NAG 2023 Part 1: It's Over for Me

The 38th National Age Group Chess Championships 2023,  held at Our Tampines Hub, Singapore. A 7-round Swiss Tournament, it is widely considered as one of the most prestigious age group tournaments in Singapore, a small red dot, where there have only been 3 Grandmasters and definitely enough chess players to go around. The 38th NAGCC changed the time-control from its previous edition, from 90 minutes + 30 seconds increment per move to just 60 minutes + 30 seconds increment per move. With me competing in the merged Under-16 and Under-20 section, it was no joke, games would last a gruelling 3 to 4 hours on average and I had to mentally prepare myself for that, with 2 rounds on each day, it would be mental torture, 8 hours of chess was awaiting me. The players were definitely more experienced and skilled compared to me as I had just started pursuing professional chess around 2 years ago at a ripe age of barely 15 years old and still FIDE unrated, I knew it was not going to be easy, but let's see how I performed in the tournament!

Day 1

Round 1:

Yeoh Kai Bo (0) SGP - Zhu Lehan (1208) SGP

NAG 2023 Game 1

Result: 0 - 1 (Loss)

After game 1, it was quite disappointing to see that I blundered a queen like that in a standard game, some would say it was a "classical" Botez Gambit but after analysing and realising I basically played like Stockfish for the first 25 moves of the game and reaching an equal position, I felt like all I needed was to focus more intently on the game and make sure I don't blunder anything, and I started staging my comeback for Round 2 of NAG 2023 the next day.

Day 2

Round 2:

Bhaskar, Maadhesh Vetrimani (0) SGP - Yeoh Kai Bo (0) SGP

NAG 2023 Game 2

Result: 0 - 1 (Win)

Round 3:

Yeoh Kai Bo (0) SGP - Tan Ying Jie (0) SGP

Result: 0 - 1 (Loss)

This game started with a London System where Black played a late c5 and Nbd7 to support the pawn after  3.... Bg4!? move, something I haven't really had much experience over the few years I've played the London, as my opponent first struck with 11... Qb6 attacking my b2 pawn, I defended with 12. Qc2?, big mistake as after 12... c4, 13. Be2 Bg6, 14. Qa4 Qxb2, I would be down a clean pawn. The next move, 15. Nh4?? attacking the bishop was basically a complete blunder, disconnecting the knights and allowing Qxd2, and Black is now up 4 points of material. After around 20 moves of trying to trap Black's Queen deep in my position, I was unable to make a comeback and eventually traded into a disadvantageous endgame before resigning on move 47.

Day 3

Round 4:

It was basically mid-way through the tournament, yet I had a depressing score of 1/3, but I was not ready to give up, so against my Chinese opponent, I played my trusty Pirc Defense that won me my 2nd game, but obviously, it didn't go so well...

Gu Yaozhong (0) CHN - Yeoh Kai Bo (0) SGP

NAG 2023 Game 4
Result: 1 - 0 (Loss)

Round 5:

Yet another demoralising loss, puts me at a score of 1/4, which was a horrible performance, losing to 2 FIDE-unrated players like me and my next opponent was an opponent I lost to in last year's NAG, it was just over, winning this game would be a breakthrough, more for myself.

Stay tuned for the next part of my NAG 2023 coverage where I will be covering the last 3 games in NAG 2023 from Rounds 5-7!