907 days - Evergreen Warrior's 26th

Good morning chess players!

It was the longest chess tournament I ever participated. 907 days!

Start Date: Feb 25, 2023
Finish Date: Aug 21, 2025

Number of Players: 6125

The tournament name was Evergreen Warrior's 26th Quick Knockouts Chess Tournament. 

Knockouts means here in chess that in every round opponents play two games — one with White and one with Black. The winner moves to the next round, or both players advance in case of a draw.

I started the event as the top seed. I had the highest rating, so I was number one on the list. Because of this, my tournament looked very unusual. Many times I moved to the next round without playing a game. When there was an odd number of players, the first player advanced automatically. So in many rounds my result was simply “BYE.”

Here is the link for my games:
https://www.chess.com/tournament/416941/player/tsubasa

This situation made my tournament both easy and strange. On the one hand, I did not have to fight in every round. On the other hand, I had less contact with the tournament, and it was harder to for me to notice when the next round started ...

Rounds 1 - 7

BYE in round 1 and BYE in round 2. Some month later...  It was enough to forgot that I am participating in the tournament.

Therefore Round 3 was very funny. I did not even notice that the round had started, and my opponent also missed it. The result was a double forfeit. Both of us lost, and the system still moved me to the next stage.

Some of my wins came also on time. In online chess, if your opponent does not move, you win after the clock runs out. I had several such victories in the beginning when my opponent even didn't start a game.

And round by round I was in Round 8 without a single battle.

 Rounds 8 - 12

In round 8 finally we made first moves but these games were interrupted while my opponent exceeded 24-hours time limit per move. Round 9 and 10 again ... as usual ... just 2 BYEs. And after over one year of participating in the tournament, in round 11, finally I played my first full game. It felt strange to "sit at the board" and actually play moves. Game 12 also was complete. 

Rounds 13 - 15

And it happened - I lost a game in the lucky round 13. Fortunately the revenge succeed and I advanced to the next round.

Lets look at both games from round 13.

Here I won. 

Here I lost. Especially 2 final moves create nice tactics.

  But in rounds 14 and 15 again there were no opponents for me, so I advanced without playing.

 Rounds 16 - 18

The most interesting part of the tournament was the last three rounds:

Round 16 quarterfinal

Round 17 semifinal

Round 18 final

Here I faced strong players, and the games were serious. I could not just wait for byes anymore. 

In the end, my path was very different from the others. I played much fewer games than most competitors. In fact, I played about half as many games as the next players .

Still, I reached the last stages and had the chance to play for a first place.
And I did it, I won a tournament that lasted almost three years!