SIX-WAY TIE FOR 1st PLACE?? Was I in it?

My blog is back! So last you've heard from me (I guess unless you're one of my IRL friends or something), I posted about how hard tournament chess is. From being crushed by an IM, having to stalemate a 1600, grind out a 1400, and choke the final round, I dropped points. Not a devastating amount, but it was substantial. I was able to gain those back in a local quad. 

My next tournament was the Waco July Swiss. It was rather a weird tournament, and I'm not necessarily spoiling anything, as the title should already indicate that as the case. The Waco Swisses had four sections: Open, U1600, U1000, and a recently-implemented U700. My section had 20 players. I was initially seeded #7, but I think one player above me no-showed, and another player was more sitting in as a house player, so that would bump me up to #5, but here's what the pre-registration list was:

Well whether I'm #7 or #5 seed, the point remains the same. Unlike last tournament, I'm comfortably in the top half, which means that I'll get a lower-rated opponent round 1. However, I see this as a good opportunity, because A) It's important to "prove myself" against lower rated players, and B) when/if I get a higher-rated pairing, I'll need to capitalize. It can be tricky, because if I fail to win round 1, I'm likely going to be paired down again, and the high-rated opportunities are somewhat few. 

In round one, I was paired with a player whom I outrate by over 300 points. I'm sure in the past, I've discussed the psychology of playing "lower-rated" players... it's important to just play good moves, let the game play itself, wait for a mistake, and don't force things unnecessarily.

I'll take the win. If I'm being completely honest, it's a little bit anti-climactic to win because of a blunder (16. Ne5??), I'd rather win by outplaying my opponent positionally. But we take those, we got the job done. 

In round 2, I was paired against my local friend, Jason. He's over 1900, and was the best chess player in Waco (my hometown) for a long time. I had played him 28 times in tournaments, and boast an 0-8-20 record against him. That's right. 0 wins, 8 draws, 20 losses. Some of those losses were from when I was "bad", or "underdeveloped" as a chess player. However, the vast majority of those came when I was 1600+, so I'm still embarrased that I have yet to beat him (at the time of that game). Can I change that? 

That was a very satisfying win, not going to lie. I've been trying to beat him for almost 7.5 years (in tournaments), and we finally got the job done! However, the job's not finished as far as the tournament goes. I need to do well the remaining two rounds if I want to walk away with substantial rating and/or clinch a share of the prize winning. 

Well my chess ego after winning round 2 is about to be tested. I was paired in round 3 vs the lowest rated player in the open section. How did that happen? This guy just knocked out two 1600+ players in rounds 1-2, so he was also on 2-0. I was scared, but also up for the challenge. Also, he apparently reads (and likes?) my blog!

Yes, drawing a player of that rating is a little bit humbling, but the way I see it, I didn't make any major mistakes (probably other than allowing Qa4!), and my opponent didn't make any substantial mistakes that I could capitalize on. And he was truly underrated. I despise making the "he's underrated" excuse when I lose or draw a game vs a lower rated player... normally that result happens because I'm bad at chess! But his post-tournament rating is over 1500... so... yeah! 

But as a whole, 2.5/3 going into the final round is not a bad situation at all! In round 4, I was paired vs the top seed himself... @LSChess! It's important that I don't get complacent, because losing to him makes the overall tournament very "meh". Like yes, I finally beat my arch-rival who's over 1900, but finishing with a draw and loss would be sad. Ultimately, it's important to take this one game at a time, and focus on the task at hand! 

Whew! Well, that was a very interesting tournament. Rounds 1 and 2 consisted of exploiting my opponent's mistakes/blunders, and winning because of that. Wheras, rounds 3 and 4 was almost a nightmare, defending a worse endgame (r3) and worse middlegame (r4) and having to give it my all to draw. All that to say, 3/4 (2 wins 2 draws) is a very solid result, I'll take it.

So what about that 6-way tie for 1st? Was I in it? Well, William, who was on 2.5/3, ended up playing another player on 2.5/3, and they drew. Jason, my r2 opponent, as well as another player who was on 2/3, ended up winning. So six players tied for 1st place at 3/4! 

The final standings... and as you can also see, my rating increased from 1726 to 1761... it's been awhile since I had a jump like that, so it felt nice!

At this point, even though I was at the time 39 points away, 1800 feels like a long shot. Not sure why. Ultimately, these days, I play chess for fun and just try to play good games, so I don't care as much about my rating as I used to, but it's always nice to re-hit a new milestone. 

Yay! Now my blog is only behind by one tournament! Well technically two, because I played in a local quad, but I haven't been posting about my quad results. And this weekend, I'm about to partake in the Houston Chess Festival. I'm playing in the open section as one of the lower rated players. That'll be super fun.

Well, that's it for my blog. Hope you enjoyed, and got something out of it. See you for the next one!

Oh, and for your enjoyment, here are a couple of other photos!