2015 PA State Championship, Day 1: Upset

It the end, it is almost always more important to focus on oneself and the game, not opponents and circumstances. But usually I have a reasonable explanation for really unexpected games, good and bad (e.g. crushed a 2190 who played a bad opening; drew a 1600 because I played fast and apathetically). But it is unlikely that in the near future I will be able to explain how after a successful opening and winning a pawn, losing the pawn back and trading rooks was all it took for my 1527-rated opponent (floored at 1500) to crush me in the resulting endgame (for what it's worth, the second lowest rated person who's beaten my in the last 12 months was rated around 1975...). I lost with at least half an hour less on the clock (these were all G/120).

So instead of playing the masters in the top half of my section (maybe tomorrow), I spent the next two rounds trying to gain back the 25 rating points I lost from the first round ;). Here are brief comments on rounds 1-3 (exams are calling a little bit and I might not otherwise post these for a while):

The second game was pretty fun.

Last game of the day was a standard taming of the Panov.

And I've gained back 11 of the 25 points (estimated) I lost in the first round. Stay tuned for the last two rounds!