I don't know whether anyone is interested in reading this but I like to share my recent tournament experience simply due to the fact that this was my first tourney in more than 12 years.

Last weekend, the Seattle City Championship took place at the Seattle Chess Club. The new location of the SCC at Northgate is much preferable to the old one in Shoreline. Carol and Fred Kleist organized and arbitered the tournament as they have done for many, many years now. 35 players entered the tournament in two sections. The Open section was led by FM Airapetian who faced (but eventually overcame) stiff competition by teenage phenome Megan Lee (15 years, rated 2100) and our own Mark Smith (fullscreen). I should mention 10 year old Marcell Szabo as well who is just short of a 1900 rating. As I was playing myself I did not get to watch too much of the action but the ending of the game between FM Airapetian and Megan Lee. In what looked like a drawish position in which Megan had the exchange for a couple of pawns FM Airapetian somehow took advantage of her young opponent's time trouble and managed to promote a pawn - into a knight! That eventually led to a bishop and knight versus naked king endgame in which Megan was down to 2 seconds (with a 5 second delay) while "Chouchou" had about 2 minutes plus delay to execute this mate which for us mortals is a daunting task even with all the time in the world. And she did! Definitely, not the kind of challenge I want to face after six hours of play. Mark Smith added to Megan's ordeal by inflicting a second defeat on her which confirmed his expert status and (if I recall correctly - please correct me if I am wrong, Mark) propels him into the Top 100 in the US for the 65+ category. Congratulations to Mark on that accomplishment!

As I mentioned it had been a while since I had a chance to play real chess so I was unsure what to expect. My first round encounter ended with a full point despite dreadfully losing in a totally misplayed King's Indian as my opponent wasn't eligible for the U1800 section. As the round started late, it got really late as my buddy Bryan and I headed to Chinatown after the round to devour some jellyfish at Hoho (by the way, I wouldn't recommend the area for a late night stroll but I suppose you are ok as long as you use some common sense). At any rate, the clock showed 2:30AM when I got home. My second round matched me up with Masayuki Nagase, a 12 year old with a 1700 + rating. I quickly screwed up another King's Indian Opening but recovered enough to salvage a draw in what may have been even a minimally better position. That game and the earlier one made me aware that my openings stank and it probably would be wiser to try something where opening knowledge wasn't as critical. Round 3 paired me with David Kelly, the VP of the SCC and also a member here. I dug out my trusted 1. f4 Bird Opening which he saw for the first time and did not play best against. Round 4 on Sunday morning paired me against Toshihiro Nagase, the younger brother of Masayuki, who had a spotless record at that point. I played 1. f4 again to take him out of his opening comfort and reached a dream position where I had all the time in the world to slowly optimize my pieces and finally crash through. It is fairly easy to tell how your game goes against the young kids. If they play fast you are toast if they start thinking you know you are doing alright. That win gave me the lead but I was pretty exhausted and hoped for a quick last round ending. It wasn't meant to be. I faced another preteen in Derek Zhang. I tried the Caro-Kann to make use of an opening book I recently bought. However, it did not take long for me to go astray and drop a pawn. As in my second round encounter, I started to put up a fight and managed to create enough problems for him to offer a draw which I gladly took. That meant shared first price with the older Nagase brother. I was happy and relieved that it was over (well, it was only over after I made it back safely across the lake on very slippery roads).

I can only recommend to the folks here to give OTB chess a try. It is a totally different experience than chess played via a computer interface. You are facing your opponent, it is really a battle one-on-one. I wish we would have more local chess clubs so a healthy competition can grow but that has been a struggle for sure. I like to thank Carol and Fred for organizing it and all the players involved for a pleasant tournament!

I hope I didn't bore you guys to death and perhaps someone will feel encouraged to join a tournament soon. I would also call on the various folks from the chess clubs in our state to announce upcoming tournaments so that interested members here may join.