Maybe I actually am getting better at chess. Or maybe the following game, or at least the end of it, is particularly easy to understand.
Near the front of every issue of Chess Informant is a list of the best games of the previous issue as voted upon by several particularly distinguished Grandmasters. Yesterday I noticed that I actually had 2 consecutive issues here, 19 and 20, so that I could look at some of 19's best games as announced in 20. Chess Informant 20 has the list of the 10 best games in 19, as elected by some of the leading lights of the chess world in 1976: Dr Euwe, Averbakh, Barcza, Dr Filip, Geller, Kotov, Pirc, Polugayevsky and Schmidt. Their 1st choice is a rather long game, and it has no illustration in no 19, but their 2nd choice, Vaganian -- Planinc, Hastings 1975, game 533 in Chess Informant 19, is just 22 moves long and the position after White's 19th move is illustrated. In Chess Informant 19 it has analysis by Vaganian, who lost. Of Vaganian's analysis, I have given here only his evaluation of several moves: he gives a ?!, meaning "a dubious move," to his own 6th and 12th moves; a ?, meaning "a mistake," to his 13th move; and a !!, meaning "an excellent move," to Planinc's 19th and 22th moves, the latter of which persuaded Vaganian to retire. I have not given Vaganian's analyses of alternate lines because I have nothing intelligent to say about them. Maybe I would if I dropped everything for several days and did nothing except study this game. Or maybe I wouldn't.
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. Nf3 cd4 4. Nd4 e6 5. Nc3 Bb4 6. Ndb5?! O-O 7. a3 Bc3 8. Nc3 d5 9. Bg5 h6 10. Bf6 Qf6 11. cd5 ed5 12. Qd5?! Rd8 13. Qf3? Qb6! 14. Rd1 Rd1 15. Nd1 Nc6 16. Qe3 Nd4 17. Qe8 Kh7 18. e3 Nc2 19. Kd2!! Bf5 20. Qa8 Qd6 21. Kc1 Na1 22. Qb7 Qc7!! (White resigns.)
Most of the analyses of chess games I've seen, apart from drawn games, have been either by the winner or by a 3rd party. It's impressive when someone analyzes a game they've lost, as Vaganian does here, because there's a strong tendency to want to forget a loss rather then overcome one's ego and learn from it. Analyzing a game one has won is also often quite egotistical: "Look how smart I am, look how I crushed this chump!"
Far from understanding all of the moves in Grandmaster games, it usually takes me more than one try just to follow all of the moves correctly, reading them and moving the pieces on a board. (And just reading the moves and seeing an entire game in my head? I don't think that's ever going to happen for me.) I looked at this game on an analysis board at lichess.org. This has a great advantage, for me, over a conventional chess set: when I move the pieces on the analysis board, the website writes out the moves for me, and this makes it much easier -- for me, at least -- to check what I'm reading against the moves I'm making and make sure I'm making the written moves.
I tried to move the pieces for this game on an analysis board last night, but I think I may've gotten the 22nd moves wrong. This morning I finally got all of the moves right.
And then, after looking at the final position for a couple of minutes, an amazing thing happened: I understood why White resigned! If he didn't take Black's Queen, instead moving his King out of check, Black would take the White Queen; but if he did take Black's Queen, then Black would move 23. [...] Nb3, checkmate.
This is still very, very far from understanding the entire game. For example, I don't understand why White was unable to develop many of his pieces, so that his white Bishop, King's Rook and f-, g-, and h-Pawns were never moved, and were all just about completely useless to him at the end of the game. (Assuming that I'm correct in judging that they were useless to him.) There must have been some threat which was too urgent to allow White to develop the pieces on his King's side. What that threat was, I don't know. Maybe the answer is somewhere in those alternate lines. Who knows? Not me, that's who. Not yet. I would compare my achievement here to watching an NBA player on video in slow motion, making a basket, and after watching it in slow motion 5 or 6 times, you notice the head fake which threw the defensive player off. That might be a great breakthrough for you as an observer of basketball, but it doesn't mean you're ready to try out for the NBA.
I apologize for not being able to show you the final board, or even, for my readers whose 1st chess language is not English, to list the moves with the little pictures of the pieces instead of their English abbreviations. But if you google vaganian planinc hastings 1975, you can find a number of websites which show the entire game move by move. If I right-click on the final board on those sites, and choose "save image as," all I've saved is a tiny black square. The struggle continues, the struggle to understand chess, and to understand IT and to understand other things.
Showing posts with label chess informant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chess informant. Show all posts
Saturday, April 8, 2017
Friday, April 7, 2017
Chess Informant
I have a few issues of Chess Informant, a periodical published in Belgrad, which is constructed like a large-format paperback book -- a rather high-quality book, or at least it was as recently as 1995, when Chess Informant 65 was published, the most recent issue I have. In 1995 the pages were still sewn together in signatures, instead of just glued to the spine, which is far more common for paperbacks, and cheaper, and much less sturdy. I have not heard anything about the quality of construction decreasing since the 1990's. Chess Informant 1 was published in 1966. At first 2 issues a year were published, then 3, and now they're publishing 4 issues a year.
(Yes, the name Chess Informant is somewhat comical, and was even stranger to English-speaking ears coming from the Soviet bloc back during the Cold War. I have no doubt that it unnecessarily raised the blood pressure of more than one FBI agent who was not familiar with the world of chess. A better translation would no doubt have been something like Chess Information. But it's far and away the most prominent publication of its type, and the name has stuck. They're not going to change the English translation now.)
What it is, is a collection of those of the most recent top-level Grandmaster chess games which the editors have deemed to be the best. These are presented with commentary, sometimes by one of the game's players, sometimes by some other Grandmaster. The games and the commentary are all presented without words: The editors of Chess Informant were among the first to devise non-lingual signs for chess pieces, moves, and evaluation by commentators. Near the front of each volume all of these signs are explained in various languages. They're all easily understandable, even to someone like me. The number of languages has increased as time has gone by. Until recently, the name of the periodical has appeared in each one of those languages on the cover. I haven't been able to find a picture of the very first Chess Informant. But I believe this is Chess Informant 2,
and it is presented in 6 languages. The name of publication in the editors' native Serbo-Croation is in large white letters running vertically from the bottom to the top; and to the left of that, the title is translated in smaller script into Russian, English, German, French and Spanish. In the 10th issue, published in 1971, Italian and Swedish were added. Chinese was added in the 23rd issue in 1977, and the 25th issue, from 1978, has the same assortment of languages. I can't see numbers 26 through 37, but number 38 from 1984 has Arabic. The 125th issue, from 2015, is the newest one I've been able to see a photo of which still lists all the languages on the cover in this manner, and it still has the same languages as #38 in 1984: Serbo-Croation, Russian, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Swedish, Chinese and Arabic. Not a bad international reach. Here's Chess Informant 95 from 2005, displaying those 10 languages on its cover:
And all of the chess in all of the volumes is at a level far above my head. I've studied 1 of these games, game 120 from Chess Informant 20, Kovács L -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, going through all of the moves and all of commentary over and over, and I don't understand what happened. It's a short game, checkmate by Black on the 26th move, and there's a diagram of the position after White's 22nd move. Both the shortness and the diagram encouraged me to choose this game to study. I'm convinced by now that I have moved all the pieces as recorded. But I'm not sure about very much at all beyond that. As usual, much of the commentary explains what would've happened if different moves had been made at this or that point. But there is no commentary at several points where I cannot understand why the game's moves were made. Presumably, when there is no commentary, the commentator assumes that it is obvious to the reader why the game move was made. (Not that the existing commentary leaves me unmystified.)
Anyway, that's 1 game out of 724 games in Chess Informant 20. Chess Informant passed 100,000 games presented some years ago, and I think it's safe to say that I would not be able even remotely understand a single one of them.
PS, 8 April 2017: Finally found a picture of the very first issue of Chess Informant!
(Yes, the name Chess Informant is somewhat comical, and was even stranger to English-speaking ears coming from the Soviet bloc back during the Cold War. I have no doubt that it unnecessarily raised the blood pressure of more than one FBI agent who was not familiar with the world of chess. A better translation would no doubt have been something like Chess Information. But it's far and away the most prominent publication of its type, and the name has stuck. They're not going to change the English translation now.)
What it is, is a collection of those of the most recent top-level Grandmaster chess games which the editors have deemed to be the best. These are presented with commentary, sometimes by one of the game's players, sometimes by some other Grandmaster. The games and the commentary are all presented without words: The editors of Chess Informant were among the first to devise non-lingual signs for chess pieces, moves, and evaluation by commentators. Near the front of each volume all of these signs are explained in various languages. They're all easily understandable, even to someone like me. The number of languages has increased as time has gone by. Until recently, the name of the periodical has appeared in each one of those languages on the cover. I haven't been able to find a picture of the very first Chess Informant. But I believe this is Chess Informant 2,
and it is presented in 6 languages. The name of publication in the editors' native Serbo-Croation is in large white letters running vertically from the bottom to the top; and to the left of that, the title is translated in smaller script into Russian, English, German, French and Spanish. In the 10th issue, published in 1971, Italian and Swedish were added. Chinese was added in the 23rd issue in 1977, and the 25th issue, from 1978, has the same assortment of languages. I can't see numbers 26 through 37, but number 38 from 1984 has Arabic. The 125th issue, from 2015, is the newest one I've been able to see a photo of which still lists all the languages on the cover in this manner, and it still has the same languages as #38 in 1984: Serbo-Croation, Russian, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Swedish, Chinese and Arabic. Not a bad international reach. Here's Chess Informant 95 from 2005, displaying those 10 languages on its cover:
And all of the chess in all of the volumes is at a level far above my head. I've studied 1 of these games, game 120 from Chess Informant 20, Kovács L -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, going through all of the moves and all of commentary over and over, and I don't understand what happened. It's a short game, checkmate by Black on the 26th move, and there's a diagram of the position after White's 22nd move. Both the shortness and the diagram encouraged me to choose this game to study. I'm convinced by now that I have moved all the pieces as recorded. But I'm not sure about very much at all beyond that. As usual, much of the commentary explains what would've happened if different moves had been made at this or that point. But there is no commentary at several points where I cannot understand why the game's moves were made. Presumably, when there is no commentary, the commentator assumes that it is obvious to the reader why the game move was made. (Not that the existing commentary leaves me unmystified.)
Anyway, that's 1 game out of 724 games in Chess Informant 20. Chess Informant passed 100,000 games presented some years ago, and I think it's safe to say that I would not be able even remotely understand a single one of them.
PS, 8 April 2017: Finally found a picture of the very first issue of Chess Informant!
Saturday, October 10, 2015
Chess Log: Did I Play A Good Game?
As I have repeatedly assured the readers of this blog, really good chess players, pros, are so much better than I am that I really don't know what they're doing.
Games of the Grandmasters are freely distributed for the public to see, and I've studied some of those games. Can't say I've really understood those games. I'm constantly thinking: why that move and not this one?! And these are annotated games, with notes either by one of the participants or by some other Grandmaster, notes explaining why this move and not that, and I'm talking about being puzzled by moves which are so obvious -- TO GRANDMASTERS -- that it hasn't occurred to the one making notes that someone somewhere might not understand the rationale behind them.
There is one partial exception to this incomprehension of mine: one game which I have been studying and studying and studying, to see whether it's just a matter of time before I understand why those moves were chosen. I've spent far more time looking at this game than any other world-class game, just to see if I can understand it. I feel that I now VAGUELY understand PARTS of this one Grandmaster game. One of 110,000 or 120,000 games published and analyzed in Chess Informant since 1966.
It's game 120 in volume 20 of Chess Informant, Kovács -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, with notes by Benkő. I chose it in part because it's one of the games in that volume which comes with a diagram, so that partway through the game I could check to make sure I'd moved the pieces correctly until then.
(Yes, "Chess Informant" sounds strange, sort of like "Chess Snitch," but that's the the way the publishers of "Šahovski Informator" in Belgrade printed the periodical's title in English on the cover when they started in the mid-60's, along with translations of the title into Russian, German, French, Spanish, Italian and Swedish, and it's still published today and it's one of the world's most highly-regarded chess publications, and its name is translated into even more languages on the cover now. It pioneered a universal, language-free system of chess notation, and everyone in the English-speaking chess world has gotten used to calling it "Chess Informant," even though "Chess Information" might've been more of a spot-on translation. Hey, their English has always been much better than my Serbo-Croatian.)
All of that by way of introduction to this game, a 5-0 blitz, which I played today, playing Black, and won, against a player rated much higher than I:
1. e4 c5 2. ♘c3 d6 3. g3 ♘c6 4. ♗g2 e5 5. d3 h6 6. f4 exf4 7. ♗xf4 ♘f6 8. ♘ge2 ♗g4 9. h3 ♗xe2 10. ♘xe2 ♕a5 11. ♘c3 ♗e7 12. O-O O-O 13. ♕d2 ♕b6 14. b3 ♘d4 15. a4 a5 16. ♗e3 ♘h7 17. ♗xd4 cxd4 18. ♘b5 ♗g5 19. ♕e2 ♗e3 20. ♔h2 ♘f6 21. ♖f5 ♖fc8 22. ♘a3 ♖c5 23. ♖f3 ♕b4 24. ♘c4 b5 25. ♘xd6 bxa4 26. ♖xa4 ♕d2 27. ♕xd2 ♗xd2 28. ♘c4 ♗c3 29. ♖f1 ♘d7 30. ♖f2 ♘e5 31. ♘b6 ♖a6 32. ♘d5 f6 33. h4 ♘g4 34. ♔g1 ♘xf2 35. ♔xf2 ♗d2 36. ♔f3 ♗e3 37. ♖a2 a4 38. ♘xe3 dxe3 39. ♔xe3 ♖e5 40. b4 g5 41. hxg5 hxg5 42. c4 ♔f8 43. d4 ♖e7 44. d5 ♔e8 45. c5 ♔d8 46. b5 ♖a5 47. ♗f1 f5 48. ♗d3 fxe4 49. ♗xe4 ♖xb5 50. ♖xa4 ♖xc5 51. ♖a8 ♖c8 52. ♖a5 ♖c4 53. d6 ♖exe4 54. ♔d3 ♖ed4 0-1 {White resigns}
The title of this blog post is not a rhetorical question. I don't know whether I played an exceptionally good game or if my opponent played far under his or her usual level, or some of both, or what. We played online. For all I know, my opponent might have been interrupted by other things while playing game or have had to deal with some other hardship. (I hope he or she wasn't driving or something like that. DON'T CHESS AND DRIVE! IT CAN WAIT!)
Somewhere, I read a comment by a Grandmaster about weak players playing "as if they were hyptnotized" when playing someone rated much higher: that is, the weak players often play even substantially worse than they usually do. I knew right away when I read that that it applied to me, and it's one of the solid pieces of advice I've tried to keep in mind: basically, advice just to keep my head, not to panic, and to play my best regardless of my opponent's rating. Used to be, I always looked at my opponent's rating before the game began. Now, sometimes I make a point of not looking at that rating until the game is well underway.
About all I can think of to say about this game, as far as blow-by-blow commentary goes, is that White's Pawn storm beginning in the early 40's intimidated me quite a bit at first, but I told myself to be calm and still play my best game. A chess game ain't over til it's over.
Maybe if I spend many hours analyzing this game I'll understand it about as well as Kovács -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, haha.
Games of the Grandmasters are freely distributed for the public to see, and I've studied some of those games. Can't say I've really understood those games. I'm constantly thinking: why that move and not this one?! And these are annotated games, with notes either by one of the participants or by some other Grandmaster, notes explaining why this move and not that, and I'm talking about being puzzled by moves which are so obvious -- TO GRANDMASTERS -- that it hasn't occurred to the one making notes that someone somewhere might not understand the rationale behind them.
There is one partial exception to this incomprehension of mine: one game which I have been studying and studying and studying, to see whether it's just a matter of time before I understand why those moves were chosen. I've spent far more time looking at this game than any other world-class game, just to see if I can understand it. I feel that I now VAGUELY understand PARTS of this one Grandmaster game. One of 110,000 or 120,000 games published and analyzed in Chess Informant since 1966.
It's game 120 in volume 20 of Chess Informant, Kovács -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, with notes by Benkő. I chose it in part because it's one of the games in that volume which comes with a diagram, so that partway through the game I could check to make sure I'd moved the pieces correctly until then.
(Yes, "Chess Informant" sounds strange, sort of like "Chess Snitch," but that's the the way the publishers of "Šahovski Informator" in Belgrade printed the periodical's title in English on the cover when they started in the mid-60's, along with translations of the title into Russian, German, French, Spanish, Italian and Swedish, and it's still published today and it's one of the world's most highly-regarded chess publications, and its name is translated into even more languages on the cover now. It pioneered a universal, language-free system of chess notation, and everyone in the English-speaking chess world has gotten used to calling it "Chess Informant," even though "Chess Information" might've been more of a spot-on translation. Hey, their English has always been much better than my Serbo-Croatian.)
All of that by way of introduction to this game, a 5-0 blitz, which I played today, playing Black, and won, against a player rated much higher than I:
1. e4 c5 2. ♘c3 d6 3. g3 ♘c6 4. ♗g2 e5 5. d3 h6 6. f4 exf4 7. ♗xf4 ♘f6 8. ♘ge2 ♗g4 9. h3 ♗xe2 10. ♘xe2 ♕a5 11. ♘c3 ♗e7 12. O-O O-O 13. ♕d2 ♕b6 14. b3 ♘d4 15. a4 a5 16. ♗e3 ♘h7 17. ♗xd4 cxd4 18. ♘b5 ♗g5 19. ♕e2 ♗e3 20. ♔h2 ♘f6 21. ♖f5 ♖fc8 22. ♘a3 ♖c5 23. ♖f3 ♕b4 24. ♘c4 b5 25. ♘xd6 bxa4 26. ♖xa4 ♕d2 27. ♕xd2 ♗xd2 28. ♘c4 ♗c3 29. ♖f1 ♘d7 30. ♖f2 ♘e5 31. ♘b6 ♖a6 32. ♘d5 f6 33. h4 ♘g4 34. ♔g1 ♘xf2 35. ♔xf2 ♗d2 36. ♔f3 ♗e3 37. ♖a2 a4 38. ♘xe3 dxe3 39. ♔xe3 ♖e5 40. b4 g5 41. hxg5 hxg5 42. c4 ♔f8 43. d4 ♖e7 44. d5 ♔e8 45. c5 ♔d8 46. b5 ♖a5 47. ♗f1 f5 48. ♗d3 fxe4 49. ♗xe4 ♖xb5 50. ♖xa4 ♖xc5 51. ♖a8 ♖c8 52. ♖a5 ♖c4 53. d6 ♖exe4 54. ♔d3 ♖ed4 0-1 {White resigns}
The title of this blog post is not a rhetorical question. I don't know whether I played an exceptionally good game or if my opponent played far under his or her usual level, or some of both, or what. We played online. For all I know, my opponent might have been interrupted by other things while playing game or have had to deal with some other hardship. (I hope he or she wasn't driving or something like that. DON'T CHESS AND DRIVE! IT CAN WAIT!)
Somewhere, I read a comment by a Grandmaster about weak players playing "as if they were hyptnotized" when playing someone rated much higher: that is, the weak players often play even substantially worse than they usually do. I knew right away when I read that that it applied to me, and it's one of the solid pieces of advice I've tried to keep in mind: basically, advice just to keep my head, not to panic, and to play my best regardless of my opponent's rating. Used to be, I always looked at my opponent's rating before the game began. Now, sometimes I make a point of not looking at that rating until the game is well underway.
About all I can think of to say about this game, as far as blow-by-blow commentary goes, is that White's Pawn storm beginning in the early 40's intimidated me quite a bit at first, but I told myself to be calm and still play my best game. A chess game ain't over til it's over.
Maybe if I spend many hours analyzing this game I'll understand it about as well as Kovács -- Benkő, Debrecen 1975, haha.
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