A Weekend in Tassie

This weekend I have been in Tasmania teaching chess at a chess camp. Each year, The Tasmanian Chess Association and Hobart International Junior Chess Club organised the camp, although as always, what makes these things happen is the vitality and energy of a few very special people. This camp was organised by Melissa Harvey with the help of Ross George and Owen Short, and Nigel Frame who came along to help with some coaching. There were about 25 kids at the camp, varying in ages from about 7 through to about 14, and varying in abilities. However, there was much enthusiasm, some amazing raw talent, and a few pretty strong young players.

My weekend started with a flight from Melbourne on Friday night where I was seated next to a woman with a baby, so by the time I arrived in Tasmania I wasn't particularly disposed to children! But then things started going good. I was picked up by a parent of one of the kids who drove me from the airport. Thanks Dave! We went to the camp where I met up with Melissa, Ross and Owen and a chat before bed. The following day was pretty much full on coaching, though there was some time to enjoy the scenery.

A 1 minute walk to this beach brought spectacular views of Mt. Wellington

I've done these camps before, and always enjoy them. This time the kids were averagely younger than in years gone by, so I chose my material to be a little less advanced than I have when I've been before. However, the material was quite interesting and challenged the kids. They rose to the challenge, and came up with some great ideas as I extended their thinking processes, and they learnt some technical and tactical ideas which they can work on from now. On the Saturday evening, we played a thematic blitz tournament in the Four Knights Opening. I had done some preparation with the kids on this opening and they had a chance to play 7 games in the tournament. The adults who were there also played and I played, though I gave everyone odds of 5minutes to 1 minute. The kids played unbelievably well on the whole, and I felt lucky to come through the tournament with just one loss, to one of the local adult players.

A great thematic opening for kids. Our games started from this position.

The Four Knights Opening proved popular with the kids. It is simple to learn, follows basic opening principles, but allows for some interesting lines as well. The tournament went well, but special mention should  go to Will Warlaw-Kelly, a young player with great talent, who came equal first on 6/7 points!

Working out their strategies on the balcony...danger man Will is second from the right.

We also had a barbecue on the Saturday night (a Tassie chess camp tradition) and a great thing about these camps is that the kids do virtually all the cooking and cleaning up, with a bit of adult supervision.

A Tassie chess camp is not complete without the Saturday night barbie

On the Sunday we had more chess through the morning session followed by a simul. The kids had been pining for a transfer tournament, but the simul went down pretty well. I managed to go through unbeaten, but had a couple of scares along the way. Twice I blundered queens, but managed to get some compensation which later I used to gain material, but I was very lucky indeed. The last man standing in the simul was Bradley Vince who is quite an experienced player in the Primary School division. Saying that, I think he'll be a bit disappointed he didn't do better after winning my queen for 2 minor pieces and a pawn.

Yuvini won a queen against me by using a variation of a trick that I'd showed the kids the day before!

Then there was a big clean up before everyone headed off. I have to say that I was pretty exhausted by the end of the weekend, and I hope the kids took some ideas from this, but even more, I hope I gave them some inspiration to go away and continue the game.

Young Oliver has great talent for the game, and plays better with his teddy near him.

Chess Symmetry

It's getting near the end of the school year in Australia, so I've been showing my students a light hearted idea this week. A casual game by Capablanca, had the great World Champion being copied for most of the game. In the end Capablanca broke the copying with a deadly check which lead to either winning his opponent's queen or checkmate.

Funnily enough, this "absurd" line has some theory about it. Capablanca's 11.Qd2 was a novelty, and in fact the game Forgacs-Teichmann San Sebastian 1912 saw 11.Kh1 Kh8 to retain the symmetry. This game ended a draw a bit later, after white had spoiled the fun by attacking one of black's minor pieces which was moved. However, they "transposed" to the symmetrical line, a little later and the game finished in a completely symmetrical position!

Final position of Forgacs-Teichmann San Sebastian 1912. Perfect symmetry!

This got me thinking about various symmetrical systems, and generally about openings.  And I've come to a conclusion based on my own personal feelings. And that is that the opening which I dislike the most is....

Actually, before answering the above statement, this is something that pretty much all chess players go through. I have had fun times with openings that I've grown to distrust. I've had serious misgivings about some openings which I now play. There are certain variations which make me laugh or make me cringe but there may be others in the same opening which have a complete opposite effect (how can Karpov's Be2/Be3 and Polugaevsky's ..b5 in the Najdorf be compared?). There are even major opening systems that I've had to just take my hat off to and say that I have little clue about what is going on, and little feel for the positions (the Grunfeld is one such opening for me, and watching the Tal Memorial recently did nothing to build my confidence about understanding this opening).

So, the opening which I dislike the most and I would love to see refuted and taken off the tournament shelves? The Petroff! I am not playing 1.e4 at the moment, and will not play the Petroff as black, so I won't be encountering it anytime soon over the board. So watch out for some subjective commentary against the Petroff in posts to come. :D

Running Diary 7/12/2011

Today I was scheduled to run, but it was one of the hottest days of the summer so far. Even now, at 9.30pm it is 22C, but earlier it reached 33C. Now I'm not saying that it was 33C when I went out to run, but it was still pretty warm, and I'm not really used to it.

So I took it pretty steady. Even so, my legs felt heavy to begin with. I dropped into a nice rhythm, but knew fairly early on that 10km was going to be a tall order today. I ran 5km in about 29.30 and then stopped for a couple of minutes to just enjoy the view of the bay. I then took a slower run back home, about 3.5 km. So all in all, I managed about 8.5km, which is more than I thought I would reach.

This means I'm definitely getting stronger and fitter. However, this is just the start of the summer, so I guess I'm going to have to prepare for the conditions. One thing I didn't realise is that one runs slower at hotter temperatures. I knew that running in heat was harder, but didn't realise that it actually slowed you down. I also didn't realise just how cool it needs to be for better running conditions. Apparently, if the temperature is 13C or above, you are likely to run slower through heat build up. There are plenty of interesting articles on this subject.

I am now having a bit of a break from running as I am going away this weekend, so my next run is not scheduled until Monday. That should give my body plenty of recovery time :)

Running Diary 5/12/2011

My reward at 6 km!

I wasn't supposed to run today, but I came in from work, it was a beautiful day outside, and I felt good so I thought I'll have an easy run. It has been nearly 36 hours since my last run, so I'm more or less sticking to the recovery program. And after this I will not run for 48 hours. I put myself under no pressure and ran a different route to the normal ones I take. One of the good things about running longer distances, is that it gives you a wider choice of places to go! I still ran to the bay, but took a more round about trip to get there.

 Elwood Beach with the West Gate Bridge in the distance. My 6 km point today

And I still have to go round the bay to Brighton, about half way on the far prom.

After running this evening, and the other morning, it suddenly dawned on me that there might be better times for me to run. Amazingly, there are, and these have something to do with circadian rhythms....ok, I haven't really got any idea what these are about, but basically the body has natural rhythms which make it function at certain activities better at certain times of the day. There is a great article that explains it better than I can :)

And last, there was a bit of excitement on the run home from the bay, when I was diverted by a policeman from going down my usual road. I ran round the block and there were dozens on police, armed and with protective gear on. Don't know what was going on, and I didn't hang around to find out. I'll check the news later like everyone else!

Armed Police block the road off, but even that doesn't stop me running!

Chess professional and amateur

There are 2 news stories about chess that have grabbed my attention that couldn't be more different. One involves the Super Grandmaster tournament being held in London at the moment, the other a story about 2 primary school boys being asked to leave their school for travelling to Brazil to represent Australia in the World Youth Chess Championships.

The London Chess Classic has the top 4 players in the World playing, along with World number 10 Nakamura and 4 top English players. The Tournament started with a match between the Grandmasters and anyone via Twitter and there is an odd number of players in the tournament so that the player with the bye can provide commentary on the other games. There is something for everyone at the tournament, with the GM tournament great for chess spectators, a FIDE open with 10 Grandmasters and a host of International Masters and other strong players, shorter events, fast chess events, a women's invitational and junior events. There are simultaneous displays, and film screenings and free coaching to schools.

This festival of chess brings professional chess players and amateurs together, and creates great press coverage. When the top players go to battle every chess player takes notice of their games and results. At London this year, ex tennis Champion Boris Becker made an appearance to make the first move against the Grandmasters in the Twitter game.

Unfortunately, chess in Australia is anything but professional. This doesn't mean that there aren't good players, or that it isn't run to the best of the ability of the organisers. However, there are limitations when a game which is considered a profession in some countries, is not considered a profession in others. In Australia, funding for chess has been non existent (at least in the 7 years I've been here). Our top players have to find their own way to the events, even when they are representing their country. Chess players in Australia do the right thing and donate from their own pocket to help our top players travel to Olympiads and World Championships, but mostly the players themselves have to fork out, or do some fundraising themselves.

The funding issue follows on with tournaments. Without decent government funding (chess isn't a sport or an art according to government, so they don't have to fund it via either of those avenues) chess tournaments seek private sponsorship which has created some great events (Doeberl, Sydney International Open, to name just 2) but these are few and far between. And more often than not, tournaments will be funded by the entry fees of the competitors, or may even just accept a small loss.

Of course, when an activity like chess isn't recognised by the authorities as anything other than a pastime, then incidents will occur like the one in Sydney last week. There should be no greater honour for a school than to say that one of their students has represented their country, but alas this was not the case. And things will continue to be marginalised for Australian chess players as long as they are seen as happy go lucky amateurs. If there is one thing that chess players and administrators should be doing in this country, it is working towards getting chess accepted as a sport and then applying for funding from the government. Getting recognition is the first step towards greater professionalism of chess in Australia, and until that is done, tournaments such as the London Chess Classic will sadly not be happening on Australian soil.

Running Diary 4/12/2011

After running a fairly quick 10 km last time (quick for me, anyway) I decided to take it easy with a free run of whatever distance felt good to me at the time and whatever speed felt comfortable. I didn't want to push myself at all. I still managed a bit over 6 km and ran at various speeds, sometimes faster, sometimes slower. I tried to concentrate on a regular breathing rhythm, and running with looser arms than I usually do.

The more I run, and the more I read about it, the more I realise that exercising is as much about recovery and looking after your body when you're not training. Cooling down after exercising can help to reduce, or even avoid sore muscles. A few weeks back, I was getting some pains in my lower back and backside after exercising, but I now ensure that my run finishes short of home, so I have to do a cooling down walk. Since then, I've started feeling better after running.

Today when I started to run, my legs felt a bit heavy which was one reason that I didn't push things too much. Recovery training is an important part of an exercise regime and my last run had come just 36 hours before this run, so I took it easy. As it was, my run today felt pretty good once I'd shaken the cobwebs from my legs. And, of course, if the views are good when you're running, then it is an extra incentive to get out!

Melbourne CBD in the distance on the left. This was taken from the end of North Road near Brighton, with Elwood the nearest beach.

Running Diary 2/12/2011

My first run of December was a good one. I felt really good and was able to keep a steady pace for 10 km. My aim for December is to run 100 km and I've joined the same challenge on Endomondo that I tried in November. Last month I only just made it, running about 103 km. This time I'd like to add a few more kilometres to the tally.

Today I also reached a personal goal running 10 km in less than an hour. However, one end is only another beginning and my next goal will be to run under 55 minutes for 10 km. This will be a stern test as I will have to run at a pace that is quite quick for me for a long period of time. But nothing ventured, nothing gained, and it's not as if I have to do it tomorrow!

Exercise has been for me a combination of fitness gain and weight loss. Besides building my fitness level, I was overweight when I started running, but I'm coming down to my correct level. I have a little bit more to lose, but feel great and am confident that it will happen sooner than later.....of course, Christmas goodies might have something to say about that, but my running will not stop through the holiday period. Reading about disease risk associated with being overweight is enough to make anyone think about their body. When, like me, 50 is not that far away, and diabetes has been in both sides of your family, it is even more important to make sure that your body is healthy and your weight is correct.