Greetings,
…
And now, the newsletter:
Game Of The Week
By Tim Brennan
Greetings Friends!
Hope you are surviving the global pandemic and your N95 masks are nice and snug!
Thank you, Paul, for inviting me back for another “Tim Brennan Week” on the Colorado Springs Chess Club newsletter!
Last week, on Easter Sunday, I was hoping that the Easter Bunny would fill my basket with toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and Clorox wipes, but, instead, I got an even nicer surprise! Paul resurrected the CSCC newsletter! That made my day! Welcome back Paul!
Here are some thoughts and news and notes from my quarantine bunker in the Mountain Shadows area of Colorado Springs:
Rest in Peace to Mikhail Ponomarev, who died recently at age 94. I remember the first time I played Mikhail was at a 24 hour tournament held in 2004. Even though it was 3AM in the morning and Mikhail was 3 times my age, he stomped me easily. He was a fierce competitor and will be missed.
I have read about several well known chess players who have contracted COVID-19. Best wishes to them on a speedy recovery. I would also like to give appreciation to the Colorado Chess leaders like Brian Wall, who were quick to shut down their clubs and cancel their tournaments, even when there was a lot of uncertainty about what to do. This leadership helped to stop the spread of the virus and was the right thing to do. Well done.
I just finished listening to the latest episodes of the Perpetual Chess Podcast by Ben Johnson where he talked to Neil Bruce about one of my favorite chess books of all times, Rapid Chess Improvement by Michael de la Maza. If you haven’t subscribed yet to Perpetual Chess, it is a really great podcast. Neil is a great follow on twitter as well, and shares lots of great tactics problems.
Shoutout to Fred Spell, who continues to do an outstanding job with the Colorado Chess Informant. With the current shutdown going on, Fred might have a harder time than usual finding content for the magazine. Since some people might have extra time on their hands, now might be a good time to submit a story or article!
I very recently completed a 1 year streak on chessable.com, meaning I solved at least one problem per day, every day, for a year! I am a big fan of their spaced repetition learning model. Both Tactics Time 1 and 2 are available on chessable, and I really enjoy going through them.
Speaking of learning, I am also reading a book called Ultralearning by Scott Young, which I am really enjoying and highly recommend. The book talks about people who are able to take a subject, such as learning a language, and make rapid progress doing it. Lots of great ideas in this book.
I only played in two tournaments last year, the Denver Open and Colorado Open, but both were outstanding. Kudos to the organizers of both. Very well run, and tournaments I will always remember.
Here is a game I played against Jesse Hester at the “Donor Cloner Closer” held earlier this year. Brian Wall contacted me about a week before the tournament. He was a few points shy of qualifying for the Colorado Closed and wanted to have a “Clone Wars” style tournament to have a shot at gaining the necessary points to qualify. He also wanted to raise money for the Denver Open, hence the name “Donor Cloner Closer.”
A “Clone Wars” tournament is where you can enter more than once, but you cannot be paired against yourself. Basically, the players are doing simuls against other players, who are also doing simuls. And it is all rated, with a clock! So it is very fun!
I was both the tournament director, and player, which was fun too. This was the 4th Clone Wars style event I have played in, and it is always a blast, but very exhausting!
In Round 2, I was paired against Jesse Hester, who I had not played against since he was a teenager about 15 years ago. I had grabbed a pawn earlier in the game, that appeared to be defended, but really wasn’t with 17.Bxg5+ but this was the real kill shot that ended it.
Stay safe friends! Your friend,
Tim
White to move
See diagram and answer here:
cschess.webs.com/apps/photos/ph … =206178610
Corona, No Lime
chessvideos.tv/chess-game-r … ?id=115356
[Event “Donor Cloner Closer”]
[Site “https://cschess.webs.com/”]
[Date “2020.01.11”]
[Round “2”]
[White “Brennan, Tim”]
[Black “Hester, Jesse”]
[Result “1-0”]
[ECO “B23”]
[WhiteElo “1818”]
[BlackElo “2030”]
[PlyCount “49”]
[EventDate “2020.01.11”]
- e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 g6 4. Bc4 Bg7 5. Nf3 d6 6. f5 Nf6 7. fxg6 hxg6 8. h3
Bg4 9. O-O Bxf3 10. Qxf3 a6 11. a4 Ne5 12. Qe2 e6 13. d3 Nh5 14. Qf2 g5 15. Ne2
Qe7 16. Rb1 Ng6 17. Bxg5 f6 18. Be3 e5 19. b4 cxb4 20. Rxb4 Rc8 21. Qf5 Rc6 22.
Qxg6+ Kd8 23. Rfb1 Kc8 24. Rxb7 Rc7 25. Qf5+ 1-0
This Week In Chess
On April 19th, the Colorado Springs Chess Club held the CSCC Mouse Rapid Online event (4SS, G/15+10).
chess.com/tournament/live/c … ne-1196948
Place, Player, Score
1 “#1cschessnews (1737)” 3.0
2 “#1Termenoil (1921)” 3.0
3 “#3deanclow (1990)” 3.0
4 “#4NMBrianWall (1837)” 2.5
5 “#5bozhenoff (1719)” 2.5
6 “#6Navajo36us80917 (1125)” 2.0
7 “#6CosmicNovaGalaxy (1253)” 2.0
8 “#6jfoxhoot (1666)” 2.0
9 “#9msmcgough (1292)” 1.0
10 “#10linuxguy1 (1511)” 1.0
11 “#10KingVed (1456)” 1.0
12 “#12agapatos1 (1427)” 0.0