OT: Chess

[Say Hey Kid]

Berlin GP: So and Fedoseev score crucial wins

"Round 4 of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin saw three games ending decisively, each of them in a different group. Going into the rest day, three of the four pools have sole leaders — Hikaru Nakamura, Levon Aronian and Welsey So — while in pool B Radoslaw Wojtaszek and Vladimir Fedoseev (pictured) are sharing first place after the latter obtained a convincing victory over Grigoriy Oparin".​

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Tallaksen Ostmoe, rated 2466, holds Magnus Carlsen to a draw

"After gaining 3.1 rating points by scoring a brilliant 9½/13 at the Tata Steel Masters, Carlsen gave up 4.1 rating points by drawing a single game in Norway. Geir Sune Tallaksen Ostmoe, an International Master and chess composer, showcased his endgame abilities to defend an inferior position with the black pieces until getting an outstanding 84-move draw against the world champion".​

 

[Harbour Dog]

Tallaksen Ostmoe, rated 2466, holds Magnus Carlsen to a draw

"After gaining 3.1 rating points by scoring a brilliant 9½/13 at the Tata Steel Masters, Carlsen gave up 4.1 rating points by drawing a single game in Norway. Geir Sune Tallaksen Ostmoe, an International Master and chess composer, showcased his endgame abilities to defend an inferior position with the black pieces until getting an outstanding 84-move draw against the world champion".​

I seen that lol

The guy that drew him was like 2260 or something.

 

[Say Hey Kid]

I seen that lol. The guy that drew him was like 2260 or something.

2466

 

[Say Hey Kid]

@aufheben Austria no.1 Markus Ragger teaches Grunfeld Defence

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Berlin GP: Aronian qualifies with a round to spare

"Levon Aronian became the first player to secure a spot in the semifinals of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin. The US grandmaster qualified to the knockout stage with one round to spare after getting an unsurmountable 1½-point lead in pool C. Suspense remains in the other three pools, though, with seven players going into Thursday’s sixth round still with chances of getting one of the three remaining spots".

Congrats to The Band and Elton John, Levon is in! Rapport may not make it. @Harbour Dog I put some special lyrics in my user title and sig for you. ​

 

[Harbour Dog]

2022 FIDE Grand Prix Berlin R5: Aronian Qualifies, Tense Last Group Round Awaits

"GM Levon Aronian won a tense tactical game with black pieces against GM Vincent Keymer to reach 4/5 and qualify with a round to spare from Group C to the semifinals of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix first leg in Berlin. Though GM Hikaru Nakamura won a well-fought game against GM Alexander Grischuk to maintain his sole lead with 3.5/5, he will play a crucial game for qualification to the knockout stage in the last round of Group A against GM Andrey Esipenko, who prevailed over GM Etienne Bacrot to reach 3/5. Group B is heading for a tense finish after two drawn games, the winner to be decided among joint leaders GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek and GM Vladimir Fedoseev (both on 3/5) and GM Richard Rapport (2.5/5). Likewise, the qualification spot from Group D will be decided between GM Wesley So (3.5/5) and GM Leinier Dominguez (3/5) both from USA, though both will be playing different opponents in the last round of the group".

Congrats to The Band and Elton John, Levon is in! Rapport may not make it. @Harbour Dog I put some special lyrics in my user title and sig for you. ​

Keymer made a giant blunder during the time scramble. Literally just forgot that his most important pawn on the board was hanging.

Esipenko has to beat Nakamura with White to advance, or else the latter makes the semis.

The Fedoseev-Rapport game should be fireworks. Rapport needs to win with Black to have a chance of getting into tiebreaks with Wojtaszek, and Fedoseev isn't capable of playing for a draw.

 

[Say Hey Kid]

2022 FIDE Grand Prix Berlin R6: Nakamura Reaches Semifinals On Day Of Nerves

"The last round of the group stage of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix first leg produced high-voltage drama in Berlin with GM Hikaru Nakamura joining GM Levon Aronian for the semifinal lineup after winning Group A and Group C respectively. In a day of nerves, many games witnessed fortunes swinging wildly as players struggled to keep their nerves on a crucial day at the Grand Prix. GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek and GM Wesley So missed valuable opportunities to win their games and sail to the semifinals, and they will now face their group-members GM Richard Rapport and GM Leinier Dominguez respectively in the tiebreak matches in faster time controls scheduled for Friday, February 11. It was a difficult day at the office for GM Andrey Esipenko and GM Vladimir Fedoseev who enjoyed better positions of varying degrees before their nerves got the better of them".​

What does @Harbour Dog think of today's events?

 

[Harbour Dog]

2022 FIDE Grand Prix Berlin R6: Nakamura Reaches Semifinals On Day Of Nerves

"The last round of the group stage of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix first leg produced high-voltage drama in Berlin with GM Hikaru Nakamura joining GM Levon Aronian for the semifinal lineup after winning Group A and Group C respectively. In a day of nerves, many games witnessed fortunes swinging wildly as players struggled to keep their nerves on a crucial day at the Grand Prix. GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek and GM Wesley So missed valuable opportunities to win their games and sail to the semifinals, and they will now face their group-members GM Richard Rapport and GM Leinier Dominguez respectively in the tiebreak matches in faster time controls scheduled for Friday, February 11. It was a difficult day at the office for GM Andrey Esipenko and GM Vladimir Fedoseev who enjoyed better positions of varying degrees before their nerves got the better of them".​

What does @Harbour Dog think of today's events?

It was a crazy day!

I was sure that Esipenko was going to convert. Somehow, he missed several decisive chances, Hikaru found some good defenses, and managed to draw.

Rapport winning on demand with Black is epic, but also unsurprising. Fedoseev was never going to be okay with playing for a draw, and they butted heads in a very positional middle game. To me, this is THE game that I will remember as Rapport's emergence as being a legit top 10 player in the world. The way he won today was by punishing a single mistake; and that's how the elite of the elite do it.

I'm guessing that Rapport and So advance to the semis. If one of Wojtaszek or Dominguez were to make it, my money would be on Wojtaszek though; So is a monster at faster time controls.

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Timman and Vaganian are playing in the background.​

Boris Gulko turns 75! I'm a huge fan. He is the only GM to have won the US and USSR championships. He has a life-time score of 3:1 against Kasparov. This is one of his best White games:

Boris Gulko vs Garry Kasparov (1990)
Linares (1990), Linares ESP, rd 8, Feb-27
King's Indian Defense: Saemisch Variation. Normal Defense (E81) · 1-0 @Harbour Dog

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Berlin GP: Dominguez and Rapport win tiebreakers, reach semis

"The two players who won their round-6 games to force tiebreaks in their respective groups managed to also win their 2-game rapid matches on Friday to reach the semifinals of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin. Leinier Dominguez knocked out Wesley So and will face an in-form Levon Aronian, while Rapport eliminated Radoslaw Wojtaszek and thus gained the right to face Hikaru Nakamura in semis".

Kurt Cobain and Perez are in the semis! @Harbour Dog​

 

[Say Hey Kid]

When you guys play the London System, do you play 6. Nc3? Why not? It earned a draw against nine-time Hungarian champion GM Almasi. Hera, Imre Jr. vs Almasi, Zoltan - Hungarian Team Chess Championship 2019 - Chess.com @Harbour Dog , @ORRFForever

​

 

[ORRFForever]

When you guys play the London System, do you play 6. Nc3? Why not? It earned a draw against nine-time Hungarian champion GM Almasi. Hera, Imre Jr. vs Almasi, Zoltan - Hungarian Team Chess Championship 2019 - Chess.com @Harbour Dog , @ORRFForever

​

TBH, I never play it.

 

[ORRFForever]

A Superbowl reference...

Super Bowl Quarterback Joe Burrow Plays a Mean Game of Chess. Really Mean. - WSJ

 

[ORRFForever]

LOL! Why 2900 is going to be sooooo difficult...

Chess: Carlsen loses hard-won rating points in a single Oslo club match | Magnus Carlsen | The Guardian

 

[Say Hey Kid]

2022 FIDE Grand Prix Berlin SF1: Aronian And Nakamura Score Emphatic Wins

"GM Levon Aronian and GM Hikaru Nakamura outplayed GM Leinier Dominguez and GM Richard Rapport respectively in the first game of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix first leg semifinals in Berlin, both achieved with the white pieces in contrasting styles. They thus take the crucial lead in the two-game semifinal match. Aronian created a chaotic hand-to-hand combat middlegame, cooked up from home preparation in a complicated variation of the Queen's Gambit Accepted Opening. Contrastingly, Nakamura steadily built pressure in a Carlsbad structure of a Queen's Gambit Declined, only to spring an imaginative assault in a queenless middlegame. All in all, it was an absorbing day of chess in Berlin on Saturday. On Sunday, February 13, Dominguez and Rapport will need to win their games to go to tiebreaks".​

 

[Say Hey Kid]

LOL! Why 2900 is going to be sooooo difficult...Chess: Carlsen loses hard-won rating points in a single Oslo club match | Magnus Carlsen | The Guardian

I posted an article about this and said the same things Barden says. There has been some slight ratings deflation recently, but the greater trend is ratings inflation. This is why Karpov and Fischer only have the 20th-21st highest ratings ever, not because there are 19 players better than them.

 

[ORRFForever]

I posted an article about this and said the same things Barden says. There has been some slight ratings deflation recently, but the greater trend is ratings inflation. This is why Karpov and Fischer only have the 20th-21st highest ratings ever, not because there are 19 players better than them.

Fair enough.

Carlsen is going to STRUGGLE to get to 2900 because you are going to lose (or draw) a game against an opponent you have no business losing (or drawing) to and your rating will tumble. It is inevitable.

2900 is an admirable goal. Wake me up when he gets there.

 

[ORRFForever]

Playing a correspondence game where I am up a Bishop but my opponent has 2 connected passed pawns - we both have a Knight and a Rook. I am 95% sure I can force a draw but this will likely drag on for a long time. I hate end games.

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Can Artificial Intelligence identify your playing style?

"Ashton Anderson, a computer scientist at the University of Toronto, wanted to know whether chess players have a unique playing style. To answer that question, he and his team gathered more than "50 million human games played on the Lichess website. They collected games by players who had played at least 1000 times and sampled sequences of up to 32 moves from those games. ... [Then] they gave the system 100 games from each of about 3000 known players, and 100 fresh games from a mystery player. The system ... identified the mystery player 86% of the time." An article in "Science" takes a closer look at the pros and cons of this experiment".​

 

[Say Hey Kid]

Berlin GP: Nakamura and Aronian are the well-deserved finalists

"The two players who have shown the strongest and most stable performances throughout the event reached the final of the FIDE Grand Prix in Berlin. Levon Aronian and Hikaru Nakamura drew with black on Sunday to knock out Leinier Dominguez and Richard Rapport, respectively. Since there was no need for tiebreaks in either match, the finalists will have a rest day on Monday".

I'm happy they won, Levon may win, but I support both. Levon's peak rating is 2830 and Naka's is 2814. The US was weaker before Naka. Eastern Europe and Anand dominated.

​

 

[aufheben]

I seen that lol

The guy that drew him was like 2260 or something.

The hell is a “chess composer”? Lost in translation?

@aufheben Austria no.1 Markus Ragger teaches Grunfeld Defence

Thanks dude, will check it out.

 

[aufheben]

I don’t remember which opening it was because it was a fairly deep line—it could have been the Grunfeld—but you ended up with a bishop pair together nice and snug with long diagonals, wide open center files for rooks, and Queenside pawn action (I think). I know it was with black and it had a very distinct feel…like a new way of seeing the board, I guess because it was cut in half.

Edit: lmao I castled the Queen.

 

[aufheben]

Yeah it felt like this. 90% it was a 1.d4 opening.

 

[X66]

One thing I recommend to a lot of players is when your opponent resigns, play out the game vs the cpu.

For me it helps because it gives more practice on a winning end game, but I’m also not kicking myself if I blunders it away. The other reason is that we don’t really get to get people on mating nets because they resign and are rare at my level at least; it’s very satisfying to land them even against a cpu.