Saturday, March 25, 2006

Quick Note...

That I did lose the game Thursday, so S. Kesti clinches the Reno CC Class B championship for this year. Two more games to go, and a couple of wins will clinch second and continue to raise my rating, so there is plenty to play for. More reflections on what I'm doing, what's working and what isn't, to come soon.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

I should like to hear these 'reflections.' You weren't the only one who failed. The fact that no one could beat Kesti in your Class is somewhat of a surprise to me. He's not that good! In a match, I would destroy him, but then again there's no one in your section that hang with the A's and Experts yet. There's too much missing in their games. Nevertheless, rather than be too harsh on yourself, as an outsider, I saw the whole section as somewhat of a failure. If Kesti was good enough to win, that's one thing, but to win by such a wide margin should not have been possible amongst equals. Look at the Experts and the A's. It's still very close among the perspective equals. Even in the C's and the D's, it's still very close. I have to wonder why there was such a wide margin amongst the B players. It seems odd. The entire section even failed to 'draw' him. Kesti is in no way an 'A' player, therefore something went bad wrong in your section and although you might have failed miserably, you were by no means alone in such a failure. Kesti might have won anyway, but it should have been close. Eric

Unknown said...

There is one other possibility. Kesti is truly a 1700 player, and the rest of the field is not at that level or not playing at that level. Eric

Robert Pearson said...

Well Eric, there are still acouple rounds to go but Kesti just performed at a higher level so far. I beleive his rating was once a good deal higher, but so was mine and O'Doan's. It is not a permanent situation. If I may peer into my crystal ball for a moment...I believe that by the end of this year I will be rated what Steve is now.

But it will take using my abilities well, that's a given.

Unknown said...

Hi Robert, no Steve was not a good deal higher. He mostly plays at the 1700 level. He poked his head into the low 1800's, but his game wasn't there yet and so went back down to the 1700's. Fleming would be the same way, but he protects his rating with inactivity and fear. I've seen this kind of thing too many times in San Diego, so it becomes very easy to determine who plays scared and who doesn't. That's also why you're seeing a lot of reversed set-ups with a move in hand for the defense, such as Fischer's Queen's Gambit Declined with both the White and Black pieces, but the early c4/c5 is a positional error according to the sources I have. The move should definitely be played, but not at the point where he is playing it. I will exploit this error this coming Thursday, like I did when I played him last, but this time I hope not to overlook anything. Reyes and Hong play the same way and with the club as weak as it is, they can get away with it. But it's actually hurting their game because at the higher levels, the initiative is very important! There are no short cuts to hard work and chess is particularly unforgiving in this respect. I think you can reach the 1800's playing the way you do (with power and initiative), but add more endgame studies to your late nights at the chess board. And keep playing topical main lines even if you do not know all the theory, because in the end, the experience will help and even 'incomplete power' is better than 'no power' in your game. And also, the players who play with fear tend to stagnate in one area of their rating. As far as myself, I'm mostly too busy to play or to study, but since coming back, I have sacrificed some sleep in order to make it possible. So if I overlook stuff, it's because I operate on 5 hours sleep when I know I do best on 7-8 hours. Eric