Trent Overcomes Kashlinskaya

IM Lawrence Trent overcame the match favorite and fifth seed, IM Alina Kashlinskaya, in the 2022 IM Not A GM Speed Chess Championship on Friday. The players traded victories for much of the match until the finish of the bullet segment when Trent's resilience and tactical awareness led him to victory. 

The next match in the IMSCC will be between IMs Bibisara Assaubayeva and Irene Sukandar, which begins on June 6 at 4 a.m. Pacific / 13:00 Central European.

• Blitz 5|1
• Blitz 3|1
• Bullet 1|1

Blitz 5|1: Kashlinskaya-Trent 3-4 

Kashlinskaya drew first blood, countering Trent's ambitious kingside play with a strike in the center. 

She won the second game too after an endgame blunder by Trent, allowing her to create a pair of powerful connected passed pawns. In Game 3, Trent overlooked a tactical opportunity to seize control over the c-file and trade into a winning ending.

Despite this, Kashlinskaya trailed on the clock and eventually made a mistake, allowing Trent to score his first victory of the match.

Game five was a mess of a game and a turning point in the match. Both players overlooked winning opportunities at different points. In a winning position for Kashlinskaya, Trent began to chase her king around with his queen and knight, the trickiest combination of pieces. 

This tied the score with the momentum in Trent's favor. The next game was a one-sided affair with Trent uncorking the rare 4. a3 variation of the Four Knights Game. 

With this, Trent took the lead by one point and maintained it to the end of the five-minute blitz portion. 

Blitz 3|1: Kashlinskaya-Trent 3.5-3.5

This segment kicked off with a high-quality positional game by Kashlinsyaka. As she was converting an extra knight to victory in the endgame, Trent overlooked a tactic to draw the game. Can you spot it?

This victory for Kashlinsyaka tied up the match. In the next game, Trent took the lead back, swindling Kashinsyaka out of her attacking advantage.

The next few games showed the tension of the match begin to wear on the players with a number of missed opportunities and mistakes by both sides. Trent fared on the favorable side of most of these games, reaching a three-point match lead. 

Despite Kashlinsaya's many excellent games, she sometimes overlooked key tactical finishes, allowing the resilient Trent to fight back and requiring her to win the game all over again. 

The players finished the segment with neck-and-neck scores within a point of each other.

Bullet 1|1:  Kashlinskaya-Trent 3-7

In the first game, Kashlinskaya blundered a piece. Unfazed, she followed it up with two victories, including a double-edged attacking one.

This tied up the score with just 15 minutes left of the bullet portion, making it anyone's match!

In the critical next game, Kashlinskaya had a positional and material advantage for much of the game. Yet, Trent cleverly ran his open king out of the destroyed kingside to the safety of the queenside and started his own king attack to win. 

With the bullet time control and the competitive intensity of the match likely affecting both players, Trent won two blunder-laden games. 

Down by three points with six minutes remaining on the match clock, Kashlinskaya faced a must-win game. She successfully fought back from a worse position to checkmate Trent's king in the center of the board. 

The following game, Trent gained such a substantial advantage out of the opening that Kashlinskaya struggled to find moves and ran out of time. This effectively clinched the hard-fought match for Trent. 

In the players' interview, Kashlinskaya shared her ambition to gain the grandmaster title, "I have just one norm, but somehow this year I felt that. I hope this will be the last 'I'm Not A GM' for me."

I hope this will be the last 'I'M Not A GM' for me."

-IM Alina Kashlinskaya

Trent had a number of positive remarks about his opponent: "Can I just say, I hope it's your last time, Alina, as well. I was incredibly stressed throughout that match, and you're incredibly strong. There's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't be a grandmaster already."

All Games - Quarterfinal

The IM Not A GM Speed Chess Championship (IMSCC) is an online event where some of the strongest IMs and other invited players compete in a series of speed chess matches. Each match consists of a 5+1 blitz segment, a 3+1 blitz segment, and a 1+1 bullet segment, with the player who scores the most points winning the match. If there's a tie, players play a four-game 1+1 match to decide the winner. If the tie persists, an armageddon game with a bidding system decides the winner.

Previous reports:

• Rosen Takes Revenge Vs Rozman: 2022 IMSCC, Quarterfinal
• Shuvalova Eliminates Pruess: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Rosen Beats Sachdev With 11-Game Streak: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Rensch Triumphant In Armageddon Tiebreak: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Kashlinskaya Blitzes Yip: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Canty Conquers Kavutskiy: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Trent Upsets Shahade: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• Rozman Defeats Nemo: 2022 IMSCC, Round Of 16
• I'M Not A GM Speed Chess Championship 2022: All The Information