Second Day at Chess Camp

The second day of the chess camp has been the hardest from the point of view of the kids and chess. They have had to play 2 tournament games, and have 3 coaching sessions, which perhaps on reflection, might have been too intense, especially for some of the younger ones. Saying that the sheer quantity of material that the kids are getting through, and the great quality of coaching, is paying dividends. I had a group of the least experienced players today in a session looking at pawn endings which is a subject they've already touched upon in other sessions. They recognised concepts such as 'opposition', 'passed pawns' 'shoudering' and 'breakthroughs' which made my lesson more of a reinforcement rather than pure teaching. As a result, I was able to test these kids ability to put these ideas into practice, and when one idea may have priority over another.

The kids have to play tournament games, and the position above is from a game this afternoon. The games are played at a rate of 25 + 10 and the kids have to record their games (some kids are learning to record!). After the games, the kids analyse their game with their opponent and a chess coach. I was watching the game above as it finished. It was black to play and the game continued 1..Rb2 2.Rxf4 Rf2 3.Kxe3 Rxf4 0-1 I asked after the game why not reply to 1..Rb2 with 2.Rh5+, and then after 2..Kd4 3.Kxf4?

The question is how does black win this? (Answer after the next post, hopefully tomorrow)

Of course, even though today was pretty full on in terms of chess, there was still some time to kick back and relax, and some fun activities were arranged to burn off some natural junior energy.

Elijah enjoying the "Flying Fox"

Isobel getting a "giant swing" adrenalin rush

Bobby was on target on the "archery range"

Answer to the chess endgame:

Those who wanted to run that pawn down straight away will be disappointed. 1..e2 only draws after 2.Rh1.

To win, black must create a Lucena type position with 1..Rf2!, cutting off white's king from the black pawn. Of course, all our kids will now know this technique and this win will be rudimentary to them!

Chess Camp 2013

Today is the first day of the 2013 Chesskids chess camp. The camp is being held in the seaside town of Cowes, on Phillip Island, and the theme of the camp is endgames. I was on a bus that took us down to Phillip Island and we spent the first part of the day playing open aired simuls with locals looking on, and even joining in. It is a good team building exercise, with the kids playing in simuls against the coaches, and then being encouraged to play simuls against the other kids.

Guest coach Luke Li giving a simul (left), while kids like Max Phillips (right) also gave simuls

After the simuls we headed back to the venue for the first of the games and training sessions. The kids are split into groups for training purposes, and they are also placed into teams for playing purposes. To start with they played the first round in their team matches, and then they broke into the training groups for endgame lectures and activities. I'm not totally sure what the other coaches were teaching, but I was looking at rook endings with my main aim being to get my students think about when to "place rooks behind passed pawns", "place rooks on open files", or to "cut the enemy king off along the rank/file". Talking about king and piece activity will be a big part of this week, as well as creating and promoting passed pawns.

Lessons are good, but tournament games are better!

The chess camp is going on for 4 days, which is a long time to focus continually on chess, so there are some other activities planned. Tonight the kids are chilling out watching a movie (Searching for Bobby Fischer, I think) and we have some excursions and non chess activities planned for the next few days. We also have some endgame quizzes for the kids, homework that they will have to try and complete throughout the week. FM Luke Li, IM Robert Jamieson and I have all come up with some testers for the kids to solve. Here's a puzzle that I gave to them, see if you can solve this as good as our kids can. I will warn you, that some of the kids are pretty good, but try to solve this puzzle faster than our youngest kids who are 5 years old!

White played 1.Rf8. Does this win, lose, or draw?

Edit: although this an amazing looking move, it actually loses! 1.Rf8? Rxf8 2.g7, but black has the amazing counter sacrifice, 2..Rf3+!! and after 3.Bxf3 Bxh7 white will not promote, while black's queen side duo, guarantee him the win. The moral of the story: "always examine all checks and captures"

Writing up my Lessons

Today is the last day before going off to coach at the endgame camp we have set up for juniors. So that meant that I had to put the final touches to my lessons and activities that I'm going to run during my sessions. Actually, I'm really looking forward to this, and hopefully we can come away having really enthused some young minds into the joys of endgames. I remember being a young player who never really appreciated endgames, probably because my games never got that far! If I looked at anything it would be attacking games and great combinations from the likes of Tal or Alekhine. I seem to remember being of the opinion that endgames were reached through the means of boring chess being played earlier!

Of course, times change and so do players. As I reminisce I can remember winning games at about 1600-1800 level and the majority of these games ran a similar course where I would win a small amount of material, nurse this through a consolidating period of the game, and then convert in endgames that were not too difficult. As I moved into open tournaments and started meeting stronger and stronger players, I realised that my endgame play was woefully lacking, but at the time (probably the early to mid 1980's) I had no one to help me and the majority of endgame books that I tried to learn from were too dry in their style to appeal to me. So my endgame ability has always been patchy, though I have recently (the past 2 or 3 years especially) worked through quite a number of techniques and examples. I guess that as I approach 50 years of age, my endgames are finally beginning to catch up with my tactical and strategic eye. While as a young player I used to marvel at the great complications in Kasparov's games, I have more recently grown a healthy respect for the play of his arch rival, Karpov. I'll be taking the following book to the camp with me.

Anyway, what I'm thinking about through these reminiscences is that if I'd have had a mentor early in my chess life who had instilled a joy of that part of the game, then I suppose I'd have become that much better as a technical player and may have advanced further as a player generally. While I have no regrets about my life, and chess life, I would like to influence some of my young charges with a healthy respect for, and even a genuine enjoyment o,f endgames.

Yesterday I showed a position that I was struggling in, but where I hastened my own demise. That game was played about 8 years ago, and in that time I have probably done more work on the endgame than in the previous 30 years that I was playing!

Today comes another endgame that was surplus to requirements for the camp. I saw this endgame while watching live games and then it was shown in GM Alexander Baburin's Chess Today.

White to play and win, and I'll post the answer the next chance I get (not sure if I'll have internet access from the camp)

Edit: White came up with the marvelous 1.Kh1! leaving black in zugzwang. 1..Kh4 is answered by 2.Kg2 with no more king moves, and after 2..h5 3.gxh5+ Kxh5 white will march her king to the queen side.

More About Endgames

Yesterday's endgame was interesting and showed how a winning position can be ruined by allowing your opponent to get counterplay. So I'm now beginning to trawl through the endgames and whittle them down to a manageable level, so that at our endgame camp the kids will have some decent quality examples to look at, demonstrating clear ideas. It means, however, that I have to leave some examples out.

Here was a painful lesson for me in my first major tournament in Australia, the 2005 Australian Masters. I played pretty well in the tournament scoring 5.5/9 for a 2370 performance, but started badly with a tough loss to German IM Peter Frohlich. Peter had ground me down from a Catalan, and I had defended dourly for most of the game. In the following diagram I had the brainwave of trading pawns being the best defence:

As black I played 1..a6? What did Peter play that made me resign? I'll tell you tomorrow :)

Edit: Peter came up with the well known theme 2.a5! ensuring that he would get an advanced passed pawn whatever I did. I did the best move and resigned! I will admit that while this is a well known endgame theme, to me it was totally new, showing that my endgame knowledge was seriously lacking.

Chess Endgame Camp

This week I will be heading off to Phillip Island along with a group of coaches and about 30 talented chess kids. The idea is to run a chess camp, and this year we have dedicated the endgame as the subject of the main body of lessons. Of course, there will be lots of games and activities, and it is a great chance for the kids to get to know each other better, as well as perhaps to meet some great coaches who they haven't met before. Foremost of the coaches going is IM Robert Jamieson and the kids should get a huge amount from his experience, especially as Robert enjoys nothing better than quiet positions and endgames.

As coaches we have been given certain areas to work on, and lecture topics cover. Personally I'll be giving 4 lectures on the following broad subjects:

- Rook Endgames
- Winning a won position
- Minor Piece endgames
- Pawn Endgames

While compiling material for the camp, there will probably be some material left over, so I'll be showing some endgames here that I've seen but decided to hold back. For example, what inspired me to come up with the subject 'winning a won position' was the following game I saw not long ago.

Now time could have been a factor, as it often is in the endgame, but when analysing a game we are free of the time constraint and must find the best move or plan. There may also have been a case of the player with black thinking that the game will win itself. This example goes to show that nothing could be further than the truth, and the phrase "the hardest thing is to win a won game" springs immediately to mind.

So how could you improve black's play and win this "won position"?

Glen Eira Chess Club

Last night was the final one for Glen Eira Chess Club at its first home, Tucker Road Primary School. It was great of the school to offer us a temporary accommodation while we were looking for a place where we could call home. So we will next be meeting in 3 weeks time at the new venue of Carnegie Library, again from 6 pm for Juniors and then from 7 pm for adults.

Local news coverage

Last night, as a fun way of seeing off the old venue, the juniors played a Transfer tournament (Bughouse to those of you in the USA) while after we had a blitz event which was won by David Beaumont (his son Fitzroy had been part of the winning Transfer team earlier, with Michael Gershenzon). David, who has just competed in the Victorian Championship, is looking forward to other strong local players coming to the club. IM James Morris lives close to Carnegie, and David relishes seeing James come along to challenge his blitz prowess! It was all played in a fun spirit and was an enjoyable evening.

The new venue, Carnegie Libaray will see us start a new initiative that seemed to appeal to those who were at the club last night. We intend to make the club specialise in round robin tournaments, so members get to play a group of players near their own standard. This might take a bit of time to sort itself out, but it is different from most clubs who are running large swiss events. We envisage running small round robin events with maybe 6 or 8 players, and having regular promotion and relegation between sections. The concept of running a club like this is fairly new to us, so we're still trying to decide on the exact format, but it should be exciting. There should still be time enough in the year to run a regular swiss system tournament, and at some stage in the future we would like to get a weekender on the map. But you have to walk before you run, so establishing the venue, and building a membership is the first priority. As Carnegie Library is close to train and tram stops, and close to main freeways (Monash and Princes) it is a perfect place for players to come to.

David's: blitz winner Beaumont (right), sits next to club founder Cordover

Queen Victoria Market

It's my first day off for 2 weeks so I deserve a decent lie in and a lazy day. However, life is too short so I was up and out the house before 6.30 am and heading to the Vic Market to stock up on some treats. Getting up early and heading to the Vic Market has become a habit for me on my first day off. The lure of the great foods on offer in the Deli and Meat markets is too big a temptation, and it was all I could do to restrain myself today. (I'll be back there next week so didn't need to go mad today)

It was a bit eerie at 7 am when I arrived at the market. There were few people about, even some of the stalls hadn't set up yet, and there was a mist hung over the city that had yet to clear. So after parking I headed straight to the Deli and meat markets. I have no interest in the main covered market, or the fruit and veg parts, though I walk through the organic section of the market to check out the goods. No, it is the deli that really captures my imagination bringing flavours from around the world. The stalls in the deli offer great cheeses, cold meats, butter, breads, cakes, salads, pasta and much more. I limited myself to some Warrnambool salted butter, Cheshire Cheese, Cambozola and a strong Cheddar, though it took an enormous amount of will power to drag myself past the expensive, but excellent, French deli stall which specialise in cheeses and pates.

The deli Market

The best for butter

It was then through to the fish and meat section which is truly excellent, with great quality food and an amazing selection. The one thing that I have noticed in Australia, compared to the UK where I was born, is that fish is expensive. There is a great variety in the Vic Market from basics such as snapper or whiting, to chunky fish such as swordfish or tuna, there are barramundi or ocean trout and loads of crustaceans such as prawns and crabs. I was lucky enough to find ocean cod which is rare in Australia, and according to the guy I bought it from, a winter fish caught when the seas are colder. As for meat, it really is a hard choice as everything looks so good. The red meats are great value, and can be brought cheaper in bulk, while the chicken is, I think, a touch pricy. There are also meats prepared to be cooked in certain ways, and I bought a mini lamb roast stuffed with sun-dried tomato and pistachio.

The entrance to the fish and meat market

All told, it took me about 45 minutes from getting out my car to getting back in it, and that was only because I was gaping every now and then at the delicious looking foods. As the first hour of parking is free, I was also lucky to get away without paying for that. A successful start to my 2 week holiday period and the joy of some good food to come over the next few days!