Thursday, April 15, 2010

draw v. a SIM

C - NN
D14
Slovenia's 15 years of ICCF (2) 2010

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Nc3 a6
is going to an exchange slav here so bad? unfortunately i can't get any of the Bb5 lines where there is play, but I am outrated by 400 points.



5.cxd5 cxd5 6.Bf4 Nc6 7.Rc1 [A finesse because if 7.e3 Bg4 actually works] 7...Bf5 8.e3 Rc8 9.Be2 e6 10.0-0 Bd6 11.Bxd6 Qxd6 12.Na4 0-0 13.Nc5 Rc7 14.Qb3 Qe7 15.Rc3 Bg4 16.Rfc1



i wonder if i shouldn't have played sharper. i was going for equality and trying to follow Khenkin vs Karjakin, 2008 Khenkin ended up drawing.

16...e5 17.dxe5 Nxe5 18.Nxe5 Bxe2 19.Na4 Rfc8 20.Rxc7 Rxc7 21.Rxc7 Qxc7 22.Qc3 Bc4 23.Nxc4 dxc4



transforming the IQP into a 3 v. 2 on the queenside. i thought if his king was a little closer he'd have some winning chances. luckily i was wrong :)

24.Qd4 Nd7 25.Nc3 b5 26.b3 = and i offered a draw which he took ½-½ not a real glorious game but hey it was a titled player. it's a very strong tournament where i'm outrated by almost 400 points in every game...we'll see if i surprise some people. ir is cowardly to play the slav exchange, but hey if he just would've played a semi-slav the best i could've had was the QGD Exchange :)

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Chessbase 8 and self-improvement

I am showing my age ;) but I still use Chessbase 8 for my chess database. One of my favourite features is the Dossier where it shows your repertoire and what the percentages are and what your performance rating is. Last year for instance it showed that I scored 18% with 1.Nf3 d5 2.g3 (rated purely on games from 2001). i had played 1.g3 the odd time so I decided that if, over the year i got either 1.g3 d5 or 1.Nf3 d5 i would go for the King's Indian Attack just to raise my score. And I did :) So in the interest of scientific research I decided to do the same thing...this is from my personal database of over 11000 correspondence, OTB, and blitz games.

My lowest two as white are two of my most hated lines as White :

1.e4 e5 2.f4 d5 3.exd5 e4 and 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 c5 5.a3 Bxc3 6.bxc3 Ne7 7.Qg4

(in the interest of putting some positivity my best numbers are against 1.e4 e5 2.d4 d6 3.d4 exd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6)

As Black my best is surprisingly the Queen's Indian 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 and my worst is the Colle 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e3

maybe for 2010 I'll go back to playing 1.d4 d5...i enjoy the Queen's Gambit Accepted, the Tarrasch and the Semi-Slav. And if I happen to beat some Colle's too...so be it :)