Gens Una Sumus!
Mechanics’ Institute Chess Club Newsletter #597
August 14, 2012
�in the end what you’re looking for is clarity at the board or clarity in action. You want to be able to play a position. You want to be able to enter it if that plays to your strengths, and that’s all that really matters. So even some false confidence is fine.
—Viswanathan Anand
Due to the upcoming U.S. Olympiad training camp and Chess Olympiad in Istanbul, the Newsletter will be taking a break until mid-September.
1) Mechanics’ Institute Chess Club News
Top-rated IM Elliott Winslow is among those tied for first after two rounds of the Henry Mar Tuesday Night Marathon. It’s still possible to enter the 70-player, 9-round event, with two half-point byes.
Alongside the recent super-tournament in Biel, there was a strong Master tournament with 112 players, four of them Americans. IM Robert Hungaski had 6-5 and IM David Pruess and FM Sunil Weeramantry finished with 5 points, but the real story was Orinda GM Sam Shankland, who will be very close to 2600 FIDE after tying for 4th.
Final standings:
1-3. GMs Kurnosov (RUS, 2663), Movsesian (ARM, 2698) and Edouard (FRA, 2646) – 8/11
4-12. GMs Wen Yang GM (CHN, 2569), Harikrishna (IND, 2684), Meier (GER, 2644), Melkumyan (ARM, 2639), Vachier-Lagrave (FRA, 2686), Saric (CRO, 2638), Roiz (ISR, 2615), Golod (ISR, 2547) and Shankland (USA 2579) - 7½, etc.
Here is the deciding game from the 2012 Vladimir Pafnutieff Memorial G/45 held August 4.
Pribyl System B07
Ricardo deGuzman – Ryan Porter
12th Vladimir Pafnutieff Memorial G/45 (5)
1.d4 d6 2.e4 Nf6 3.Nc3 c6 4.a4 Qa5 5.Bd3 e5 6.Nge2 Be7 7.0–0 0–0 8.h3 Nbd7 9.Be3 exd4 10.Nxd4 Nc5 11.Qd2 Re8 12.b4 Qxb4 13.a5 Nxd3 14.cxd3 Bd8 15.Rfb1 Qc5 16.Nf5 Qe5 17.Bf4 Qe6 18.Nxd6 Re7 19.Ne2 Rd7 20.Nd4 Qe7 21.N4f5 Qe6 22.Qe3 g6 23.a6! 1-0
Carlos D’Avila won the Mechanics’ Institute Chess Club Wednesday Night Blitz on August 8th with a score of 11 from 12.
2) Remembering Val Zemitis
We pay our respects to the late Val Zemitis by presenting this previously-unpublished game from a simul held at the time of the 1958 Olympiad in Munich.
King’s Indian Samisch E83
Mikhail Tal–Val Zemitis
Munich (simul), 1958
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3 0–0 6.Be3 Nc6 7.Qd2 a6 8.Bd3 e5 9.d5 Nd4 10.Nge2
wIIIIIIIIw
[rdb1w4kd]
[dp0wdpgp]
[pdw0whpd]
[dwdP0wdw]
[wdPhPdwd]
[dwHBGPdw]
[P)w!NdP)]
[$wdwIwdR]
wiiiiiiiiw
10...Nd7 11.0–0
11.Bb1 c5 12.dxc6 bxc6 13.Nxd4 exd4 14.Bxd4 Ne5 15.0–0 Nxc4 was equal in Saidy-R.Byrne, US Ch. 1961, but White later won.
11...c5 12.dxc6 bxc6 13.Rad1 Nc5 14.Bb1 Nce6 15.Bf2
wIIIIIIIIw
[rdb1w4kd]
[dwdwdpgp]
[pdp0ndpd]
[dwdw0wdw]
[wdPhPdwd]
[dwHwdPdw]
[P)w!NGP)]
[dBdRdRIw]
wiiiiiiiiw
15...f5 16.exf5 gxf5 17.Nxd4 Nxd4 18.Ne2 c5 19.b4 Qf6 20.Nc3 Be6 21.Nd5 Bxd5 22.cxd5 Bh6 23.Qe1
wIIIIIIIIw
[rdwdw4kd]
[dwdwdwdp]
[pdw0w1wg]
[dw0P0pdw]
[w)whwdwd]
[dwdwdPdw]
[PdwdwGP)]
[dBdR!RIw]
wiiiiiiiiw
23...Ra7 24.bxc5 dxc5 25.Kh1 Rg7 26.Be3 Rg6 27.g3 Kh8 28.f4
wIIIIIIIIw
[wdwdw4wi]
[dwdwdwdp]
[pdwdw1rg]
[dw0P0pdw]
[wdwhw)wd]
[dwdwGw)w]
[Pdwdwdw)]
[dBdR!RdK]
wiiiiiiiiw
28...Qd6 29.fxe5 Qxd5+ 30.Kg1 Bxe3+ 31.Qxe3 Re6 32.Rde1 Rfe8 33.Qf4 Rxe5
wIIIIIIIIw
[wdwdrdwi]
[dwdwdwdp]
[pdwdwdwd]
[dw0q4pdw]
[wdwhw!wd]
[dwdwdw)w]
[Pdwdwdw)]
[dBdw$RIw]
wiiiiiiiiw
34.Rxe5 Qxe5 35.Qxe5+ Rxe5 36.Bd3 a5
wIIIIIIIIw
[wdwdwdwi]
[dwdwdwdp]
[wdwdwdwd]
[0w0w4pdw]
[wdwhwdwd]
[dwdBdw)w]
[Pdwdwdw)]
[dwdwdRIw]
wiiiiiiiiw
½–½
3) Here and There
The noted author Jeremy Silman’s website has undergone an extensive reworking, and is now back up as two sites: www.jeremysilman.com and www.silmansasianmoviereviews.com.
Dr. Joseph Ponterotto recently-released book Psychobiography of Bobby Fischer is not only an insightful book which breaks new ground in analyzing Fischer’s psyche, but also a research tour-de-force that extensively utilizes FBI files. This includes one report that Bobby and his mother Regina traveled to Mexico City on January 21, 1959 and remained there until February 11. We find it hard to believe that Bobby was a tourist for three weeks, but have never read of any chess activities by him in Mexico.
IM Gregory Shahade’s U.S. Chess League and U.S. Chess School have done much to invigorate American chess. So too has the awarding of chess scholarship at the University of Baltimore at Maryland County, Texas Tech, and the University of Texas, at both Dallas and Brownsville. This coming year the year two St. Louis schools, Webster and Lindenwood, will join their ranks.
Defending champion Texas Tech looked to face a massive rebuilding effort when Susan Polgar took the entire team to Webster, but don’t count out the Red Raiders just yet. They recently signed U.S. number three Alex Onischuk to be their coach. A veteran of many Olympiad teams, both for his native Ukraine and his adopted homeland, the United States, with a peak rating over 2700 FIDE, Onischuk is by far the strongest coach to be hired by a U.S. university. The respect he has generated as both a competitor and a class act will likely translate into serious chess talent being drawn to West Texas.
(4) GM Manuel Leon Hoyos wins 2012 US Open in Vancouver, WA
For a great pair of photos of Yasser Seirawan and Viktors Pupols from 1975 and 2012 go to
www.idahochessassociation.org/otherresults-yasser_seirawan_viktors_pupols_2012_0812.asp
Mexican GM Manuel Leon Hoyos, who is studying at Webster University in St. Louis, won an Armageddon playoff with the white pieces to earn the title of 2012 United States Open Chess Champion. Hoyos finished with an 8-1 score, the same as Chicago GM Dmitry Gurevich and another Webster student, FM John Bryant of California. They each received $4677. The top two players on tiebreak (Hoyos and Bryant) contested a playoff for an extra $200 in prize money and the championship trophy in a blitz match (5 minutes vs. 3 minutes with a 5-second delay and Black having draw odds). Bryant, as the first American finisher on tiebreaks, will be seeded into the next U.S. Closed Championship.
The turnout for the 2012 US Open, 517 players, was over a hundred more than expected, and a great success. The United States Chess Federation hopes to return to the Pacific Northwest in the next 6-10 years. The 114th U.S. Open will be in Madison, Wisconsin, and the 115th in St. Louis, Missouri.
The last U.S. Open held in Washington State was Seattle 1966. There were 8 players who played in that event who returned to compete in Vancouver. They are
Rusty Miller
Mike Murray
Joe Brandenburg
Anthony Saidy
Ronald Gross
Sam Sloan
Viktors Pupols
David Rupel
(5) Appeal for Games from 2012 US Open Participants
Hello, chess friends.
Since the USCF decided not to publish the U.S. Open bulletin any longer, I have been borrowing their scoresheets and recording some games myself, both for the article in an upcoming Northwest Chess and to put on the nwchess.com website. I have processed about 120 games so far, which is plenty more than needed for the article, but I would like a larger file for the website. So, if you are a person who puts your games into a database, could you email me a PGN copy of all your games from Vancouver? Open, weekend Swiss, quads, G/15 if you kept score (seems unlikely): the whole thing would be great. My email is [email protected]. Or, if you can’t do it that way and don’t mind parting with your scoresheets, you could mail them (or copies) to me at Murlin Varner, 13329 20th Ave NE, Woodinville, WA 98077.
I do not have a huge file of email addresses, so if you know the email of someone attending the U.S. Open that is not mentioned in the address line above, please forward this message on to them. Thanks.
Once this file is done, it will be posted for use on the nwchess.com game viewer. I will also be providing a copy of my finished file to the U.S.C.F. and the U.S. Open head tournament director, Bill Snead.
Thanks for your help.
Murlin Varner, NWC Grand Prix Administrator and WCF Games Editor
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