Casual Chess (Post tournament musings)

I woke up on Saturday already not in the winning spirit. I managed to start the day on a relatively good note by eating a salad and doing 20 minutes of yoga. You could compare my morning to an ideal morning for me and if you only saw the surface you’d be convinced they were the same. The problems, selected, are that I’d eaten the salad as a light option hoping not to upset my stomach from my real breakfast; an aleve taken in hopes that my back wouldn’t ache relentlessly after a day playing chess on park benches. I’d done the yoga in hopes of optimizing my health for the day, not as a testament of true habit. It would also be fair to note, most damningly of all, that I’d woken up after having drunk a 6 pack of budweiser and smoked most of the last of my weed. A testament of a true habit, being that I drink and smoke nearly as often as I am in possession of free time, and sometimes more often. So when the uber I’d taken to Wickham park for the New Britain Chess Club Summer Open failed to locate the event in the park and left me to fend for myself in the pouring rain-well you could say I’d prepared well to do poorly. Playing chess regularly is not enough to improve in chess. Not to the degree that you would need to compete and win at least, or to stand a chance of drawing, which would be considered quite a feat in some circumstances within the chess world. I’d spent the week prior to the tournament actively trying to improve in chess however and I wonder if I’d have been able to secure my lone victory of five games had I not. I knew that competing would give me a framework for my strengths and weaknesses, as well as inform my decision about continuing to pursue chess improvement and competition. On Saturday I came to learn that I have a strong ability to enjoy a casual day of playing chess. I also found out that in a competitive environment I bring a weak level of play to the board. There have been few other thoughts in my head then the game of kings, so I expect I will continue the journey. That is what this piece is about. When I finally located the event within the park after having been saved from the rain, walking in the wrong direction, by two other competitors. Two sweet older women, one of whom will be referred to again later in this piece. I was not surprised by what I found. A small gathering of roughly 40 people taking shelter in and around a pavilion. It was comfortable and exciting. The arbiter asked for our assistance setting up the boards and I complied-setting up a board in a far corner I thought would be pleasant to play in, and ended up playing nowhere near this spot. Aside from a discussion with the arbiter about the set I placed being short a spare white queen nothing much happened between when I arrived and later began playing.. I suppose the rules were given. So on to my first game. I was playing an older gentleman and he could be compared to a crab. He was not pleasant-seeming and rated 1080 USCF and 1750 on chess.com so I was prepared for an uphill battle being that I am 1100 on that website and unrated over the board. Early in the game he gave me a material advantage by sacrificing his bishop-opening my kingside pawn structure. I spent the majority of the game trying to walk my king to safety, and in hindsight would probably have found the best moves in walking safety to my king. I annotated my games because it is the rules to do so and hoping to review them later, but this was also a struggle and I expect trying to plug them in a computer analysis program that I would find many mistakes. I lost my first rated match, a kick in the nuts. My second game was against a 14 year old rated at 1200 I believe. He captured a center pawn with a wing pawn revealing an attack on a hung bishop and won the piece. I’d thought he was proposing we trade knights to weaken my control of the center when I took the pawn back and I was painfully mistaken. I had known my ability to see the board is not impressive, expected that I’d have difficulty in transitioning from the 2 dimensional view the screen offers to that of a live board, anticipated the hardships of these issues in the context of my first competition. Blundering my first tournament piece was devastating nonetheless. The idea of counter play did not once occur to me. I went on the defensive and begged my opponent to blunder a piece like I had. He played well and earned the victory. In congratulating him I explained to him that I was unrated and he said he did not expect that, that I have played strongly for a lower rated online player playing at his first USCF event. I appreciated this from the child, a pleasant young man in contrast to my first opponent. At this point I had become comfortable here, I was ready to win some games. A new friend had made me aware that in a swiss tournament I would be playing someone who had also lost their first two games, I was hopeful. My opponent started the clock which I was grateful for having no experience with them and the game began. I had castled and we’d developed most of our pieces before I hit the clock and checked my time, noticing we had been playing a game without a running clock, smacking it like morons. The arbiter started it for us and instructed us to just continue playing, a choice I understand as it was equal parts our responsibility to see to the clock's function and did not mind in the moment. At this point I’d realized I quite had to pee and whispered to my opponent if it was acceptable to, she offered to pause the clock, I said that would be unnecessary I was merely unaware of if it was within the rules to abandon the board for the bathroom in this circumstance. Considering how easy it would be to use an engine in there I assumed this was a fair question. She advanced her knight and I recalled my thoughts of attacking a hanging pawn with my queen from before the clock had been started, I noticed the knight could advance and capture a rook in 2 moves, then I leaned over to glance at the arbiter to see if I could get his attention and ask about the bathroom. I looked back at the board, decided I would let her win the rook and go in with my queen for the hanging pawn thinking I’d see if I could win a trapped rook of my own on her back rank, and moved my queen on to the G file glancing back over for the arbiters attention. My opponent sweetly said ‘See now you’re distracted..’ because she had felt the game ought to have been restarted for her mistake with the clock, and then paused so I could use the restroom having been rushed to sit with her not realizing the round had begun. I was not the only person who did not hear the arbiter announce rounds, he had previously explained he was unable to raise his voice and was a perpetual quiet speaker. I’m sure there is an interesting anecdote or condition there. Ne2! Forking my king and queen.. I’d blundered my queen in front of a living person at a competition. I should mention this was one of the women who had saved me from the rain while I was unknowingly walking away from the event. The pawn I had considered trying to capture before the clock fiasco was not even hanging! What was this?! Yet again, there were no thoughts of counter play, short of a queen I held my position as best I could and again gave my opponent the hardest time to finish I could. Hoping I could beat her on time, I had 13 minutes-more than her remaining 6 at the end, and couldn’t help but wonder if the sweet woman had used 6 minutes thinking before we noticed the clock situation. I wonder if I could have flagged her on time short of my queen. I tried to. I wonder if I would have blundered my queen without the circumstances as they were. What good is that thought. I think in many other games I could beat this player, confidently I think this. Yet I cannot fairly think of myself to be a stronger chess player because in that moment, with no one forcing my hand, I blundered my queen at competition. I finally achieved a victory in my fourth game. I played a 950 rated woman who was the mother of the 5th grade state champion who beat me in my final game, his rating was also around 950. He played so fast and was allowed to play without notating, I expect I could have requested a time penalty on him from the arbiter, he would have won regardless. He played so fast. He avenged his mother's defeat adequately and I could not hold this against him. She was short and I considered her beautiful. I expect she’s very proud of her son. I would punctuate this piece by asking you the question I’ve been asking myself. Had I not enjoyed a day of casual chess, but instead suffered in focused competition, how would that be?