"Laziness makes improvement impossible."

   Bobby Fischer

1) 4th Max Wilkerson Open this Saturday
2) Spring Tuesday Night Marathon Starts
3) 2nd SF International - 1986 Revisted
4) Here and There 
5) Upcoming Events

1) 4th Max Wilkerson Open this Saturday

The 4th annual Max Wilkerson Open will be held this Saturday starting at 10am. Named after the longest serving Mechanics' Institute Chess Director (16 years) this five round event will differ from other MI's other monthly G/45 event in that few kids are expected to play because of the concurrent Northern California Scholastic Championships.

2) Spring Tuesday Night Marathon Starts

Seventy entrants are signed up for the Mechanics' Institute Spring Tuesday Night Marathon with FM Frank Thornally the top seed. The nine round event will run through early May. It is still possible to enter the tournament with a half point bye for round 1.

3) 2nd SF International - 1986 Revisited

The 2nd San Francisco International, held at Mz. Brown's Kitchen in the Mission District and organized by Guillermo Rey, was a memorable event. Zsuzsa Polgar made her first appearance in California and Elliott Winslow achieved his third and final IM norm.

Category 4 (2344 FIDE average) IM norm = 8

1. GM Nick deFirmian 9.5/12; 2. FM Elliott Winslow 8.5 3-6. IMs John Donaldson, Victor Frias, Zsuzsa Polgar and Cris Ramayrat 8; 7. IM Jay Whitehead 6; 8-9. NMs Zaki Harari and Guillermo Rey 5; 10-11. NMs Benjamin Ferrera and Dennis Fritzinger 4; 12. FM Richard Lobo 3.5; 13. NM Steven Cross .5

Polgar,Z (2400) - Ramayrat,C (2430) [E84]
San Francisco 2nd San Francisco (2), 03.1986

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3 0-0 6.Be3 Nc6 7.Nge2 a6 8.Qd2 Rb8 9.Nc1 e5 10.d5 Nd4 11.N1e2 Nxe2 12.Bxe2 Nh5 13.0-0-0 f5 14.c5 Nf4 15.Bc4 b5 16.Bf1 Rf7 17.c6 Bf6 18.Kb1 Nh5 19.b4 f4 20.Ba7 Ra8 21.Bf2 Bh4 22.Kb2 Bxf2 23.Qxf2 g5 24.Be2 Nf6 25.a4 bxa4 26.Ra1 g4 27.Rxa4 Rg7 28.Rha1 g3 29.Qg1 gxh2 30.Qxh2 Rb8 31.Kb3 h5 32.Bxa6 Bxa6 33.Rxa6 Rg3 34.b5 Qf8 35.Ra7 Qc8 36.Kc4 Kg7 37.R1a2 Kg6 38.Qh1 Ng8 39.Qh4 Nf6 40.Ne2 Rg5 41.Qh3 Kh6 42.Qxc8 Rxc8 43.Nc3 h4 44.b6 cxb6 45.Nb5 1-0

De Firmian,N (2520) - Ramayrat,C (2440) [B87]
San Francisco 2nd San Francisco (4), 03.1986

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bc4 e6 7.Bb3 b5 8.0-0 Bb7 9.Re1 Nbd7 10.Bg5 h6 11.Bxf6 Nxf6 12.Qd3 Nd7 13.Qh3 Nc5 14.Bd5 exd5 15.exd5+ Be7 16.Nf5 Bc8 17.Nxe7 Bxh3 18.Nc6+ Ne6 19.Nxd8 Kxd8 20.gxh3 Nf4 21.Re4 Nxh3+ 22.Kg2 f5 23.Rb4 Ng5 24.a4 bxa4 25.Rbxa4 Ke7 26.Rxa6 Rxa6 27.Rxa6 Rb8 28.b3 Nf7 29.Ne2 Rb5 30.c4 Rxb3 31.Nd4 Rb2 32.Nxf5+ Kf6 33.Nxd6 Ne5 34.c5 Rc2 35.Nc4+ 1-0

Winslow had beaten IMs Whitehead and Ramayrat and was contending for first when a loss near the end of the event nearly derailed him. The following game, from one of the last rounds, was critical to his success. Winslow quickly achieves a dominating position but then leaves his Queen hanging one move too long. That's when the real adventures start!

Winslow,E (2340) - Fritzinger,D (2215) [A54]
San Francisco 2nd San Francisco (10), 03.1986

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 d6 3.Nc3 Nbd7 4.Nf3 e5 5.Bg5 Be7 6.e3 0-0 7.Qc2 Ne8 8.Bxe7 Qxe7 9.0-0-0 c6 10.Bd3 g6 11.g4 Ndf6 12.h3 Ng7 13.c5 dxc5 14.dxe5 Nd7 15.Ne4 b5 16.Qc3 Ne6 17.Nf6+ Kh8 18.g5 Nb6 19.h4 c4 20.h5 cxd3 21.hxg6 fxg6 22.Qb4 Rf7 23.Nxh7 Nf4 24.exf4 Qxb4 25.Nf6+ Bh3 26.Rxh3+ Kg7 27.Rxd3 Qc4+ 28.Kd2 Qxf4+ 29.Ke2 Re7 30.Rh7+ Kf8 31.Rh8+ Kf7 32.Rh7+ Ke6 33.Nd4+ Kxe5 34.Rxe7+ Kd6 35.Nf5+ Kc5 36.Re4 Qxe4+ 37.Nxe4+ Kb4 38.Ne3 Nc4 39.b3 Nxe3 40.Rxe3 Rd8 41.Nc3 Rd4 42.Nb1 Kc5 43.Rc3+ 1-0

All the games from this event will soon be available at www.chessdryad.com in its Cal Database.

4) Here and There

Filipino IM Ricardo DeGuzman will be giving a simul at the Burlingame Chess Club on Thursday, April 1. Go to

http://www.burlingamechessclub.com/bccPAIR/2004tmts/deguzman/deguzman_simul.htm for more information.

GM Alex Baburin in the excellent online daily Chess Today (http://www.chesstoday.net) recently shared some information about some strange incidents involving Kasparov at Linares.

Dmitry Komarov in the Ukrainian newspaper Facty told a story about a little known aspect of the recent Linares tournament. Below is our translation of his text (in Russian): A real detective story happened in the last rounds of the Super tournament in Linares. According to Silvio Danailov, manager of Ruslan Ponomariov, when playing against Vallejo, Kasparov before making his move suddenly stood up and left the playing hall. He did the same the day before when he played against Topalov.

In accordance with the rules such behavior is strictly prohibited because of the possible computer assistance and is punished with a defeat. The arbiters noticed Kasparov's strange maneuver and asked the girl who was working in the press center to follow him. Garry went to his hotel room and stayed there for about fifteen minutes. Coming back he explained to the arbiters that he had had to take some medicine urgently. The arbiters gave Kasparov just a warning, while at the last European Team Championship Ponomariov lost a full point for a lesser offense; "an accidental mobile phone call."

It's not at all clear that Kasparov was cheating, but can you imagine what his reaction would be if one of his opponents left the board for an extended period of time without consulting an arbiter? Though unquestionably one of the greatest, if not the greatest player of all time, Kasparov is not likely to be remembered as having great board manners. One only has to recall his actively utilized repertoire of facial grimaces and the incident with Judit Polgar where he violated the touch move rule. - J.D.

5) Upcoming Events

Upcoming Tournaments at the MI

Max Wilkerson Open - March 20
Lovegrove Senior - April 3-4
Imre Konig Memorial - April 24

The Mechanics' Institute Scholastic Quads Tournaments: February 21, and March 13 Open to players age 18 and under (Limited to first 80 players) Game/45