Playing Catch-Up

A month ago I decided to study chess more actively and improve my play. I began working through the copy of Silman's Complete Endgame Course with the idea that the endgame was historically the weakest part of my game and would yield the most results. Arbitrary goals were established and a week or two later, I joined a strong chess club (The Mechanics Institute in San Francisco) in the hopes of playing against a more serious class of players in long time control games, immediately joining a Tuesday Night Marathon Tournament that had begun the week prior.

Since then, I've played two tournament games and took a bye last night due to catching a short but fierce cold. My first game is below, against Glenn McEnroe.



 2) c3 is a move I don't believe I've ever seen before, and I'll admit that it threw me. I had heard of Anti-Sicilians before, and just assumed this must be that. Knowing no lines I simply set the goal of establishing a small center with pieces in line with a Najdorf style opening and would see where the game went.


13) ...Bd3 was my first break. Immediately I knew this was trouble for white, and quickly worked out an approach to pile up and win the d4 pawn. "The d4 pawn" at this point was my plan; Non-specific and amorphous, just the idea of an advantage. I wanted to work toward an endgame and reckoned that just the fact of the d pawn was enough to eek out an endgame victory.

After using the next few moves to liquidate pieces and get closer to an endgame, my first real failure, I think, came with 20) ...Qd7. Much more aggressive would have been to push the pawn to d4, and only then piling up on it. The only solace from the move was that it wasn't as bad as the next move 21) ...Rc8, which solved the problem of what to do with the d pawn altogether.  Just a colossally ridiculous set of moves on my part, frankly.

We entered an endgame, Glenn was able to isolate my pawns, but I was fairly sure I could always get a draw due to the rook pawns w/ ideas to trap White's King if he ever took on the a file. This was Silman's handiwork at play... a confidence that at least I had that in my pocket -- probably. While white was trying to do something Queenside, I was making a play with the pawns Kingside in what I was hoping would be a brilliant and dastardly onslaught resulting in promotion and the win. Finally, upon 43) Ka8, I prepared to push the g pawn, when it occurred to me that after 43 ...g3 44) f3, suddenly I am in jeopardy of being put into opposition. I was not thinking of Kb6, because White can sacrifice that pawn to get the edge in the race to the pawns, and white's h pawn would be all that would remain, soon to be a Queen. A draw was offered, I asked to play a move more, just to see what his next move might be, and then we split the point.

Key lessons from this game for me:

• Push the passed pawn.  I didn't push the pawn on move 20 because it seemed too committal. Passed pawns should be pushed and that pawn should have gone to a dark square to negate the bishop. Not doing so was a mistake; the cause of the mistake was a fear of sending it so far beyond the wall.
• Stop wasting moves. There were two moves in this game that were frivolous. 28) ...g6 and 35) ...Kc6. The first was just to stall, the second was to make me feel better about being closer to the a file, when neither served any use.
• Lastly, most importantly, focus on the threats. After 20) Qc5, there were two pieces attacking d5 and rather than focus on that, I just assumed there could be some tactics after the Bishop took, rather than looking at Occam's move, Qxd5 -- winning the pawn with or without any ensuing exchange.