Game 8 for the Grandmaster title - Last game of the first tourney

In the last round of the  year opening tourney in Budapest I played with International Master Emil Szalanczy, a great tactician and endgame player. 

I decided to play a line to prevent his attacking ideas and put the game into a positional warface.I played the classical sicilian which was my main weapon on the road to the International Master title. 

I used too much time to find a plan in the beginning of the middlegame which put me under big pressure. I solved the challange and even I got a better position, then a better endgame. MY pieces were much more active.

We had only minutes left with a 30 seconds increment per move, where I miised 2 times the chance to break in and get a big advantage.

Then I missed his idea to open the h-file and to penetrate. 

The main issue was to change my mindset from playing for the win from a better position to defend.

The best was to sacrifice a pawn and go for a draw endgame.

I tried to keep the pawn which was not possible and I lost an other pawn which was more painful. Then it was no way back.

I got 6 wins and 2 loses and missed round 2 because of my birthday party. I got 8th place and lost 2,7 rating points.

I think it was a good experience on my road to the Grandmaster title.

This was the only tourney in Budapest in January so I decided to play even the rating of the opponents was very low. In the coming tourneys I plan to play in tourneys where I can play with opponents around my rating range.

The next tourney will start on Tuesday and it will be an all play all 10 players round robin tourney in Leányfalu.  You can check it at http://chess-results.com/tnr401692.aspx?lan=1

I will write about my tourney plan soon.

You can watch the preparation for my games LIVE on twitch at https://twitch.tv/attilaturzo

Have a great day! See you soon!