Quality Chess Blog

In last week’s post I talked a bit about the four types of decisions we need to make during the game. (Yes, I am aware that you can define it in other ways; this is just a way I find useful to do it when helping strong players navigate the complexities of the game). Please revisit if you have not read it yet.

Ashish kindly put up a link to a blog post by American Master and Mathematician Dana McKenzie. In this Dana talks about two types of players; those that approach chess with calculation and those that approach it with more general considerations, such as bad bishop, improving the worst piece and so on.

I know this is the reality for a lot of people playing chess; even very strong ones. One guy I worked with at some point (rated about 2625) was tactically exceptionally inclined, but like a computer, he could only make decisions with brute force. Unfortunately, unlike with computers, he was not able to calculate 2 million moves a second, so he had sort of hit a ceiling.

Although exceptionally intelligent, he had not worked out how to deal with the more positional aspects of the game. He had never had a trainer and although he had worked with some of the best players in the world as a second or as training partner, he was still missing basic skills.

Because this is what Dana McKenzie is talking about. Let us compare with football (soccer for our US friends). Obviously we have a natural way to kick the ball that we all do intuitively. If we play regularly we will pick up a few tricks and improve our skills, but we might still have a “lame left foot” and struggle to head the ball (closing your eyes while doing it as I used to do).

With this player we called calculation the hammer. This comes from the old saying, for the man with a hammer, every problem is a nail.

As this guy was much smarter than I, it was very quick and pain free to teach him to make simple moves based on positional considerations. I put him through the program I had in POSITIONAL PLAY and quickly he had it all covered.

Obviously he is still a great calculator; but now he calculates when there are things to calculate, not in all situations. He has more tools in his tool box.

I am writing on an article to New in Chess at the moment and I came to think of an old argument I had with a friend about definitions. Basically he was of the opinion that good chess consists of opening preparation, intuition and calculation – and nothing else. I have a different view, cutting things up to minor sections. One of the differences came across when we debated a complex position. He said that it was solved with calculation, while I insisted that it was solved with strategic thinking. He did not see a difference.

Sometimes you have to accept that you do not speak the same languages. He had a lot of good points that were interesting, but here I think that we had a different approach. Unfortunately the debate turned sour and never became fruitful.

In STRATEGIC PLAY I wrote about one of my better ideas: to divide chess decisions into four categories. (Obviously they can be put into more or less categories; it all depends on how you choose to see the game. As far as I am concerned, anything that anyone finds useful is worth investigating.)

These categories are (free from memory – what I actually call them is less important, it is the ideas that matter):

a) Automatic Decisions

Moves that can be made without really thinking about it. Either because it is theory, or because there are no alternatives (legal or sensible).

b) Simple Decisions

Positions that can be solved without calculation (not variations necessarily – read the NIC article when it comes!). I have a training system for this in POSITIONAL PLAY, based on the three questions. It is a very powerful training system and if both 2600-players and my six year old daughter find it useful, it might help you as well.

c) Critical Moments

Positions where the difference between the best move (or two best moves, it is not an exact science, but a way for us to understand how we should relate to the position) is big. Let us say a pawn or +1.00 as the young people would call it.

d) Complex Positions

These are difficult positions that can only be solved with an interaction of positional thinking (b) and calculation (c). These come around only a few times in a game, if at all. They will at times have solutions where a positional aim is solved with counter-intuitive or anti-positional sequences. I deal with this type of positions in STRATEGIC PLAY and ATTACK&DEFENCE.

I find this way of carving the various decisions up useful during the game, in order to work out where to invest my time. Maybe I will write a book about this one day…

It is one of those days… I cycled to the office for the first time in months (since I was fined £50 for riding with 6 k/ph through a green lights for pedestrians – with no pedestrians in sight – incidentally the same amount I would have been fined for speeding through a red light in a car). I struggled and it took me 55 minutes to cover 13.2 k downhill… Yeah, I have gone fat writing Endgame Play. +5k in a month to be exact.

Once in the office, my desktop obviously decided to not cooperate. It cuts out after 10-20 seconds and will be picked up by Laptop Doctor in the afternoon.

But a good thing is that I will be able to give you a small link to an article I wrote for FIDE. It contains three positions I have used in playing exercises with my students. If you want to attempt to beat a computer, just take Black in both positions and give yourself at least an hour. It is by no means easy; but it is top training.

[fen size=”small”]8/8/1p2bk2/pBpp1p2/5K1P/1P3P2/P7/8 w – – 0 1[/fen]

[fen size=”small”]r1b1r1k1/2p2pp1/3p1n1p/1p5q/3Pp3/1P2P1PP/P4PB1/R1BQ1RK1 b – – 0 18[/fen]

The article is found here. If you want to do your chess any good, you try to play the positions before reading it.

There was little to play for in the last round of the Danish Championship. GM Allan Stig Rasmussen looked set to win the tournament after winning against all the other grandmasters. Sune Berg Hansen could still theoretically catch him, but when Allan made a draw, Sune had no fight left in him. He offered a draw, which I declined, only to realise that I had no fight left in me either. On the next move I offered a draw, which was accepted.

All in all I played not that badly, scoring +2 in a strong and highly motivated field. I achieved my goal of securing a spot on the Olympiad team, as the no. 4/5 player together with Jakob Vang Glud, with whom I shared 3rd here. At times I played some good chess, but I clearly ran out of energy by the 6th/7th round and was lucky to end the tournament with only one loss at that point. The many chocolate bars I have consumed while finishing Endgame Play in the night, has not helped. But now the sun is out and it is time to ride the bike to work again. May is maybe the best month of the year in Scotland and I am going to get the most out of it. Sorry John, I will not be coming in that often the next 4-5 weeks :-).

Hansen,Sune Berg (2569) – Aagaard,Jacob (2520) [D00]
DEN-ch 2014 Skorping (9), 20.04.2014

1.d4 d5 2.Bf4 c5 3.e3 Nf6 4.c3 Nc6 5.Nd2 Qb6 6.Qb3 c4 7.Qc2 g6 8.Ngf3 Bf5 9.Qc1 Nh5 10.Bg3 Nxg3 11.hxg3 Qd8 12.Be2 b5 13.Bd1 Bd7 14.e4 e6 15.exd5 exd5 16.Nf1 h5 17.Qe3+ Qe7 ½-½

Today was probably the hardest fought game I played in the tournament. I was early in trouble and tried to find ways to play my position, but instead ran out of time. I found a lot of tricks, but at move 40 we went into an endgame that was entirely lost for me. The easiest way was to exchange rooks and win slowly on the kingside. But all the way to move 57 he had winning chances.

Aagaard,Jacob (2520) – Aabling-Thomsen,Jakob (2331) [B07]
DEN-ch 2014 Skorping (8), 19.04.2014

1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Nge2 Bg7 5.g3 0-0 6.Bg2 e5 7.h3 c6 8.Be3 b5 9.a3 Bb7 10.0-0 Nbd7 11.f4 exd4 12.Nxd4 a6 13.Nde2 Re8 14.Bf2 c5 15.Qxd6 Nxe4 16.Bxe4 Bxe4 17.Rad1 Bxc2 18.Rd2 Bf5 19.g4 Bf8 20.Qc6 Be6 21.Rfd1 Qb6 22.Qf3 Nf6 23.Bh4 Bb3 24.Rf1 b4 25.Bxf6 Qxf6 26.Ne4 Qe6 27.N2g3 Red8 28.f5 Qc4 29.Rdf2 Qd3 30.Qf4 Qd4 31.fxg6 fxg6 32.Nf6+ Kh8 33.Qc7 Bg7 34.Nge4 Rf8 35.g5 Bc4 36.Rc1 Rac8 37.Qf4 Bd5 38.Nxc5 Bxf6 39.gxf6 Qxf4 40.Rxf4 bxa3 41.bxa3 Rc6 42.Rd4 Bg8 43.Nd3 Rxc1+ 44.Nxc1 Rxf6 45.Nd3 Rf5 46.Nf4 Ra5 47.Rd3 Rb5 48.Kf2 a5 49.Kf3 Kg7 50.h4 Kf6 51.Rd8 Bc4 52.Rc8 Rb3+ 53.Ke4 Bf7 54.Rc6+ Kg7 55.Rc7 Rxa3 56.Ne6+ Kf6 57.Ng5
[fen size=”small”]8/2R2b1p/5kp1/p5N1/4K2P/r7/8/8 b – – 0 57[/fen]
Here it was suggested from the commentary room that Black still wins with 57…Bg8!, where I would probably have to find 58.Kf4!? to keep the game going, avoiding 58.Nxh7+ Bxh7 59.Rxh7 Rh3!, where White can play 60.Kd5! and keep fighting. I will check finalgen to see if Black is winning here. [obviously it is].
57…Ra4+ 58.Ke3 Bb3 59.Nxh7+ Kf5 60.Rc5+ Kg4 61.h5 ½-½

Today’s opponent is one of my really good friends. Last time we met, in the 2012 championship, I had no fight left in me and we made a draw. But all our other games have been hard fought, with a score of 1-1 with a few draws on top. Still the danish state bookmaker Oddset were fearing foul play when more than 90% of all bets put on the game were put on it being a draw. Maybe this was influenced by the fact that we were playing tennis at 10am! But this means nothing, we are playing again tomorrow…

Lars Schandorff (2531) – Jacob Aagaard (2520) [D35]
DEN-ch 2014 Skørping (5), 16.04.2014

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5 c6 6.e3 Qb6!?
A silly move suggested by Nikos as a surprise weapon.
7.Qc2
7.Bxf6 Qxb2 8.Qc1 Ba3 is a famous mess.
7…Ne4 8.Bf4 Na6 9.f3
During the game I feared White would be better after 9.Nxe4 , but the computer gives a nice line: 9…Nb4 10.Qb1 dxe4 11.Qxe4+ Be6 12.Nf3 Nd5 13.0–0–0 Nxf4 14.Qxf4 Qa5 15.a3 Bxa3 with perpetual check.
9…Nd6 10.a3 Bf5 11.Qd2
11.e4 Bg6 is better for White according to Komodo, but I am happy be be Black here.
11…Be7 12.b4 Qd8
12…0–0 made more sense. I did not want to give White a chance to put the knight on a4 before taking on c5. Only later I realised the knight is better on c3.
[fen size=”small”]r2qk2r/pp2bppp/n1pn4/3p1b2/1P1P1B2/P1N1PP2/3Q2PP/R3KBNR w KQkq – 0 13[/fen]
13.Na4?
Played with a draw offer. Lars was clearly unhappy. If he had played 13.Bxa6 bxa6 14.Bxd6! I would have taken it, although I am not worse as I was thinking. 14…Qxd6 15.Nge2 0–0 16.0–0 a5 17.b5 Rac8 with about even chances.
13…Nc7 14.Kf2
Lars could not find a plan.
14…0–0 15.g3 Ncb5!
With his last move Lars indirectly decided to take on d6 with the bishop. As this knight is my best piece, I decided to support it!
16.Nc5 b6 17.Bxd6 Nxd6 18.Nb3 Re8
Threatening …Bg5.
19.h4
Here Lars was down to 5 minutes. I really lost my cool entirely. I did not think long and clearly enough to realise that I have to win on the queenside only and that the kingside is irrelevant. Thus the right move is 19…a5!.
[fen size=”small”]r2qr1k1/p3bppp/1ppn4/3p1b2/1P1P3P/PN2PPP1/3Q1K2/R4BNR b – – 0 19[/fen]
19…g5? 20.hxg5 Bxg5
I am still better, but why did I weaken my position. Lars now found a few good moves quickly.
21.Re1 a5?!
Trying to bring in the remaining piece.
21…Qf6 22.Kg2 Re6 was a more natural way to play.
21…Nc4 22.Bxc4 dxc4 23.Nc1 c5 24.bxc5 bxc5 25.d5 Re5!? was a strong option suggested by Schandorff.
22.Nh3! axb4
I did not want to take on h3, as the bishop needs to defend h7 and the king.
23.axb4
During the game I thought 23.Nxg5 Rxa3 24.e4 dxe4 25.fxe4 Bxe4 26.Nxe4 Nxe4+ 27.Rxe4 Rxe4 was overwhelming, but I did not see 28.Bd3 when White is back in the game.
23…Ra3 24.Nxg5 Rxb3 25.Nh3 Qf6?
To be honest, I completely missed my opponent’s next move.
26.Nf4 b5!
[fen size=”small”]4r1k1/5p1p/2pn1q2/1p1p1b2/1P1P1N2/1r2PPP1/3Q1K2/4RB1R w – – 0 27[/fen]
I managed to recover and keep some advantage.
27.g4?!
Apparently this does nothing for White’s position.
27…Bg6 28.Kg1 Nc4 29.Bxc4 bxc4 30.Nxg6 Qxg6 31.Qh2 Rxb4
With an extra pawn and a clear advantage, I won on time. Not a great game. Actually, a really poor game, ruining by White’s bad clock handling.
0–1

[pgn]

[Event “Landholdsklassen”]

[Site “Comwell Rebild”]

[Date “2014.04.16”]

[Round “5”]

[White “GM Lars Schandorff (2531)”]

[Black “GM Jacob Aagaard (2520)”]

[Result “0-1”]

 

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5 c6 6.e3 Qb6 7.Qc2 Ne4 8.Bf4

Na6 9.f3 Nd6 10.a3 Bf5 11.Qd2 Be7 12.b4 Qd8 13.Na4 Nc7 14.Kf2 O-O 15.g3

Ncb5 16.Nc5 b6 17.Bxd6 Nxd6 18.Nb3 Re8 19.h4 g5 20.hxg5 Bxg5 21.Re1 a5

22.Nh3 axb4 23.axb4 Ra3 24.Nxg5 Rxb3 25.Nh3 Qf6 26.Nf4 b5 27.g4 Bg6 28.

Kg1 Nc4 29.Bxc4 bxc4 30.Nxg6 Qxg6 31.Qh2 Rxb4 0-1

 

[Event “Landholdsklassen”]

[Site “Comwell Rebild”]

[Date “2014.04.15”]

[Round “4”]

[White “GM Jacob Aagaard (2520)”]

[Black “IM Mikkel Djernæs Antonsen (2”]

[Result “1/2-1/2”]

 

1.c4 e6 2.Nc3 d5 3.d4 Nf6 4.Nf3 Bb4 5.cxd5 exd5 6.Bg5 h6 7.Bh4 c5 8.e3

c4 9.Nd2 Be6 10.Be2 O-O 11.g4 Nc6 12.a3 Be7 13.Bg3 Nh7 14.O-O Na5 15.b4

cxb3 16.Nxb3 Rc8 17.Nb5 Nxb3 18.Qxb3 a6 19.Nc3 Nf6 20.f3 b5 21.Bd3

1/2-1/2

 

[Event “Landholdsklassen”]

[Site “Comwell Rebild”]

[Date “2014.04.14”]

[Round “3”]

[White “IM Mads Andersen (2473)”]

[Black “GM Jacob Aagaard (2520)”]

[Result “0-1”]

1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e3 c5 4.Nbd2 cxd4 5.exd4 Nc6 6.c3 Qc7 7.Be2 Bf5 8.

Nf1 h6 9.Ng3 Bh7 10.O-O e6 11.Re1 Bd6 12.Bd3 Bxd3 13.Qxd3 O-O 14.Bd2 b5

15.b3 Rab8 16.Re2 Rfd8 17.Rae1 b4 18.Ne5 bxc3 19.Qxc3 Rdc8 20.Rc1 Rb6 21.

Qd3 Qb7 22.f4 Ba3 23.Rc3 Bb2 24.Rxc6 Rbxc6 25.Nxc6 Qxc6 26.Be3 Bc1 27.h3

Ne4 28.Nxe4 dxe4 29.Qd1 Bxe3+ 30.Rxe3 f5 31.Re2 Qd6 32.Rf2 Rc3 33.Qh5 e3

34.Rf1 Qxd4 35.Kh2 Kh7 36.Qf3 Qd2 37.Rd1 Rc1 0-1

 

[Event “Landholdsklassen”]

[Site “Comwell Rebild”]

[Date “2014.04.13”]

[Round “2”]

[White “GM Jacob Aagaard (2520)”]

[Black “IM Jakob Vang Glud (2518)”]

[Result “1/2-1/2”]

 

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e3 g6 5.Nf3 Bg7 6.Be2 O-O 7.O-O Bg4 8.cxd5

Nxd5 9.e4 Nb6 10.Be3 Bxf3 11.gxf3 N8d7 12.f4 e6 13.Kh1 a5 14.Rc1 1/2-1/2

 

 

[Event “Landholdsklassen”]

[Site “Comwell Rebild”]

[Date “2014.04.12”]

[Round “1”]

[White “IM Simon Bekker-Jensen (2445)”]

[Black “GM Jacob Aagaard (2520)”]

[Result “0-1”]

 

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5 c6 6.Qc2 h6 7.Bh4 Be6 8.e3

Nbd7 9.Bd3 g5 10.Bg3 Nh5 11.Nge2 Nxg3 12.Nxg3 h5 13.O-O h4 14.Nge2 Bd6

15.f4 Nf6 16.Qd2 g4 17.f5 Bd7 18.Nf4 Qe7 19.Rae1 O-O-O 20.Qc2 Kb8 21.a3

Bc8 22.b4 Qc7 23.Qd2 Rhe8 24.Qf2 g3 25.hxg3 hxg3 26.Qxg3 Nh5 27.Qh4 Nxf4

28.exf4 Rh8 29.Qg3 Rdg8 30.Qf3 f6 31.Ne2 Rh4 32.g3 Qh7 33.Rf2 Bxf5 34.

Bxf5 Qxf5 35.Rg2 Rhg4 36.Kf2 a6 37.Nc1 Qc2+ 38.Kg1 Qh7 39.Nd3 Bc7 40.Kf2

Ka7 41.Re3 Bb6 42.Nc5 R4g7 43.Qe2 Qf5 44.Rh2 Rh7 45.Rxh7 Qxh7 46.Qf3 Rg6

47.Ne6 Rh6 48.f5 Rh2+ 49.Ke1 Ra2 50.Re2 Ra1+ 51.Kf2 Qh2+ 52.Qg2 Qh5 53.

g4 Qh4+ 54.Ke3 Rxa3+ 55.Kd2 Rg3 56.Qf2 Qxg4 57.Kc2 Rf3 0-1 [/pgn]

 

In round 2 Jakob and I both surprised each other in the opening. Blind man’s bluff, sort of thing. At move 10 I played too quickly. Instead I should have played 10.Ng5, I think, and I would have had a nice opening advantage. When I started thinking deeply about the position, I realised that I had long term challenges and that I had no active plans. In other words; from more 12 I was playing for a draw. I was not overly impressed with 13…a5, as …Ra5-h5 would never happen. Instead I prepared for an opening of the c-file and offered a draw. Jakob accepted without serious thoughts.

Aagaard,Jacob (2520) – Glud,Jakob Vang (2518) [D94]
DEN-ch DM 2014 Sk0rping (2), 13.04.2014

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e3 g6 5.Nf3 Bg7 6.Be2 0-0 7.0-0 Bg4 8.cxd5 Nxd5 9.e4 Nb6 10.Be3 Bxf3 11.gxf3 N8d7 12.f4 e6 13.Kh1 a5 14.Rc1 ½-½

So round 1 of the Danish Championship is over. I had the longest game of the day and followed a super-recommendation from Nikos, my long running second. With Black I had an at least equal position after 13 moves and +20 minutes on the clock. My opponent reacted poorly and I got a lasting edge. At move 30 I missed a forced win (…Qd8-h4, as was my alternative, but there is some …Bxf4! sacrifice I was nowhere close to finding), but managed to retain a lasting edge. After move 40 I was starting to wonder if I had overplayed my position and did not see a way to improve. Finally it dawned on me that I would be better off if I managed to exchange a pair of rooks. I did and won the game quickly thereafter.

Some of the other games looked a bit ropy, but all in all a good first day at the Danish Championships.

Bekker-Jensen,Simon (2445) – Aagaard,Jacob (2520) [D36]
DEN-ch DM 2014 Skorping (1), 12.04.2014

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5 c6 6.Qc2 h6 7.Bh4 Be6 8.e3 Nbd7 9.Bd3 g5 10.Bg3 Nh5 11.Nge2 Nxg3 12.Nxg3 h5 13.0-0 h4 14.Nge2 Bd6 15.f4 Nf6 16.Qd2 g4 17.f5 Bd7 18.Nf4 Qe7 19.Rae1 0-0-0 20.Qc2 Kb8 21.a3 Bc8 22.b4 Qc7 23.Qd2 Rhe8 24.Qf2 g3 25.hxg3 hxg3 26.Qxg3 Nh5 27.Qh4 Nxf4 28.exf4 Rh8 29.Qg3 Rdg8 30.Qf3 f6 31.Ne2 Rh4 32.g3 Qh7 33.Rf2 Bxf5 34.Bxf5 Qxf5 35.Rg2 Rhg4 36.Kf2 a6 37.Nc1 Qc2+ 38.Kg1 Qh7 39.Nd3 Bc7 40.Kf2 Ka7 41.Re3 Bb6 42.Nc5 R4g7 43.Qe2 Qf5 44.Rh2 Rh7 45.Rxh7 Qxh7 46.Qf3 Rg6 47.Ne6 Rh6 48.f5 Rh2+ 49.Ke1 Ra2 50.Re2 Ra1+ 51.Kf2 Qh2+ 52.Qg2 Qh5 53.g4 Qh4+ 54.Ke3 Rxa3+ 55.Kd2 Rg3 56.Qf2 Qxg4 57.Kc2 Rf3 0-1

http://liveskak.dk/dm/2014/