Simultaneous Display and Lecture-Report

Hi all,

I think everyone enjoyed the lecture and simultaneous display by Grandmaster Alexander Baburin. The list of players was as follows:
Jack McHugh
Colin Power
Diego Lionello
Zbigniew Zdziarski
Matthew Berkeley
Nicholas Bland
Hugh O'Connor
Charles Dillon
James Vaughan

Deep in thought...

A big well done to Ennis captain Colin, who was the only one to take a draw off him. In fact, it was Alexander who offered as he was down on material. Also, 0.5/9 against a GM rated 2540 gives us performance rating of 2096. Just thought you'd like to know.

Colin looking happy with himself.

Last mention should probably go to Diego who help out longest against Alex, and was unlucky in a tricky ending.

Before the simul, GM Baburin answered a few questions. The main points to take from his answers were:

• Always go on what the position demands, there are no rules that apply to every position.
• Play what you think is right, not what you think should be right.
• If time trouble is a problem, try be more confident in your moves. Spending too much time too often does a lot more damage than making a small mistake every now and then by playing more quickly.
• The best way to improve involves 3 things: Analyzing your own games (your losses most of all), practicing your tactics, and working on your endgame technique.

He also said that he was banned from playing swap chess in Russia when he was growing up. No swap chess you say? What kind of a deprived childhood...

Anyway, feedback was generally positive, so we might look at organising another early next year, possibly around fresher's week.

If anyone feels like looking over their game with Alex, remember you can always bring it down to the club. I'd be very interested in seeing some of them.

See you then,

Stephen

Ever Wanted to Play a Grandmaster?

Hi guys,

Exciting news this week. As part of the Russian Cultural Festival 2011, we will be hosting a lecture and simultaneous display by International Grandmaster Alexander Baburin (above), internationally rated 2539. For those who don't know, a simultaneous display is where a strong player plays several games at once against different opponents, making one move on each board before moving to the next game.

• Where? Room 3051 in the Arts building.
• When? Wednesday March 2nd, 12-2pm (during reading week, no excuses!)
• How much? Free!

Alexander is the only Grandmaster living in Ireland, so chances to play him, or any grandmaster, do not come along often. I'd highly recommend you play, once you get a taste of playing someone that good it really encourages you to improve. I speak from experience on that. Demand for this will be high, so get back to me soon as you can to make sure you've a good chance of getting a place.

Cheers,
Stephen

Last Few League Results

We've had a couple of tough matches recently against teams up near the top of the table. First was Rathmines A:

Rathmines have a very consistent team rating wise, two and a half is not a bad result against them. A couple of games that they won could have gone either way, so the ratings did not count for as much as the scoreline suggests.

Next was Bray, who also have a very strong all round team: 

Everyone did exceptionally well against higher rated players, and like last time, with a bit of extra luck we could have tied the match. Everyone was ahead in their game at least once, so it's a little disappointing to only come out with 4 draws, but again not bad against a strong team.

Two games left for the Armstong team against Gonzaga and Dun Laoghaire and we've a 3 point cushion over the relegation places. 

The Ennis team are also doing their best with a few points cushion over the relegation places. Both teams will be run close though, so there's an exciting run in to look forward to.

More news soon,

Stephen

It's Been a Long Time...

Haven't posted in a while. Since the last one, the Armstrong team has played two of the best teams in the division, Kilkenny and Phibsboro. Kilkenny was a bit of an ugly result:

Tim and James doing well being the high points on a bad day.

However we rebounded excellently with a great win against Phibsboro:

On boards 7 and 8, Jack and John were making debuts on the Armstrong team and both overcame rating gaps in great wins. On board 1 John played his usual everything-under-control game and finished with a nice combination to win the queen. Hugely satisfying result.

The Ennis team are going to have a tough second half to the season. Laurence and Anastasia finished their Erasmus so we're a couple of players down there already. On top of that they're in a relegation place at the moment too. But we're always optimistic here, they won their last game 5-1 (!) against Wicklow who are probably in more danger of going down. This should take them out of the bottom two and there's a great chance of a few more good results like that.

Finally, probable blitz tournament in a couple of weeks at the club, keep an eye on the blog for news.

See you at the club,
Stephen

Bits and Bobs

I didn't put up the result from the Elm Mount game, so I'll do that now. 7-1 is not a nice scoreline to be on the end of, here's the scorecard:

We also held a blitz last night. The bad weather may have been the reason for the low turnout, but it was still good fun. Results of the round robin were as follows:

Look out for the LCU Christmas Blitz coming up in a couple of weeks, you can find details on the ICU website and I'll mention it on here again closer the time.

Next post will probably be after the big Kilkenny match, hopefully we'll have some good news.

Stephen

Tournament Tomorrow

We'll be having a blitz tournament tomorrow to get in practice for the upcoming Leinster Chess Union Christmas Blitz in a couple of weeks. Come down if you fancy sharpening up, it's always good fun :)
See you then,
Stephen

Looking to Improve?

Tactics tactics tactics. That's all you need. If you get your tactical sharpness up, you spot opportunities to go for the kill a lot quicker, and patterns that crop up time and again on the board will become easy to see. Chess Emrald is a particularly good site for training yourself in tactics. You create an account so it can track your progess with a rating, then you do a few problems. It quickly gets to understand your standard, and so gives you problems that will just about challenge you. You really do notice your standard getting better and I really can't overstate how handy the site is.

Here's one to get you started, it's a little tricky ;) White to play and checkmate in 2 moves:

Also, club night tomorrow night at 7 as usual. Check the sidebar ==> for directions.
See you there,
Stephen.