Blogs
Journey to National Master #5: NCM NORM!!! (2025 Chess4Win Happy New Year Markham O1900)

Journey to National Master #5: NCM NORM!!! (2025 Chess4Win Happy New Year Markham O1900)

Avatar of TristonLi
TristonLi
Show your flair!
| 2

Welcome back to the 5th blog in my journey to National Master! I guess we finally see some improvement!? This wasn't an easy tournament. I was paired up against around 2000+ elo opponents for every single game. However, that also elevated the level of my play from usually down at the foot of Mt. Everest to the peak of the mountain. Anyways, getting back on track, this was a new month, a new year, and my only time to do well before I go downhill in the following 11 months. 

Round 1: Smooth, no sweat.

It's always awesome to start off with a win. The momentum definitely helped in the upcoming rounds. 

Round 2: I won an FM!!!?

Anyway, it's not that deep. Let's move on to the game.

What a chaotic game! But way to cap it off. I think the eval. bar was swinging up and down for both sides after every move, basically, in this game, but I hung on and super luckily got the job done.

Round 3: First Board in a long time

Up to this point, I was very delighted with my current score/position in this tournament. Until I completely miscalculated in a position, I thought I was slightly better.

I'm a little disappointed at sacking in a slightly worse position. However, at the end of the day, my opponent is much more skilled and competent than I am. So it's not like losing to a 1500, which, uhrmm... definitely doesn't happen to me a ton.
a basketball player with a beard is talking into a microphone on a court .

Round 4: I'm locked in for real

Before the 4th round, I had to get my mindset right. I was feeling my unconsciousness kicking in and telling me that I'm about to finish strong the night before. Yet it also felt so far away at the same time. For some reason I didn't have a good sleep, but luckily I had a great breakfast, which lightened the mood a bit. I was paired against a 2100 in my age group, and I had some random thought of having to beat him because I might face him in a later, more important tournament, which would give me a mental advantage then (e.g., North American Youth Chess Championship). Now, please buckle up before I take you into this 77-move mess (yes, the perfect, fitting word to describe this game, certainly not a rollercoaster or slugfest). 

So he should have kept his bishop on the h6 square and moved his rook around and would have drawn, but hey, a win is always still a win🏆, and I will certainly take it.

Round 5: Not knowing I can achieve NM norm by simply drawing 

So, like, yeah... I lowkey screwed up big time. I mean, I guess you're just not supposed to use the rating estimator. Anyways, I definitely had a lot of drawing chances and completely messed up because I just wasn't focused enough. Here's the game...

Conclusion: Overall, I just completely lucked out this tournament, as my opponents didn't play really well and I played spectacularly. I was in control of the pace of each game and tactically really accurate. The only thing that I kind of regretted was not making a draw in round 5 and sacking the piece in round 3, so other than that, I'm thrilled with this outstanding performance from me. Thank you for reading till the end of this blog! A new blog will be shortly released.

P.S. I start falling off from here on out in the next 11 months of this year.