutive same-colour takes precedence.
You are guaranteed White in round 5.

Tim Harding

Sodacat won today despite his second Black in a row. Anthony drew with his IM and I also drew in the Ancients section so we are all on 50 per cent after four rounds.

Two more games before the rest day when those who do not wish to rest can indulge in blitz and/or rapid.

Surprisingly the weather here in west Bohemia is at least as warm as in Dublin at present though they had -8 one night last week.

sodacat11

My game today was even wilder than yesterday's. http://www.viewchess.com/cbreader/2016/11/22/Game287032781.html Not only did my opponent turn the down the perpetual but he could have won with 36 Qxc5+ ! Still, fortune favours the brave and playing the Hennig Scara Gambit when I don't know any theory was risky to say the least.
Great fun game to play though, I remember thinking during it that it was like two guys going at each other with flailing machetes and the winner would be whoever could keep his head on his neck the longest.

Tim Harding

It's a rest day here on Friday. Tomorrow I will be playing on a live board again against IM Leon Lederman from Israel. In the 50+ sodacat won and Anthony Fox drew. Though he has the lowest points total of the three of us he actually has the highest Rp so far.
Lots can change in the second week. Some Seniors are rusty at the beginning and play themselves into form; others get tired and fade.

sodacat11

Rps can be deceptive. If you lose to a 2600 and beat a 1400 you get a Rp of 2000. Beat a 2100 and lose to a 1850 and your Rp is only 1975. I would prefer to do the latter, some people prefer the former. I guess what really matters is the quality of the games.

sodacat11

Good win yesterday Tim by the way!!

Tim Harding

Peter and I drew today in round 7 of our respective events.

Tony Fox was still playing a few minutes ago but had a clearly winning ending.

Tim Harding

Apologies and explanation to anyone who was watching my game live today. I just had a total "senior moment" brain freeze when the obvious 40...a2 would have drawn comfortably. If I'd only had ten seconds left I would have played it without analysing! A great pity as earlier there was a good fight back against the Norwegian FM...

sodacat11

This has been an immensely enjoyable tournament apart from two things.
 Firstly the FIDE insistence that non -Czech players must stay in "approved" hotels at inflated prices ( I managed to get around that by entering under Petr Cafollavich).
and Secondly,the inadequate new FIDE time controls where we don't even get 2 hours for 40 moves. Presumably this stupid rule was brought in to give arbiters a shorter working week . Maybe they are all teachers !!

EnPassant

Does anyone get norms at these events?

sodacat11

EnPassant wrote: »

Does anyone get norms at these events?

Yes, the winner becomes a GM if he isn't one already and there are norms available. It is a strange tournament rating wise because some high rated players seem to be giving draws to all and sundry and also there are some I;Ms with ratings as low as 2200. Also there are a lot of highly rated players who haven't been very active in recent years. With a bit of luck in the draw one could get a very flattering rating gain without having to do an awful lot for it. Having said that, it is a strong tournament as can be seen from the players on the top boards.