what the #$%^was he playing and how did he win?

@Somebodysson

P-R-O FESSIONAL GUNSLINGER!!

yes, but it was a blunder that I would definitely have made if I was in his shoes. It looked like trading rooks. It was more than that 

aronchuck, I'll be honest. If I did anything differently in this game than in any game I've played before,  it was asking the questions what is my opponents idea and where are the weaknesses. On almost (it is that ALmost that needs to change...it has to be ALWays) every move I asked what is my opponent threatening to do, what is my opponent's plan, and on almost every single move I looked for my weaknesses and my opponents weaknesses. 

This game was definitely unrecongiable to me. The whole activity of playing the game was completely unrecognizable to me. Looking for weaknesses in my and the opponents' postions, and taking steps to act on my opponent's weaknessess and to defend my weakensses, that is what made this game an ENTirely different experience for me. Up till now I looked at the board and had emotions, uh oh, yay, uh oh, yay, uh oh, uh oh, uh oh, well, there's always anothe time. This time, instead of thinking about emotions. I loked for weaknesses. ITs an entirely different activity...looking for weaknesses than looking for emotions. ITs chess!!! I love it!!!

The thing is, about sitting on hands... I realize now that while sitting on my hands I have to do something, not just sit on my hands. I have to look for weakensses, look for vulnerabilities.

then, when I got the advantage, I remembred reading that when you get an advantage you have to make sure that you don't lose it. So when I had the knight advantage, and I realized I had to activate that knight and do something with it, I realized I had to trade down, I had to knock off a few pawns that were in the way of my  d pawn.

I'm sooo glad. It was the threat of the unstoppable passed pawn that won this game. I saw it, and he saw it. 

I was careful to not move pawns irresponsibly. I was careful about pawn moves. aronchuck,. I will look deeply over your comment about the dxc. That point in the game is ALWAYS the critical moment for me (well, now I have some new critical moments, like how to play when you have a won game ). But it is precisely that point, when I can't find another move, and I make the pawn break,,,that is my weakness. 

aronchuck and yaroslavl: let's look a little more at that moment, where I dxc. Let's look at what else I might have done. I'm going to do that now. 

I just realized that I posted my whole annotation of the game, and it didn't save. They really have to fix this viewer. I spent more time on the annotation than on the game. And its gone. I'll do it over. they really have to fix this. 

we know that jojojpo!!! I just posted a long annotation of my whole game, and it is lost. They have to fix the viewer. 

aronchuck wrote <If I was being critical I would say that 11...cxd5 was probably the wrong choice to play for a win as it leads to a completely symmetrical position where white has a slight initiative and more active pieces. For this reason I would probably have chosen one of the other recaptures. - But lets be honest this is a very very minor error and not in the same league as the sort of mistakes you were making before.>

ah, I see now that it was not the dxc that you were critical of, it was later. I would like to ask you to comment more on this aronchuck. thank you. I will try to reannotate my game, the entire annotation was lost. 

But analyse it on the link I gave you! It's a "standalone" analysis board. That way you create all the annotations you want, and then, you copy the pgn (which will have the annotations), enter the thread, create a reply, and on the option of "insert position or game" you select the option to paste a pgn, and the game will be pasted will all the annotations, and you will not lose your work do to the forum timeout.

And I will agree that this game seems to be played by a different person. Congratulations! You deserved this win.

I was also going to suggest the 11... exd5 idea, but for different reasons than aronchuk. I just saw the posibility of letting the LSB enter the game, pinning the Nf3, and possibly trading it for that piece, so that bishop could at least be useful.

I like how you managed 13. Bb5. You forced White to exchange bishops, and his LSB had many more prospects than yours!

Respecting 23. Rc1, I think I'm missing something, so I would like an explanation. I know there's a backrank mate threat, but if Black plays 23... Rxd7 the instant 24. Rc8+ does not work because of 24... Bf8 blocking the check. So White may try 24. Bxd6 to get rid of the bishop, but 24... Nxd6, and the knight is controling c8, so 25. Rc8+ is just met with 25... Nxc8. So, what am I missing here? Is really this backrank mate threat sound? I don't see how White can make it work after 23... Rxd7.

ahhhh, I get it. Thanks jojojopo. Now I'm going to read the replies. thank you thank you thank you. 

thank you aronchuck. I'll be honest, I read over the lines you posted just now, and there's a lot there. Its a lot for me. I'm going to study it. It includes ebing able to evaluate drawing chances, piece activity...lots of things that are outside of my ability at this point. But its great because it makes it clear 1. where I may have played substantially differently from how I played, and could have changed my objective chances from white winning or drawing, to white winning or losing. That is a huge difference in evaluation. And, again, t be honest. its above my level. But since this thread is my main textbook (well, realy my only textbook besides tactics trainig, and now the chess mentor lessons that Yaroslavl provided about color complexes, which I always read about but figured that woud be some other time. I'me going to work on that chess mentor lesson this weekend. So far, as a diamond member of over one month, I have only used tactics trainer. AND THERE's a lot more tactics to learn!!!)

But I;d like to get to the point where I can visulaize different scenarios like aronchuck effortlessly visualized, and evaluate them, do I want to play for a win or for a draw. That's chess!!!

aronchuck wrote <There is strong evidence that you were asking yourself about your opponent's idea and defending it. 16. Qb3 b6 is one example. But the star example and move I am most pleased with is that on move 23 after Rc1 you obviously asked what is my opponent's idea? And realised that if you took the Nd7 he had 24. Bxd6 Nxd6 25. Rc8 with mate to follow. Well done! And instead you took on the Bishop on f4 creating a pawn weakness on d4 and f4. This is good for you and you proved it wasn't a fluke because you consistently avoided falling for the bank rank mate.>

 strong evidence indeed! That is exactly what I was doing. I couldn't believe I was doing it, yet I was doing it.  

jojojopo wrote: <Respecting 23. Rc1, I think I'm missing something, so I would like an explanation. I know there's a backrank mate threat, but if Black plays 23... Rxd7 the instant 24. Rc8+ does not work because of 24... Bf8 blocking the check. So White may try 24. Bxd6 to get rid of the bishop, but 24... Nxd6, and the knight is controling c8, so 25. Rc8+ is just met with 25... Nxc8. So, what am I missing here? Is really this backrank mate threat sound? I don't see how White can make it work after 23... Rxd7.>

jojojopo! SWEET!@!@@@!!! beautiful. YES!!! awesome!! jojojopo wins the brilliancy prize of this game!!!

Lol, thanks! However, I don't think I would have found that if I was playing on the board. For some reason I can't calculate as efficiently as I'm able to do while analysing :(, so I wouldn't have captured the knight.

I wanted to share this video on calculation, I watched it yesterday and I thought "how appropiate for the thread". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwN5vsr-4DM

I found this relevant because it talks about targetting, how to find targets (other than loose pieces) and how one can find ways to exploit them. I think you will really like it SBS.

haha, @jojojopo! I just watched the whole video!!! hahaha. What can I say? I'm someone who never had a tv growing growing up. I just never did. Let's leave it at that. When I did see tv, like tv news or that kind of things, I thought 'wow. is this ever inefficient. They can fit a lot more information into print, or even radio (and I didn't grow up with radio either...I grew up pretty strange...). So I found this video entertaining, but...I really think doing the tactics puzzles, and finding the patterns for myself, and finding out what works for me....is key. Definitely... looking for the opponent's idea, the opponents' threats and the weaknesses, did I say it loud enough THE WEAKNESSES, is key. Totally. but some guy quizzing a bunch of other guys...its so inefficient. Watching tv isn't how to learn chess. 

But jojojopo, I loved your analysis. And I love your sincerity. and your generosity!! totally. But this video teaching format, I don't buy it, I just don't. The chess mentor that Yaroslavl linked, THAT's worth looking at. Its basically guess the next move, with technology. But its really guess the best move. 

I don't regret not watching any videos on chess.com with my diamond membership. But I'll DEFINITELY be doing some chess mentor lessons. 

but first, back to patterns. Patterns are the soul of chess. Phildor had it wrong. Pawns are the skeletons of chess. Patterns are the soul of chess. Right idea, wrong application.  back to my littel tactics trainer. I have another game  in 2.5 hours. 

I agree that it is inefficient. However, I liked how he made the "target" definition broader when he explained the part of "is this pawn defended?", and the part about connecting the targets, and the geometry of the board. Those useful concepts really helped me be more efficient in my thinking. Respecting tv, I don't watch tv either :P, but I think about that format like assisting a class. I internalize concepts much more faster when I hear someone explain them than when I read them. That's why this helped me, I suppose that reading an article on those concepts would have been more useful to you. Everyone is a different learner. Now, no video or concept is going to replace hours of training, no matter what. But someone sharing some key concepts can make it much faster than discovering on your own (the color pattern to help detect knight forks for example, or the ones I just mentioned from the video).

Good luck in your game!

you know what jojojopo?!! Me too. I just realized it!! Besides the fact that I found it inefficient, I 'internalized' it better than reading it, because I was hearing it!! It was inefficient! And it worked! 

You win! and I win! We both win! thank you jojojopo. 

just a head's up. I have a game in 20 minutes, and then another one in eight hours. I can't expect to win them both.

But I'll try very hard to

1. look for my opponent's idea and threat

2. I'll look for responses to my opponent's idea/and threat

3. I'll look for weaknesses on my time and on my opponent's time and

3.5. failing either of those I'll attempt to find my worst placed piece, and try to place it in a location that makes it more dangerous to the opponent. 

I will not make frivolos pawn moves, and in positions that seem difficult, I will watch the board and not the clock. In situations where it does not seem difficult, I will simply make a move, and I will understand that more experience will guide me with pattern recognition. 

a bientot (till soon) somebodysoon

two minutes to game time. I just want to tell everybody, that the past hour doing tactics puzzles, asking the question 'what is my opponent's idea/plan' gives a clue to the next move. It doesn't GIVE the next move, it gives an idea to the next move. Then I have to ask, 'where are the weaknesses' and I may come up with a better move than the first question indicated. 

So I have a tiny little window into 'when you see a good move, look for a better one'. The 'good move'  is indicated ny the opponent's plan; the 'better move' may be indicated by weaknesses that even my opponent didn't see.

I lost. It was interesting. I got ahead of myself. I blundered. But it was interesting. I'll post it in a second. There's not much to analyze aftger one hangs their Queen. But it was definitely interesting until then. And it was clear why I hung my queen. It was because I decided on my  next move before my opponent made their move. So when it came my turn I just made the move that I had decided on the previous turn, and my boafrd vision isn't good enough to do that kind of thing. It was clear immediately that I had hung my queen. Sorry folks.