Thursday 30 May 2013

So far, so good

This is the period of a year when I usually play some chess in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
This year is not an exception, and in two days starts traditional Bosna Open.
This year a bit later then usual, due to late start of European Individual Chess Championship.
After Bosna 2013 I will play Bosnian premier league, which will be played in Sarajevo.
I am not completely sure, but I think that capital city is for the first time host of the league.
Bosnian premier league is played in one period, nine days, which is very suitable for professional players.
On this blog you can find more information about that competition after Bosna Open.

After these two competitions it will be the half of season for me, and I will draw a line to see how is everything going in my chess.

Today I will do a little review of my results in 2013.

In the beginning of year I played in Prague Open.



My result was good, and with 7 out of 9 I could finish on shared fourth place.
Still, I did not improved my elo substantial, because the tournament was weaker then before.
The main positive thing was that I was undefeated.

Immediately after that tournament I played in Marianske Lazne, and there despite the tragedy in the last round, I did not played well.
I was quite solid, but my energy was not on a high level, and I got three strange defeats.


The last game there influenced me so much, that I lost my game in the Swedish league, week after that.
However I manged to improve my form in the Swedish league, and soon I started to play really well.


I was near to score GM norm.

In between the round in Swedish league I played in Cannes in France.
My result there was fantastic and I was very near to score one more GM norm.
As I predicted before that tournament, Cannes Open was the highest point of the spring 2013.

After that, I took a small pause, in order to accumulate my energy and to prepare for the next tournaments.
I was interested to play in April, and went to Sonde cup, where I won my group.
I improved my Elo further and a joy was complete.


In that moment I took very bad decision.

I went for Copenhagen Chess Challenge 2013, and I can see now, from the time distance, that it was not good tournament for me.
The whole four days with the double rounds and a time control of 90 minutes +30 seconds for the whole game, was not the things that could suit me.
At the end I finished on +2, and with 5,5 out of 9 it looked not so bad, but my expected score was 7 out of 9, and only that fact shows that it was not good decision to play there.
The overall level of the players in the tournament was lower then in the tournaments where I usually play, but I could not beat them all, just because of a high tempo with short time control and double rounds.
This mistake will be not repeated!
My Elo dropped, and it is just as I erased my good tournament in Cannes.

Still, the feeling in this year is very good, things moved forward, and I hope to perform well in the next two tournaments.
The title of this text explains for it self....so far so good....but it can be better.

Chess and Life will be a bit inactive in the next week, due to my participation in Bosna 2013, but readers can expect a lot of articles after that.

Tuesday 28 May 2013

Bosna 2013


Chess Club Bosna Sarajevo, four times Champion of Europe, organise 43rd International Chess Tournament.
Tournament will be played between 01 and 08 June in Sarajevo.
It is one of the three oldest open tournaments in World.
The good thing about this tournament is that there is a rating floor at 2200/2300 Elo points.
The highest group is 2300+ and B group is 2200-.
The players between 2200 and 2300 can choose in which group they want to play.
The huge majority of them are already in B group, and that makes A group very strong.
In the focus of this blog it will be only A group.
Right now there are 30 players on the starting list, and among them are seventeen (17) Grandmasters.
It gives me a great opportunity to play against very strong opponents, not depending on my form.
Here you can find the starting list:


Starting rank list

No.NameFideIDFEDRtg
1
GMErdos Viktor719978HUN2641
2
GMKozul Zdenko14502879CRO2624
3
GMPredojevic Borki930849BIH2616
4
GMMarkus Robert921637SRB2606
5
GMNikolic Predrag14400014BIH2603
6
GMDurarbayli Vasif13402935AZE2597
7
GMBanusz Tamas722413HUN2592
8
GMPapp Gabor718602HUN2570
9
GMGrandelius Nils1710400SWE2556
10
GMDjukic Nikola922412MNE2555
11
GMKovacevic Aleksandar903124SRB2555
12
GMSebenik Matej14602296SLO2527
13
GMStojanovic Dalibor922692BIH2514
14
GMMilanovic Danilo915483SRB2487
15
GMCan Emre6302181TUR2471
16
IMAntipov Mikhail Al.4107012RUS2464
17
IMNestorovic Dejan904279SRB2428
18
GMHaznedaroglu Kivanc6300634TUR2427
19
IMBejtovic Jasmin14400936BIH2412
20
IMNestorovic Nikola934526SRB2405
21
GMCabrilo Goran900249SRB2404
22
FMRasidovic Sead14400286BIH2381
23
IMNestorovic Lazar937517SRB2380
24
IMArapovic Vitomir14401614BIH2356
25
FMBurovic Ismet14400219BIH2351
26
Sutkovic Damir14400820BIH2346
27
IMMestrovic Zvonimir14602059BIH2327
28
WGMYildiz Betul Cemre6302920TUR2325
29
Forsberg Viktor1707914SWE2286
30
Vucinic Gojko945374SRB2240

If you visit Chessresults, you can easy find the B group, and all the details during the tournament.
For other information you can visit official website: Chess Club Bosna Sarajevo .

Friday 24 May 2013

Sigeman & Co Chess Tournament 2013

The best Swedish chess tournament, Sigeman & Co Chess is approaching it´s middle part.
It is a round robin tournament with eight players, among them four Swedish players and four very strong Grandmasters from other countries.
The first name of the tournament is former challenger for chess crown, Nigel Short.
Usually, I am not able to visit commentary room and playing venue during previous editions of this tournament, due to my schedule, but this year I grab my chance to visit the tournament.
I was in Hipp in Malmö yesterday, and today.

In the commentary room you can follow very instructive analysis of the living legend, GM Ulf Andersson, and GM Stellan Brynell assisting him.



When I was watching Ulf Andersson sharing his opinions about positions,  I thought that chess must be the simple game, yet I know how hard and complex it is.
I should also mention a funny and pragmatic comments and style of Stellan Brynell (neighbour Stellan, as he is called on Inte bara schack ).

There were some very interesting games in the first three rounds of the tournament.
The most impression on me left, Richard Rapport´s victory against Nigel Short and Grandelius victory over Jonny Hector, when he showed nice technique from the position after the opening.
His play with a bishop, which was better then Hector´s knight was instructive.
Even Ulf Andersson looked impressed, although he already after the opening explained why the bishop is better and what will be the best plan for Nils.


In today's game however a luck turned against Nils, and in favour of Short.
Despite rather easy play in the opening, Nils went wrong and Short got his first full point.
There were a lot of fight in every game, but today´s round was finished earlier then one could expect.



As some players like to say " A short day at the office".
In this picture you can see a playing hall at 18:00 p.m. exactly four hours after the start of the round.
For the players who has possibility to visit the tournament, I can strongly recommend it, as entry is only 30 Swedish crowns (3,5 euro), while those who can not visit it, I can recommend very good coverage on official site, and on Lars Grahn´s blog (link is on the right side of blog).

Solution for May combinations

In this position White´s first move is logical:

1. Rg3

By taking with bishop on e6 Black can achieve a draw, because White needs to take it, but...

1...Re4+

Nice try..

2. Kf1

Tuesday 21 May 2013

May combinations

This rubric is not forgotten of course.
For this month I prepared seven combinations.
The seventh is really hard, clearly Grandmaster level, and it is very challenging.

Anyway, we can start from the beginning.
I am sure that many of you will find the first move for White here, but to find all the resources for Black, and to evaluate how this game should finish with the best possible play is another story.
So, White is on move, find the best sequence!



Sunday 19 May 2013

Karjakin´s victory in Norway

Karjakin Sergey won the first super tournament in Norway.
Not without drama in the last rounds, as we are already used to, after tournament in London.
Second place was shared by Nakamura and Carlsen.

Thursday 16 May 2013

EICC finished, rest day in Norway

European Individual Chess Championship finished today.
Despite his lost in the last game, Grandmaster from Ukraine, Moiseenko Alexander won the title for 2013.
He was leading the field during whole tournament and his victory is well deserved.

Tuesday 14 May 2013

Norway Chess 2013 and EICC in Legnica 2013

In the first super tournament on Norwegian ground reached it´s last third part.
The middle of the tournament was very interesting and the number of high quality games is very high.
At the same time, an army of strong Grandmasters are fighting for their place in The World Cup in European Individual Chess Championship in Polish town of Legnica.

Monday 13 May 2013

Solution for strategic exercises - part 2/2

I am still in the process of analysing my games from my tournaments in Denmark, and I am presenting them here in the form of exercises.
I found this method most challenging for the ambitious readers.
This position is somehow the most complicated of all the positions that I published earlier from Denmark, and I decided to devote it the whole article.
In the beginning I would like to repeat the questions which I asked when showing this position.
After answering the questions I will provide the explanations.


Saturday 11 May 2013

Rest day in Norway and Legnica

The first third part of supertournament Norway Chess 2013 ended yesterday, and in the EICC in Polish Legnica today finished seventh round which means that tomorrow is a rest day.
There were really interesting fights in these top events.

Friday 10 May 2013

Solutions for strategic exercises - Part 1/2

While presenting the solutions for the strategic exercises that was published a couple of days ago I will try to go with a principle of simplicity.
However the position which you can see on the first diagram demands a very deep analysis.
I will leave some points where the  curious reader can go further by themselves and publish the solution in the two parts.
The second part will contain the solution for the position on this diagram. 
The first part are the solution on subjects, weaknesses and prophylactic thinking.

Wednesday 8 May 2013

Norway Chess 2013 and EICC 2013 Legnica

Today started the first super tournament in Norway. The participants played the blitz tournament yesterday, and Sergey Karjakin won in front of Carlsen, Anand and Nakamura...
It was very interesting results in the first round...

Tuesday 7 May 2013

Find the right move - Strategic exercises

Later on in May, I will publish some combinations in the regular  column of monthly combinations, but today I would like to publish some other sort of exercises.
This sort of exercises which I will publish, can be called for the strategic exercises.
This terminology I adopted from the excellent books of
GM Jacob Aagaard in his serial Grandmaster preparation.
It is somehow different from the usual positional exercises.
For the better understanding I will provide one example in the following lines.
However, the solutions for these positions will be published in the next article.

Sunday 5 May 2013

Sunny day in Copenhagen

It was a time to take a little break from the hard fights on the 64 squares, so I decided to visit a capital of Denmark, Copenhagen.
I took some pictures and I would like to share them with the readers.

Kenneth Hastings "Have you seen what a beautiful weather was there, it was almost like a spring day...."

















Thursday 2 May 2013

Queen sacrifice in practise

Even if professional players often can notice most of correct combinations with a queen sacrifice there are no so many chances in practise to demonstrate the symbiosis of skill and beauty.
I am not an exception.
In one of my games from Copenhagen Chess Challenge I found beautiful idea of a queen sacrifice but I never got a chance to do it on the board.
When I started to analyse my games from Danish tournaments, I did not have many doubts about a choice of the first game who I analysed.
Why? You can find it if you read the text.