Ilkley Festival 2023 Part 3

So, 1.5/3 overnight was a reasonable position to be. The draw for round 4 was already made so I googled my opponent and found a couple of games on-line, including an odd line in the Budapest. This paid dividends when he played it against me the next morning! However it's a very drawish line with the queens off early, and although I had some hopes of generating an advantageous endgame, it never came to anything....until a last-minute scramble where he blew the draw! I think he even had a winning position at some point. Unfortunately I don't have a full record of the moves as we were playing on the increment towards the end.  But I do remember the denoument, so I've made up some silly moves to get there.

I think his 1777 rating is the highest I've beaten OTB, though I've certainly had strongly winning positions against higher rated opponents.

2.5/4 with one game left, there were no players on 4 points and a win would give me a good finishing position. Black for the second time and a Budapest for the second time in a row! However I didn't have any prep for this and he surprised me on move 4 (though it's reasonably standard, I just haven't seen that many Budapests). I didn't play correctly but he then dropped a pawn and I was soon in a very strong position. Further gains put me 3 pawns up and I should probably have taken the chance to swap off everything for a straightforward endgame, but I played for checkmate and missed it, getting my king in a tangle and losing on time (in a lost endgame). A bit of an unfortunate end but I did really enjoy the game up to the last 5 mins!

Overall a fun weekend, a higher standard of opposition than in the Minor last year and a few rating points dropped but nothing too disastrous.