BNbank Blitz Norway 09

On Saturday I went down to Oslo S to watch the finals of BNbank Blitz Norway 09, were GM Magnus Carlsen and GM Hiraku Nakamura were among the participants. Magnus Carlsen was the favorite to win the tournament as he recently became the World Blitz Chess Champion, but it turned out that Hiraku Nakamura was the strongest part. I took a few pictures of the event:


GM Kejtil Lie, NOR (2547) - GM Hiraku Nakamura, USA (2715)

GM Jon Ludvig Hammer, NOR (2588) - GM Magnus Carlsen, NOR (2801)

GM Magnus Carlsen, NOR (2801) - GM Hiraku Nakamura, USA (2715)

Round 8/9, ClubTournament, Fall -09

11/26 I played round 8 out of 9 at my club's ClubTournament. I played a 1117 player, and if my goal is to improve, and progress in chess, this was a guy I had to win against. I have played him once before (victory), and then he played The Scandinavian. So that's what I prepared for. I have just started to play The Blackmar-Diemer Gambit against The Scandinavian, and since I've never tried it in an otb match before, this seemed like a good moment. If I couldn't win against a lower rated player, how am I then gonna win with The Blaskmar-Diemer Gambit ever, was my thought ;) For those wondering, the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit is a 1.d4 opening, but can be used against the Scandinavian as well, as it's transposes, i.e.: 1.d4 d5 2.e4 or 1.e4 d5 2.d4




1.e4 c6 What?? This isn't The Scandiavian!! There goes all my preparations :D Well, let's outplay him in The Caro-Kann instead ;)

2.d3 d6 hmmm, 2.d3 is what I play against Caro-Kann, but 2...d6 is not in my repertoire :D Needed to play plain chess then...

4.Be3 Seeing him preparing the Fianchetto, I thought I might as well go for some standard Bishop trading attack.

7.Be2 I thought he was very passive in the opening, and wanted to punish him. What I really wanted to do was play maybe 7.d4 (I started to regret my 2.d3 move and wanted to place my Bishop more aggressively on c4 making some treats. I ended up playing sound with development before attacking.

7...b5 ?? This can be any good? Not in my chess understanding anyway. Maybe 8.a3 is unnecessary, but at least I stop the possible complications.

8...Qa5 I had a plan of long castling, after this move I skipped that plan ;) So, 9.0-0 is logic and sound. He is pretty undeveloped and there should soon be some tactics punishing his play.

10.Bh6 I was more eager to play 10.d4, but couldn't really find the right plan. Some kingside pawn storm was also in my mind. A crazy continuation would be 10.d4 Bb7 11.Nxb5 Qxd2 12.Nxd6+ Kd7 13.Bxd2 Kxd6 14.Bb4+ c5 15.dxe5+ Nxe5 16.Rd1+ Ke6 17.Ng5+ and take on c5 with the Bishop. This should be winning, but with a piece down, I'm not sure if my strength would have won after this line :D

13.h4 Not sure if this is any good, but felt I had to attack. Black doesn't really have to much defense present. But after 15.h5 Nxh5 I'm finally getting my combination and have the advantage.

21.Qc7 I wanted to see if he dared taking on b2 - and end up losing -, but of course he didn't fall for that. 21.Qxh5 would have been better, but I felt I had a good game anyway. And he can still fall for the b2 trap.

26.Rfg7 OMG!!, had I overlooked something? I thought I was close to losing, and had a big time figuring out what to do. I thought g3 would lose to Rxg3 since my f-pawn is pinned. I totally overlooked saving the day with my Rook :D A good example on how to lose your mind tired and deep into a game ;) Well, I finally found Rd8 and was quite proud. This saves me totally, I think :) I hoped he would take on g2, and then I can take with the Queen, and he can't take back since his Rook is pinned. Then it would be curtains down.

27.Rd8 Qe5 28.R1d7 Qg5 His tempoloss with the Queen only helps me big time. 27...Qg5 would have been much better, but still losing.

35.Qf2 The final blow. Balck must take the Queen to avoid a quick loss. Of course, taking the Queen isn't really an option either ;)

42.Nf2 is a bit cautious. Nf4 intending Nxh5 threatening a backrank mate, would have been more mature :D I was'nt really afraid of messing things up tho.

So after a few more moves he gave up...

One of my best results so far.

Thought it was a good idea to post one of my best results so far. Being ELO 1261 at the time, and drawing a 2035 player, is a bit sensational. You would probably think that a win against a very good player would more likely be considered as my best result, but this draw is quite good, so here you go. I'm playing black against Victor Aavik (2035), Norway:




The game starts as a Kings Indian Defence, which is in my repertoire. I was a bit anxious playing this opening against such a good player, but thought that with my knowledge about this opening I would maybe have a descent chance - or at least I would probably learn some from my mistakes ;)

10.Nd3 I wonder if this is a slight inaccuracy? Everything has been quite classical until this moment, and I wonder if he maybe should have played 10.Be3 'cause after 11.f5 f3 the Bishop has been developed, and has a retreat square on f2.

18...g4 ?? This is a total miscalculation from me. This just makes things worse. I was actually only calculating 19.hxg4 and not the easy refutation 19.fxg4 :D So from here I'm probably loosing :-/ It would have been much better to get the Knights into the attack first.

20...Qg5 this can't be good either. My thought was I wanted the Queen into the attack, now that attacking is the only reasonable thing to do. The best would probably be to play Nf6 first, but then I would block my queen. After 21.Be6 (which I totally overlooked)...Nf6 22.Bxf7+ I was a bit satisfied giving up the exchange and keep my precious c8 Bishop, as it's an important piece in KID.

23.Rf3? Nh4 24.Qe2 He decides to give back the exchange! I'm lucky :) He told me after the game that it was on purpose, when I thought during the game that it was a blunder. Well, I still think it was a blunder. But if he had moved the Rook away i.e. Rf2, then Bxh3 would have been good for Black.

30.Nexf4 eeh...I remember thinking he had found some way to mate me or something, but the more I looked at it, I couldn't see why I couldn't take the Knight. So, I went for it, and took the offer to see what he had hidden up in his sleeves ;)

32...Bxg4 this is probably a move he overlooked when sacrificing his Knight. It's not a particularly great move, but looks like it saves me from further complications. It turns out though, that 32...Bb5 probably is winning, or at least advantage for Black - he will probably be a piece down after that move.

35.e6+ Well, this probably saves my draw along with some other good moves later on. 35.exd6 would probably have caused me more problems. After the good move 35...Kg6 I'm back on track :)

40.Bd4 This move kind of shocked me. I thought I was totally lost now. After a while though, I found the great move 40...Nxd5 which probably saves me from a loss. Funny enough Fritz thinks I'm totally lost!(?) After 41...Ke4 I just can't find the win for White (even if Fritz with Rybka 3 engine says +4.45 advantage for White) There must be something wrong with my engine, or the machine simply doesn't understand the position! So, I invite anyone to find the win Fritz says is there ;)

Blog created

So, where to start...well, this blog is gonna be chess related, and mainly about my progress and games. Maybe not the most intriguing blog, since I'm only a mediocre chessplayer, but I hope some will find it interesting :) My current national rating is 1273, and hopefully rising. Please note that I'm Norwegian and therefore my native language is not English. Guess that's all for now, see ya later! :)