Nova Daily - 2 May 2025
Hi!
Today the results of April's blogging contest in The Blogger Awards were announced. I decided to participate with my blog on the chess in Harry Potter and the question whether the pawns go first.. I'm absolutely stunned, but I was awarded the gold medal in no less than three out of ten categories! Even more critically, I got gold in the category for overall Best Blog. I honestly didn't expect that to happen, as I indicated in my response:
To my knowledge I've read every submission for the month, and there were so many excellent entries that I really didn't expect to do well at all, and definitely not as well as I did. I have the creator's bias that whenever I read my own texts, I always think, "Oh come on, even I can do that!" and I'm always amazed at the content that everyone else creates.
My blog being considered the best blog out of 28 excellent entries to the April competition by all three judges unanimously just feels unreal. From the bottom of my heart: thank you @VOB96 @JustGettingThisOffMyChess @KevinSmithIdiot
I've been euphoric ever since the release of the April results today. But I have to get going: there are new blogs to write, new tasks to perform, and new challenges to take on. The eighth point of Iain Abernethy's "10 things the martial arts should have taught you about life" makes perfect sense for today.
8. Life is hard, but human resilience is harder.
As martial artists, we don't seek an easy life.
- Iain Abernetehy
At the beginning of his podcast, Iain Abernethy indicates that martial arts can have all kinds of benefits for their practicioners. Discipline is one of these: in order to become good at it, the student will need to expend effort and time. Martial arts also have a lot of sports benefits and other character-building aspects, and while these may not be unique, they are apparent.
Beautiful as they are, martial arts have one perpetual drawback: they can be seen in the public eye as violent pursuits. Because of this, they can attract thugs who seek to use the skills for their own ends. In order to prevent their systems from being viewed as disruptive for the harmony in society, the earliest masters recognised that they'd need to instill in their trainees a moral code. Without this, their systems would have no future, and all the positive benefits to individual growth would be lost.
One of the virtues that almost all martial arts share is the propagation of personal challenges. Not shying away from challenges means that there is possibility to expand the comfort zone (in other words: growth). Pushing beyond your skill level means an increase in skill level. Pushing beyond the new skill level will once again mean an increase in skill level. And so on.
If things do go wrong, as they will inevitably do at some point, the martial way is to take the hits, get up, learn the lessons and move on. The winner's mentality is to take the hits, get up, learn the lessons and move on. If you lose a contest, keep going.
I'd always have included the following video in this blog, even if I hadn't won anything in the blogging contest:
Iain Abernethy quotes the speech in his podcast, but there's nothing that can compare to the real deal. See it in action for yourself, harness this piece of experiential wisdom, and set sail to achieve your goals. Get what you're worth. I'll be rooting for you.
The game analysis
As I indicated at the end of last month, I've decided to split up the work for my rapid games in two blogs. One blog contains the game with my thoughts and preliminary analysis, and the second blog will contain the thorough analysis with all the sources and resources (opening books, databases, courses, YouTube videos, engines) that I have at my disposal, as well as the takeaway points that I managed to elicit from my games. By taking longer per game, I hope to be able to reduce the stress of my work as well as improve its overall quality.
Read yesterday's blog here.
Source analysis:
Model game:
The below blitz game is a good demonstration of how black should've played against white's imprecise move-order.
What can I take away from this game:
- The greatest lesson that can be taken away from this game is that the details matter. With white's sloppy move-order, I could have spared myself the tempo with the h-pawn and played 10...Nf8 right away.
- The next detail is that white's moving the f-pawn early is unnatural in this line. I should've grabbed the opportunity with both hands and played 11...c5! without delay. That's a move that I already play almost automatically when I'm faced with the Stonewall centre d4/e3/f4. Here the situation was even more favourable to black.
- Coupled with the previous point, the knight could've had an even better life much earlier if I hadn't played it to f8 on move 11.
- White was equally inattentive to the details of the position: 13.Bf4! would've been a great move.
- Giving up the bishop-pair to win the d-pawn isn't always worth it. In these positions it wouldn't have yielded black any significant advantage: white's possession of the bishop-pair provides ample compensation for the minor material deficit.
- Black isn't necessarily better in these positions, but in this game the activity certainly counted for something. White's worst overall mistake is having played the position too passively.
- I had good compensation for the deficit in pawn-structure because of the activity of my pieces.
All in all, I'm confident in concluding that I played a very good game. It wasn't perfect, and it doesn't have to be. I did manage to outperform my opponent in the middlegame and earn the point. I fought my way to victory. And that's what matters.
