Road to 2000!! - Ep.3 Blunders of Birmingham
Yes I am aware this is several months late, been really busy with tournaments the past couple months.
A Recap of The Steel City Classic
Hey Everyone! Welcome back to Episode 3 of my attempt to reach 2000 OTB. On November 2nd, I played in the Steel City Classic. I had a very shaky Tournament Game wise, but performance wise I did fairly well! beat a 1690, Drew against Sai Kesireddy (1876), Won against my first 2000! Micheal W. Porcelli(2032) and could've won the Tournament but lost the Last Round to Cody Smith(1792) after a terrible Middlegame performance and yet another d4 loss....fun....
Funny enough everyone but me got a bye and I ended up in 3rd place with 2.5/4 Score. I gained a couple good rating points jumping up to 1810! So far I was really happy with myself, 2 months after the State Championship and I go from 1586 to Over 1800!! It reminded me of when i started the Armature Section in January of 2024 and in the span of 2 months I jumped from 1241 to 1486!
I would Love to share all the games but uh......Timothy of the past may have lost those scoresheets cause he didn't bring his Scorebook :'). Thankfully! Scott Varagona put my game against Porcelli in the Antics Magazine so I have it to share with you guys!
Taylor - Porcelli
Pre-Tournament Prep.
Back to the Drawing board eh? Well At the Steel City Classic my other games saw me have a Loss and a struggling hold as black against d4 as per natural (Seriously my Rate against d4 is so bad it is concerning 😭). So taking that I finally decided to start expanding more in my prep against d4 and focused it into a new Opening I wanted to try.....The Grunfeld Defense. But before we get into the Repertoire part some notes for me to cover that I took from the Steel City Classic
1. Lack of Prep and understanding in d4 Posistions - Specifically against the Tromp (looking at you Randy >:c ) and against the Torre. I keep procrastinating practicing it and would only study the first 5ish moves and after that "wing" it. Now that I am facing d4 more and more frequently (roughly 45% of the time, in the reserve I would see it every 1-2/5 Games as Black).
2. Taking more time to figure unfamiliar positions out. - In my game against Porcelli while I did went onto win, I quickly played "natural" looking moves and was already slightly worse from the opening and I was soon regretting it very early on. Ontop of, my Round 2 game against the French, I continued my win streak but once I got into new waters I stuck to playing the same tarrasch setup without considering alternatives to try (missed some "winning" ideas and lines). Ive gone from not trusting myself on some lines to not even considering alternatives, was not the plan.
3. Insert all reasons from the last post - Self explanatory :')
Training wise, I liked how it was going and decided to keep the same goals.
- Minimum of 2 30m games a day (I would load up a chess.com game but play it otb to help "simulate" a tournament game)
- Minimum 2 Hours a day working on Prep, reviewing Lines, and testing certain lines against engines.
- Completing Daily Puzzles, Puzzle Rushes, and Puzzle Survival
- Solving online training puzzles each day
- Playing otb Blitz games in an attempt to improve my intuition in time scambles
- And getting pleanty of rest before the tournament date so im not exhaused before I even played the first move
Okay now onto the repertoire! Most is the same but with a few tweaks and one new opening.
The Repertoire:
- (W) The Open Italian - 1.e5,e5 2.Nf3,Nc6 3. Bc4,Nf6 4.d4,exd5 5.e5!,d5 6.Bb5
- (W) The "Magnus" Sicilian - 1.e4,c5 2.Nc3,d6 3.d4!?
- (W) The Fantasy Caro - 1.e4,c6 2.d4,d5 3.f3!? (My Beloved)
- (W) The Tarrasch French - 1.e4,e6 2.d4,d5 3.Nd2
- (B) The Grunfeld Defense - 1.d4,Nf6 2.c4,g6 3. Nc3,d5 (The new one)
- (B) The O'Kelly Sicilian - 1.e4,c5 2.Nf2,a6!? (Its been working so bringing it back again ^^)
So after a few worse Nimzo's I wanted to try smth new. I liked alot of the Grunfeld lines and took it as an opening that d4 players are not as prepared for as compared to the more popular Nimzo (that was my train of thought). Along with it gave me imbalances to push for getting to counterattack the White Center and my aggressive desire couldnt resist lol.
The Magic City Classic
- 2024 Magic City Classic
- 4 Rounds: 70m | 5 delay
- Premier Section (1600+)
- Birmingham, Alabama
Its the Big Day! and oh boy was this Tournament much different then the last two......almost double the players and Multiple 2000+ Masters playing.....including Stuart himself...gulp. Ah well Stu is likely going to crush the field so there is like Zero chance I play him so I shouldn't be worried right hehe........(defiantly not foreshadowing).
Round 1: There's Snow way out
Okay it is Round 1! Lets end the Year strong. My first opponent was Zachary Snow, aka Lightning on Chess.com, he was the State Champion last year and was defiantly one of the three players I was worried to play the most......ah well Im going to have to play them eventually Right? Better sooner then later ig. I recall him saying "I knew we would get paired up eventually but didn't think it would be this soon" and I was 100% with him in that boat, last I saw him was the State Championship and now we get to play (fun).
He is far from an easy opponent, one of the best in the state, the 2023 Co-Champion, and has competed with 2200-2400 level players. As of writing this he just hit 2150 again and is on his way to 2200, great progress by him hands down.
He is on his Journey to National Master and posts his own blogs from his tournaments (I would defiantly recommend checking them out. Lots of Fire posts). Zachary said in his post "what, no I'm not scared, why would you say that..." which is funny since I was terrified expecting myself to be at best an "Inconvenient Roadbump"
For my analysis on this Game ill also include Lines and comments he made in his post. Was the furthest thing from a "Solid" Game but I hope I didn't make too much of a fool of myself.
**Viewers be aware, Blunders are there**
Well what a roller coaster huh? After playing some of the best games of my life at the States and the Chris Bond Memorial, I go to giving up two free tempos, missplaying my preparation, and getting way too risky for my own good lol. Moves like g5 have helped me win many Reserve tournaments but oh boy it is quickly turned against me when I face the Premier players. Again I heavily recommend you check his blog out! Lots of great reports there. Anyhow ggs to him and off to the next game ay?
Round 2: Facing the Petrov
Well coming off that embarrassing loss, my next oppenent is someone I've gotten the pleasure to meet several times playing in his tournaments. Douglas Strout has held many tournaments that I have gotten to play in and has helped me build up my rating and skill from my 200 beginnings to now. At the 2023 Rasberry Rapid + Blitz I played him during both tournaments, three Petroffs where I loss in the Rapid, and loss the Blitz 0.5-1.5. (Tho to be fair I was 1200 Rapid and 700 Blitz respectively to his 1500 rating). Since then at the Quick + Blitz State Championship of 2024 I got to play him again, after missing a win out of the opening we went on to draw. Now I go in as the higher seed wanting to bounce back in the tournament and (hopefully) make up for my past losses to him. Best of luck and may the best man win!
Round 3: Grunfeld Grumbles
Okay Round 3! And I get to face off against Aaron Decord! This man towers over me in both Rating and Height (not that suprising). Ontop of that he was the one person to take out the Legendary Stuart Rachels during the Alabama State Championship.......Me? Scared? pffttttt get outta here :'D. All jokes aside I was nervous but excited to get to ply more higher rated opponents, who knows maybe the loss against Snow was one bad Snow Day and this Game I can continue to turn my event around!
Okay well.....that was uh....heartbreaking to say the least. Could have secured a draw from a worse posistion and instead play like the only bad Bishop move there is-. Idk I tried to be risky and go for something off beat from my usual repertoire (due to my really really bad score to d4) and faced the consequences. Oh well atleast the one good thing about lossing is that you play a weaker oppenent in the next round right? So I should defiantly get a lower rated oppenent, and get a win, and end today on a even score.
"What's the worst that can happen right? :'D"
Round 4: Getting "Stu" Fried
Well.......after having 2 quite frankly embarrassing losses to the 2000 club, was hoping to get an easier game but no....oh no I get another High Rated oppenent......and not just ANY 2000+ player but none other then Stuart Rachels in the living flesh.
Hehe......I'm in danger
Yeah just a Co-US Champion and the reigning Alabama champion, totally nothing to worry about...toooottalllllyyyyy.
Yeah im screwed, well might as well try to win right? hey I paid 50 dollars to get in so I want my moneys worth atleast XD.
Final Thoughts & Review
Okay, definitely have alot to work on-....Okay where to start.....Man that was a rough tournament. Up to this point I have been doing really well against the Sub-2000 group but man.....these Top players are something else, spent the day giving out free points like it was still Christmas. All three of the games I lost I was extremely nervous having to play those higher rated oppenents and I definitely played badly having mentally resigned before the game already began.
Now ofc they are 2000,2100,2500 for good reason and it shows, if I ever want to get to the point where I can beat them its going to take alot of work.......and alot of future beatings. Idk...really wish I could say alot more but I am really just at a loss of words for this tournament. I mean hey it can't get worse then this right?? (definitely not foreshadowing a worse tournament *wink wink*).
Well next report will be on the Evangel Open and the Tom Nard Memorial, 2 tournaments in 1 special! My Rating at the time of going into them is at 1816 and its the slow and steady grind upwards to 1900. Going to miss the days like the Chris Bond where I can jump up nearly 100 rating points........
Anyhow see you guys and gals there! I'll do my best to give better games that I can actually talk alot about and now just post a long roll of me being crushed lol.
