Playing In A Chess Simul Against A Master
Have you participated in a “simul,” a simultaneous exhibition that features a highly ranked chess expert playing concurrently with several players?
I played in one in Burlington, NC after a three-round tournament organized by the Burlington Chess Club had ended. The simul incidentally featured the winner of the tournament, 18-year-old Emmanuel Carter. After the open had ended, Carter, who received his chess master certification from the U.S. Chess Federation at age 14, took on anyone interested in being an opponent.
The boards were organized in a large circle. No chess clocks were used, as is typical in a simul. Each player made a move when Carter (whose USCF rating that day was 2259) arrived at their board. When the player on my left resigned after 18 moves, I became more concerned about my survival. In less than an hour, several players had folded and left the playing area.
The board position or my game after 19 moves (shown above) is even, according to the chess engine Stockfish. On my 29th move (I'm playing Black), I erred by placing a rook on c8 that set up a winning move for him. See if you can find White's best move in the board position below.
In the above position, White's best move is Nd3. After 30…Qc8, he missed the crushing 31.Rc4+ and chose instead Rxd5?, which made the positions almost equal again (although his advantage is +1.45).
After about two hours of play, my game was on the 38th move when I resigned because checkmate was imminent. Although I did lose, I feel good about my play and had parity for almost 30 moves. When I resigned, only four other games were continuing. Because I was one of the final 10 players still playing, I got a prize: a free ice cream cone!
The next day after the game when I was reviewing information about simuls, I was surprised to see that I had followed one piece of advice for playing in a simul offered by Dutch Grandmaster Jan Hein Donner: Don’t be afraid to exchange pieces. I did make several exchanges and don’t think that they placed me at a disadvantage. (I lost in the end game because I left my king vulnerable while I launched an attack.)
Being able to play a master was a great experience. I’m encouraged to register for another simul and hope to play even better next time.
Ray Linville’s high point as a chess player occurred when he swiped the queen of GM Hikaru Nakamura in a 60-second bullet game in 2021. This game was reported in a “My Best Move” column of the Chess Life magazine, published by the U.S. Chess Federation.
At Chess.com, he has been an editor (part-time) since 2019 and has edited news articles and tournament reports—including those of the Candidates and World Championship Tournaments and other major events—by titled players and noted chess writers as well as Game of the Day annotations by leading grandmasters. He has also been a contributing writer of chess terms, e-books, and general interest articles for ChessKid.com.
He enjoys “top blogger” status at Chess.com. His blog has won the award for Best Chess Blog from the Chess Journalists of America for several years. In addition, he has also been the recipient of first-place CJA awards for feature article, humorous contribution, online review, and educational lesson as well as honorable mention in the categories of personal narrative and historical article.