Toppling Giants-An Attempt

     Hello everyone! Recently I competed in the 2022 Birmingham Classic tournament. Except it wasn’t really recent since it was on July 16th 😅. I’ve been busy writing two other blogs and am finally getting around to recapping this event. Like the previous tournament I attended, the Birmingham Classic time control was G/60 d5, which is a flexible, easy-to-work-with time control. Not that it matters anyway considering I never use more than half of the time on my clock. 

     Before I registered for this tournament, a ton of people were advising that I played up in my next OTB event. Initially, I was adamant on playing in U1200, going for the money one more time, then I became swayed by the benefits of playing in the U1700 section. From my current standpoint it had seemed logical. I only had three tournaments left before my rating became un-provisional, making chunks of rating gains nearly impossible. Thus, it only made sense to try to increase my rating as much as possible before I got out of provisional. How could I accomplish this? By beating players a lot higher rated than me, and with the opportunity to play 1600s in the U1700 section, this was a great chance to salvage my rating. Plus, if this went really bad at least I’d have the experience of playing better players. Or at least, that’s what I believed… It was decided. I’d be playing up.

      The prizes for the tournament are shown below, and I thought I had a solid shot at winning the U1400 prize. However, after the brutal second half I experienced in my last tournament after being cocky, I decided to not even think about money and set myself the low goal of .5/4. If I achieved this goal, I’d be happy since I was entering a field full of chess players substantially better than myself. 

      As always, I’ll briefly describe what I did before and after each round, provide fully annotated games from all four rounds, and list insights that can be taken from each game: major mistakes, opening inaccuracies, alternate lines, etc. But enough of my rambling, let’s fast forward to tournament day!

      My preparation was pretty ordinary for this tournament. I followed my PACE training (Puzzles, analysis, classical games, endgames), which I explained in my last blog. However, before this tournament I knew I’d have to study a new d4 defense after my namesake Nimzo-Indian was derailed in May. So I learned two new openings for this event: the Ponziani and the Dutch. I learned the latter specifically for one opponent who I’d play later, but more on that when we get to it. 

Round 1: Unlucky Against the Latvian

         
  Well, that was expected. That was the highest rated player I’ve ever faced OTB, and he used an opening I had never seen before in my life. Plus, I felt absolutely dreadful during the round. I had a terrible stomachache from nerves all the way to the tournament and felt nauseous throughout game 1. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I decided to stay up until 12:30 the night before, giving me 6 1/2 hours of inadequate sleep. My eyelids fluttered between being open and closed the whole time 🤣. I had seriously contemplated going home and back to bed after just a few moves of play. Luckily, I was able to finish the game without falling asleep and I wasn’t too disappointed with my loss. I was glad to have survived that long.

                                        Insights:

• I’ve said before that trying to refute an unknown gambit over-the-board is usually a bad idea but I think in this particular circumstance it was my only option. Trying d3, for example, against the Latvian validates black’s opening choice and doesn’t exploit  the fact that they played f5 on move two.
• 6.dxc6 was an instructive move by black, showing that capturing towards the center isn’t always the right move. My opponent’s choice better prepared for 0-0-0, by opening up the d-file and adding some cushion to the queenside.
• I think I missed several opportunities to play Be2 and 0-0, although granted, black would have moves like Qg6 and Bh3 at their disposal and belligerent attacks like that are tough to work out OTB.
• 11. Na3: While this move had some good maneuvering ideas, it’s just stupid in light of black’s impending attack. Far too slow to be effective in this position. Much better was a4, as discussed in the annotations.
• Allowing 13. Bxc3, and then following it up with the inaccurate 14. Ra2? increased the stress on my position by tenfold. 
• 22. Qd3, the final straw, failing to respond to black’s lethal pin.

At the end of the day I think I was simply outplayed and my opponent had a greater opening knowledge than me. Just so that you don’t fall into the same traps that I did, I’ve linked GM Eugene Perelshteyn’s Latvian refutation here. Onto Round 2!

Round 2: Oops... I Did It Again...

Just some context before I show the game, for this round I actually got paired with someone who I thought I'd get paired against in this tournament and who I was very excited to face. In fact, he's the only opponent I specifically prepped for, pre-tournament. I knew that he played the Pirc as black and 1. d4 as white, so I prepared lines against both of these openings. I also studied the Dutch, just to play against this one guy. Afterall, he did obliterate me off the face of the Earth with both colors last year... so yeah, some revenge would be nice. 

      Welp. Should I have won that? Maybe. Stockfish claimed it was a draw but it's difficult for humans to navigate that kind of pressure. Should I have at least drawn that? Absolutely. Once again, I fail OTB to an unacceptable endgame blunder, which could easily be corrected with more endgame study. I think this game proved that while I'm strong in other areas of the game, I have a very shallow foundation of endgame knowledge, and struggle to convert won positions. I do believe that in order to finally have an OTB breakthrough, I have to rectify these weaknesses. Until then, I'll keep performing sub-par. 

        At the end of the day though, I played another strong, underrated opponent, who demonstrated impeccable endgame technique and resilience in losing middlegames. I was outplayed again. While I did take another loss, I wasn't too disappointed because I had actually enjoyed that game. I got a flawless middlegame from my first game with the Dutch OTB and got a winning position against a high-rated player. Plus, my stomachache and drowsiness were gone.

                                                                       Insights:

• I think my opening went perfectly. 11. Nc5 was maybe slightly weakening, but if I had applied more pressure in the middlegame and hadn't allowed 20. f3, it would've been fine.
• Poor endgame technique by me ultimately led to my second loss. 41. Kb2 was the greatest blunder by me, although I made a few other mistakes as well.

Round 3: A Quiet Game for Once?

     In round 3, I was paired against an 1112 who had beat me back in round 3 of the Tom Nard Memorial in February with a strange French sideline. I was a little intimidated to start, but was grateful for another opportunity for revenge.

    So I know what you're thinking. Nimzo, why did the game end abruptly, and why does the PGN say the game ended in a draw? Did one of you flag? Was there an OTB rules dispute? Did you agree to a draw in a completely won position like that?  Surely you didn't throw another  game? Well, unfortunately, it was the latter. It was here that my opponent's clock dipped below a minute and the wild concept of trying to flag him jumped into my head. So there it was. The last game of the round, spectators surrounding the board, me pushing pieces around the board, knocking pawns over like a madman, my opponent responding in lightning time. As fifteen moves had been blitzed out, I realized with a sickening feeling that there was a delay and my opponent was not going to flag. 

       Heart thumping like a snare drum in my chest, I stalemated my opponent with the final position looking exactly like this:

     So yes ladies and gentleman, I lost both my queenside pawns, and traded queens into a King+Pawn endgame, where I had h & g pawns, and my adversary an h-pawn alone. When the game finished and I tremelously shook my opponent's hand, I glanced at the clock to see that the game finished with six seconds for black, and thirty minutes for me. This might have been the biggest facepalm moment in my life. The bullet player at heart within me had tried to flag in a classical tournament with a delay! I know that 0.5/3 was sort of decent since this was my first time playing up, but that draw was simply devastating. Insights? Well maybe next time chill out and don't try to clock your opponent OTB. I had half an hour left to calculate that endgame to its conclusion. It wouldn't have been easy, but my opponent would've been under time pressure and I should've won.

Round 4: Can I Get a Win This Tournament?

       Despite my disappointment, I went outside and talked to Lightning, B1Z, and a few others and had shook off my loss. I knew that dwelling on a past game would only demoralize me and that I could still push for a win in this event. If I could defeat this 1213, I could even gain a respectable amount of rating.

     Let's go!!!! I desperately needed that win. Although the game wasn't too long, it still lasted for over an hour because my opponent spent large amounts of time calculating once the situation on the queenside became tangled. Overall though, that was a pretty clean victory for me and I was now at a 1.5/4 record, not enough for me to qualify for the U1400 prize, but enough for me to have the biggest rating boost I had received since May 2021. According to official USCF reports, my rating went from 1013 to 1040, a respectable thirty point gain, and all that from one win!

Conclusion: 

       I really enjoyed that event, despite my rocky first half because I found areas of my chess game that needed improvement, played some instructive games, and finally surmounted the psychological problems I had formerly experienced OTB, what with the anxiety, nervousness during a winning position, fear of playing high-rated players, etc. I finally played the board instead of my opponents that tournament and had fun during the games. I wouldn't have played any differently here on chess.com.

       As always, thanks so much for taking the time to read this blog! After two more blog posts I'll be applying for top blogger so thank you to everyone who's supported me! Make sure to leave a comment if you'd like and I'll see you in my next blog. 

     Until next time, -Nimzo