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Wins are a relief, and losses are devastating. There is no giddy or fun. That is why we are all sick puppies. Greg Popovich coach of the NBA's San Antonio Spurs Thanks to IM Walter Morris for sending this quote which bears an uncanny similarity to GM Ljubojevic's sentiments in Newsletter #337. |
1) Mechanics' Institute Chess Club News 2) Jorge Sammour-Hasbun wins 8th Dos Hermanas Internet Tournament by John Henderson 3) David Pruess at Cappelle Le Grande 4) FIDE Tournament reporting change by Michael Aigner 5) The Cappelle rate of play 6) Upcoming Tournaments |
1) Mechanics' Institute Chess Club NewsIM Ricardo DeGuzman won the 7th Annual Max Wilkerson Open last Saturday by defeating NM Sam Shankland in the last round. DeGuzman finished with 4.5 from 5 while Shankland ended on 4, tying with NMs Peter Zavadsky and Keith Vickers, Experts Romulo Fuentes (who drew with DeGuzman in round four), Michael Zhong and Alexander Samak and Class C player Ryan Cassidy of Alaska in the 53-player field. The latter had a tremendous tournament. Playing up every round he drew two Experts and defeated two 1900s to gain over 100 USCF rating points. Thanks to Bill Schutt for his generous donation of books from the library of his late brother Ray to the Mechanics' Institute. Highlights include almost 50 New in Chess Yearbooks and the entire set of Opening for White According to Kramnik by Alexander Khalifman. Last Newsletter we reported that the 2nd Imre Konig Memorial will be held at the Mechanics' Institute this July and listed all the participating GMs. We can add the names of IMs Dmitry Zilberstein, David Pruess and Josh Friedel to the list of confirmed players. The Far West Open will be held in Reno April 6-8. If you would like to play for the Mechanics' team contact John Donaldson at imwjd@aol.com Good luck to all MI members who will be playing in the National Junior High School Championship this weekend in Sacramento. A few Newsletters ago we published a list of all Stamer winners. Here we look at the Mechanics' other long running annual weekend event. Carroll M. Capps Memorial Winners 1971 Julio Kaplan 1972 Craig Barnes 1973 James Tarjan 1974 Walter Browne 1975 David Strauss and Paul Cornelius 1976 Jay Whitehead and Max Burkett 1977 Jeremy Silman and Cicero Braga 1978 Tournament Cancelled 1979 (July) Nick deFirmian and (November) ??? 1980 John Grefe, Jay Whitehead and Charles Powell 1981 Peter Biyiasas and John Grefe 1982 Jeremy Silman, Peter Biyiasas, Alan Pollard and Vince McCambridge 1983 Peter Biyiasa, Craig Mar and Victor Baja 1984 Charles Powell, Victor Baja and Bill Orton 1985 Nick deFirmian, Peter Biyiasa, Charles Powell and Rudolfo Hernandez 1986 Igor Ivanov and Jay Whitehead 1987 Marc Leski, John Grefe and Gustavo Darcy Lima 1988 Guillermo Rey, Bill Orton and Romulio Fuentes 1989 Vladimir Strugatsky, Charles Powell and Rudolfo Hernandez 1990 Loal Davis 1991 Walter Browne, Jay Whitehead, and Greg Kotlyar 1992 Walter Browne and Renard Anderson 1993 John Grefe, Emmanuel Perez and Adrian Keatinge-Clay 1994 Craig Mar, John Grefe and Rostislav Tsodikov 1995 Enrico Sevillano and Joe Weber 1996 Igor Ivanov and Omar Cartagena 1997 Alexander Baburin 1998 Mladen Vucic, Mark Pinto, Omar Cartagena, Ron Cusi and Jonathan Baker 1999 Russell Wong, Paul Gallegos, David Blohm, and Larry Snyder 2000 Kenneth Hills and Ryan Porter 2001 Ricardo DeGuzman 2002 Ricardo DeGuzman and Victor Ossipov 2003 Ricardo DeGuzman and Batsaikhan Tserendorj 2004 Nicolas Yap 2005 Ricardo DeGuzman and Ron Cusi 2006 Batchimeg Tuvshintugs The 1978 event was scheduled for the normal dates, the second week of November, but canceled at the last minute. A tournament was held in July of 1979 and another was advertised in Chess Voice to be held in November of that year. All indications are that it was held. We have been unable to find results for this event and ask for assistance. 2) Jorge Sammour-Hasbun wins 8th Dos Hermanas Internet Tournament by John HendersonJorge Sammour-Hasbun - the ICC comeback kid! by John Henderson
It was a true Cinderella-story conclusion to the Internet Chess Club's annual Dos Hermanas blitz tournament at the weekend, as "unknown" Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (formerly Zamora) (ICC handle: One of the few untitled players to qualify from the mega event, Jorge entered Dos Hermanas unsure if he could even reach the final knockout stage! The impressive field of world class players for the quarterfinals included GMs Shahriyar Mamedyarov, Tigran L. Petrosian, Gata Kamsky, Hikaru Nakamura, Kiril Georgiev, Sergey Shipov, Rasul Ibrahimov, and underdogs IM Farid Khanlar Abbasov and Jorge Sammour-Hasbun. Jorge's quarterfinal victory over 2661 rated GM Kiril Georgiev (ICC: KGeorgiev) was particularly sweet, as he has fond memories of playing ultra-long blitz sessions with the Bulgarian grandmaster way back in the late nineties before his ten-year hiatus from the game. As child prodigy Jorge Zamora won the world championship under-10 title in 1988 and later also the world under-12 title. Jorge's family emigrated from Palestine to America and there, at the age of 15 he already had a USCF rating of 2500 and an over-the-board defeated Gata Kamsky. He has an ambitious over the- board comeback planned now on the back of his resounding victory at Dos Hermanas, an event regarded by many as the world's premier online chess tournament. Being an unknown quantity, untitled and out of the game for ten years, Jorge saw that his progress was causing concerns from the many chess fans following the tournament, so immediately agreed to the ICC's request to have a USCF TD to act as an independent proctor for all of the KO finals to ensure there would be no accusations of cheating. There's more in Macualey Peterson's 27 minute audio interview with Jorge Sammour-Hasbun (requires ICC membership) recorded LIVE, just minutes after his harrowing 227 move (!) draw to guarantee the match win against runner-up Tigran L. Petrosian (ICC: Anyuta).
Sammour Hasbun,Jorge (3213) - Petrosian,Tigran L (3208) [B96] 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 e6 7.f4 Nbd7 8.Qf3 Qc7 9.0-0-0 b5 10.Bd3 Bb7 11.Rhe1 Qb6 12.Nb3 b4 13.Ne2 a5 14.Nbd4 a4 15.Bxf6 gxf6 16.Qh5 Ra5 17.f5 Nc5 18.Bc4 b3 19.Nxe6 bxc2 20.Rd2 a3 21.b3 Nxe4 22.N6f4 d5 23.Nxd5 Bxd5 24.Nf4 Bxc4 25.Rxe4+ Re5 26.Rxc4 Bb4 27.Rdd4 Bc5 28.Re4 Be3+ 29.Kxc2 Bxf4 30.Rxf4 0-0 31.Qxh7+! Kxh7 32.Rh4+ Kg7 33.Rcg4# 1-0
Final standings: 3) David Pruess at Cappelle Le GrandeThe following snap-crackle-pop pretty much guaranteed that David would make a GM norm.
Cappelle Le Grande 2007 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Nc6 6.Bg5 Qb6 7.Bxf6 gxf6 8.Nb3 f5 9.Nd5 Qd8 10.exf5 Bxf5 11.Qf3 e6 12.Bb5 Rc8 13.Qc3 f6 14.Nd4 Kf7 15.Nxf5 exf5 16.O-O Bh6 17.Qh3 Kg7 18.f4 Nd4 19.Rae1 Nxb5 20.Re7+ Kg6 21.Qg3+ Bg5 22.fxg5 fxg5 23.Rxf5 1-0 4) FIDE Tournament reporting change by Michael AignerHello John, On the USCF forums, I had asked why only a couple of USA events are on the list for April 2007. Major tournaments like both North American Opens (Las Vegas and Oklahoma) are missing. The response I got from Mike Nolan at the USCF and Casto Abundo at FIDE explains that the USCF has not been in compliance with the new FIDE regulation requiring tournaments indicate the colors for each game. Fortunately the USCF has received a temporary reprieve. Please email the reports to me by tomorrow latest and we shall include them in the April list if they are in the correct format (except unknown color.) But please make the no-color cross table a temporary accommodation. FIDE endorsed Swiss system programs such as Swiss Manager output the Krause format. Please suggest to Swiss system programmers in the U.S. to include this in their programs.
Regards, 5) The Cappelle rate of playFollowing its innovation in the realm of pairings (trying out the "Decreasingly Accelerated System") the Cappelle-La-Grande tournament has done it again, by coming up with a new rate of play. Why another rate of play ? Since electronic clocks became available and adjournments fell into disuse, organizers have had two options : a "mechanical" rate of play in which each player is allotted a maximum period of time. The chief advantage is that the organizers can predict when the round will end and the playing venue be vacated. The disadvantages are the stress resulting from time scrambles (and any reconstructions of the moves of the game) or players exceeding the time limit, as well as the possibility that draw claims under Article 10.2 will force the arbiter into an area which is, ethically speaking, outside his competence. an "electronic" rate of play in which players receive an initial amount of time which is increased by a fixed amount after each move. This reverses the advantages and disadvantages. Most players and arbiters prefer this system as it seems more just. But it can give the arbiters problems when one or more games is extended indefinitely (going on one or two hours, or even longer, than the other games). The solution ? Starting with an "electronic" rate of play, one must therefore find a way to ensure that after a certain duration the longest games will not continue more than a few more minutes. The Cappelle solution is to reduce drastically the additional time added after a certain number of moves (fewer than one game in a hundred will be affected). The following extract from the Tournament Rules shows how this will work : The rate of play is :
Players must keep score for the first 80 moves. Rule 10.2 (claiming a draw to the arbiter) does not apply. A 40 move game cannot last longer than (100 + 20) x 2, i.e. 240 minutes (four hours). For an 80 move game one must add (30 + 20) x 2, i.e.100 minutes (one hour 40 minutes) with a total duration of five hours 40 minutes, which would be increased by 20 seconds for each additional move. It would need a 140 move game to exceed six hours of play. This retains the advantages of both types of rate of play without leading to any obvious disadvantages.
IA Jean-Claude TEMPLEUR 6) Upcoming EventsMI Events - go to http://www.chessclub.org/ for more information
Walter Lovegrove Senior Open - April 14th and 15th
A Classic Event!
Apr.14 12th California Classic Championship California, Northern
A Classic Event!
Jun.16 14th California Classic Championship California, Northern
The East Bay Chess Club has two tournaments coming up in March:
March 25: March Adult Quads (open to all ages)
Apr. 6-8 Reno-Far West Open VII GPP: 150 Enhanced Nevada
May 15-23, Oklahoma
Aug. 14-19 2007 U.S. Senior Open S. California |