NY Times Chess and NY Times Bridge? Rara Avis, Indeed!

Double Gaming: Chess and Bridge

How many chess players were in the New York Times Bridge column by Alan Truscott and also the Chess column by Robert Byrne? Well, I was. But I thought I had lost this ancient newsprint hardcopy! Mirabile dictu, it is found! Found, I tell you! I am not particularly good at bridge but at some point I managed to do a “squeeze” (think of chess zugzwang) and there it went into the Times! Here is the 1980 bridge hand clipping. Click to display it enlarged.

I appear in Alan Truscott’s New York Times bridge column, 1980.

As for the chess, to complete the 1980 double-header, remember I had defeated Dzindzi in an upset at the Chicago Open 1979. Well in 1980 he got his revenge. At the World Open, I won his queen but allowed obvious monster compensation, losing to give the big bear sweet revenge. Here is Robert Byrne’s September 1980 report!   Click to enlarge.

World Open 1980: The Big Bear Gains Sweet Revenge

I am also going to shock the chess world with a young Ken Regan (and me) posing for a photo op in a Princeton University chess team story, circa 1979. There’s something very special about 70’s hair. Click a few times for best enlargement.

Ginsburg and Regan 4/9/80. Nice hair.

This clipping was from the “Daily Princetonian” 4/9/80 – it was a complete miracle that I graduated from this esteemed institution (rated #1 undergrad again in 2008, hurrah) in June 1980.

The National Chess League!

Feast your eyes on a news clipping describing Washington DC vs Berkeley in the 1978 (!) National Chess League; an inter-city league where the games were contested by telephone and “runners” relayed the moves (often times, games had to be partially retracted due to misheard relays). Click to enlarge. For more on my game vs. Christiansen (referenced in the post), see this entry. In the clipping, the reporter amusingly refers to Eugene Meyer as Gene Myer. Note that Berkeley’s Kaplan in the clipping report was stated to have only one minute to make 20 moves. This was pre-digital clocks! Nevertheless, the feat was not so incredible because between moves, even in mutual time trouble, minutes elapsed due to the byzantine runner system!

Berkeley Riot wins the 1978 National Chess League! (Click to enlarge)

If you don’t understand the team name “Washington Plumbers”, you may not be old enough to remember Nixon and the Watergate incident of 1974. Berkeley “Riot” was also amusing, bringing to mind the famous student protests of the 60s.

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The Fabulous 70s: 3 Chess People and a Beautiful Woman … Plus, Petrosian Tidbits

4 Peeps Hangin’ Out in 1976

Upper left: Louis D. Statham, the famous patron of the Lone Pine super-Swisses. Upper right: ex-WC Tigran Petrosian, winner of Lone Pine 1976 (the 6th LP incarnation). Bottom left: OK it’s not a beautiful woman. That title was simply meant to trick you to this site. It’s British GM Tony Miles, co-winner of the 1976 National Open in Las Vegas. Bottom right: the other co-winner, future IM Ed Formanek. Carl Budd took both photographs.

Tigran Petrosian Tidbits

We learn some interesting tidbits from Petrosian’s interview in this issue (interview conducted by stalwart USCF official Ed Edmondson – he had a cool name).

1. Tigran Vartanovich Petrosian Factoid #1: He was born in Tbilisi, Georgia, but was 100% Armenian.
2. Tigran’s dad was a refugee from Turkey.
3. Tigran left Georgia when he was 17.
4. Tigran journeyed 160 miles to Yerevan, Armenia.
5. Before she got married to Tigran, Rona was an English teacher.
6. Tigran had two sons, Mikhail and Vartan.
7. Petrosian also enjoyed checkers, cards, and an Armenian backgammon variant called Nardy. He also played ping ping and billiards.
8. He liked to watch ice hockey and soccer.
9. He was a supporter of club “Spartak” and played first board for Spartak chess team.
10. His main hobby was philately (stamp collecting) MG Note: just as it is Anatoly Karpov’s! He liked to collect art stamps and chess stamps.
11. He used to attend the opera regularly.
12. He was awarded the honorary Master of Sport title [MG: relatively late?!] in 1960.
13. He was chief editor of “64” chess magazine when this interview was conducted in 1976.
14. If he won a prize abroad, he could keep some of it and give some of it back to the state (the USSR).
15. He was impressed by young Seirawan at Lone Pine 1976. Apparently young Yasser managed to beat Tigran in a friendly skittles game (one of several they played) although Tigran pointed out “I was not serious, I was having fun.” MG Note: You wouldn’t see Fischer very light-hearted after a skittles loss.
16. He reiterates his belief that “… in chess there is nothing accidental. I believe only in logical, correct play.”
17. On Fischer: “[he] tries to make the opponent play something other than the best move, than he – in turn – does make the best move.”
18. “Everything in chess is rather wooden – wooden pieces, wooden problems, wooden decisions.”
19. Petrosian in 1976 rated Ljubojevic’s chances of becoming a world championship contender as higher than Mecking’s, although both GMs were at that time young superstars. He also mentioned Ulf Andersson and he stated “I hope he will awaken one day.” (!)

Readers will enjoy this mind-blowing Petrosian victory over former World Champ Garry Kasparov.

I also learned from Wikipedia that Petrosian received a PhD in 1968 from Yerevan State University (is this something like Georgia State University?) on the topic of “Chess Logic.” Write what you know about!

So Many Tigran Petrosians

There’s a modern-day (young) GM Tigran Petrosian, apparently unrelated to the WC unless somebody knows differently?.  But did you know there’s a third Tigran Petrosian running around, quite literally – a professional soccer player!

More Lone Pine: Not for the Faint of Heart

On the principle you can’t get enough Lone Pine photos, here I am playing GM Lev Alburt at Lone Pine 1980 with Steve Odendahl (nice hair!) in the back. Lev, who had only recently defected to the USA, had cool Soviet-style slightly tinted dark glasses that he wore indoors.

Postscript: Princeton Graduation Drama in 1980

Since the above Lone Pine photo was from March 1980 I only had 2 more months ahead of me of the undergraduate life at Princeton. Woo-hoo! But there was drama. I overslept a required final in Genetics administered by the non-too-happy Professor Tom Cline (we called him Tom Clone). I was able to get a re-test supervised by a proctor in some administrative building a few days later. Guess what, I overslept again. I was 75 minutes late for a 2 1/2 hour exam. I wound up getting 43 points out of a maximum of 200. On one essay, the grader drew a red diagonal line through my babble and simply wrote “Sorry”, awarding me a 0 out of 50 on that question (involving an asteroid that crashed to Earth with some genetic samples; I had no idea what the question was talking about). After this debacle, Prof. Cline called me into the office. “This exam”, he exclaimed, waving it around, “is not just an F. It’s a K or an L. But I’m not going to fail you, I don’t want to see you on campus next term. So I’m giving you a D minus. Now get out.”

Amusing Post-Postscript

Ian Rogers has popped up on the blogosphere. But it’s not the Grandmaster. Instead, we apparently have a media baron who recently departed the ‘troubled’ Yahoo company.

Pictures

In the beginning there was a passport. Notice the funky Belgian and Dutch addenda.

Moving ahead a few decades, the US Open in Fort Lauderdale, FL 2005:

GM Susan Polgar (left), I’m on the right.

This was the first time, I think, that Susan ran the girls’ event and distributed those cute crowns. Gabby Kay (center) played, but opted for some reason not to wear her crown in this shot. Here’s a second photo from the same event, a breakfast candid scene.

The Fabulous 80s: Lugano, Switzerland

Nobody can say this site doesn’t have cool photos. Let’s go back to 1984, the Open tournament in the beautiful Swiss-Italian (Tyrolian) Alps town of Lugano, for this classic.

The hoodie guy with his back to the camera is indefatigable, indomitable IM Jay Whitehead. Of course the person he is analyzing with is the one and only GM Viktor Korchnoi. But look at the all-star kibitzers! Ex-World Champ Boris Spassky is seated next to Korchnoi. GM Florin Gheorghiu is standing next to Spassky. Sergey Kudrin is standing between Spassky and Korchnoi. I don’t know who the two fellows behind Kudrin and Gheorghiu are.  The photo is by French photographer Catherine Jaeg. Quite a nice shot, don’t you think?

Why was I playing in this pretty, exotic but rather expensive locale? Because Jay had won enough money for both of us to go with an incredible backgammon streak one evening in New York City. He had gone downtown from our crash pad in Washington Heights and he took a big win away from a Jazz Club owner (I think a famous club, such as Kenny’s Castaways or The Village Gate).  As a spiritual footnote, he had previously informed me that his Hare Krishna temple had given him permission to gamble (his other moniker was Jaya Krishna). When he got back, he woke me up to count the 50’s and 100’s bulging out of every one of his pockets. We were on a flight to Milan, Italy only two days later. So we get to Milan. We transfer to a train that will take us from Italy across Lake Como and on into Switzerland. On this train, I meet a panicky Malcolm Pein in the club car. “Mark, there is the most dreadful fellow on this train!” I asked why and he said “he is going on and on about vegetarian food options in Lugano!” I knew right away this was my patron saint, Jay. Malcolm was feeling probably a wee bit put upon but, amusingly, there were decent vegetarian options in meat-crazed Switzerland. Once we got to Lugano, there were a whole bunch of Brits. Glenn Flear, and many more. They had an economy cottage rental and bought enough groceries for the week – very clever. I was rooming with John Fedorowicz. One day we had a surprise visitor: Spassky. More on this later.

Watch this space for some good Lugano 1984 games, including a win over Dutch blabbermouth Erik Knoppert.  It’s too bad they discontinued this classic annual Open.

2 Strange Pictures and a Chess Openings Tidbit

It’s almost Halloween.

Here are the eerie Sky Eyes of Bryce Canyon, Utah.  I took this shocking photograph on October 12, 2004.  There are absolutely no chess events at or near Bryce Canyon and there haven’t been since the beginning of time.

And here is what happens when the author ignores the warning “Do Not Put Face in Push-Pin Exhibit.”  But the exhibit is crying out for a face mold!  A bunch of push pins, what does the curator expect?  Thus the author’s face mold as of October 19, 2007.  What’s the technical term, a bas-relief?  Or an intaglio?  There has to be some technical term here.

Readers are probably weary of these photos already and what we do to break up the photo monotony is to present a small Openings tidbit.

French Defense Tidbit

Here it is.   As Black, if you like the French, and someone plays like this in the Exchange French:

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. exd5 exd5 4. c4

The correct move isn’t so easy to spot.  It is (drum roll) the counter-intuitive 4…Nc6! and white cannot easily defend the center.   Black gains easy equality, and sometimes even an edge, in all lines.  So remember this move and don’t play the weaker 4….Bb4+?! or 4…c6?!. I know what you are thinking: this variation hardly ever happens. But it does! French defense aficionado Simone Sobel didn’t know 4…Nc6 and played the inferior 4…Bb4+ and lost a game in a Florida Swiss. I had to tell her after the game in the midst of her angst and woe about this 4…Nc6! trick and I can only hope she remembers it for “the next time.”  By the way, I have a suspicion (but cannot prove) that this trick originated from IM Michael Brooks. At the very least, he communicated it to others. But where did it originate? That is a question for chess openings paleontology.

The Fabulous 80s: Washington Heights, NYC and Belgium and a tiny little bit of WO

For most of the 1980s, I lived on W 170th St. and Fort Washington Avenue in Washington Heights, Upper Manhattan. Senior Master Jeremy Barth was one of my roommates. At one time or another, John Fedorowicz, Michael Rohde, and others also stayed there. This heavily Dominican neighborhood saw many the odd chess player stay in our sprawling 3-bedroom: for example, Vince McCambridge, Pia Cramling, Ralf Lau, and Eric Lobron. The historical reason for this neighborhood choice was that at one time, I attended Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons (to be distinguished from Columbia’s main campus at 116th and Broadway).

Here are some action pictures from the era.

This happens to be Hanna Moishezon (daughter of the famous Columbia U. mathematics professor Boris Moishezon), me with Petey Pie the cat, and Jeremy. That Radcliffe sweatshirt is too small! Boris had his own geometric space(!), and was a specialist in the abstruse field of Algebraic Geometry. I would estimate this photo as somewhere in the 1985-8 range.

Moving back to August 1983 (fortunately some photos are labeled!), we have me battling Natasha Christiansen in a blitz game (back then she was Natasha Us) with a really old-fashioned Garde chess clock. In fact, the tint of the photo suggests the 19th century. I like my moustache. Is that wrong??

I don’t remember how the actual game went.

Belgium

Here’s a good one. We have Vreele Goethals, British future-GM David Norwood, me, and seated we have IM Roman Tomaszewski from Poland. On the right is Vreele’s mother, Mia Goethals. I think this was taken in August 1985 in the ECI Youth open tournament at Eeklo, Belgium (not far from Sas van Gent, Holland, site of the tournament in alternating years). It also had a parallel IM round robin tournament. Roman and I were in that – I beat him in a crazy Nimzo 4. Qc2 game where I was one of the early experimenters with a strange gambit as black; namely 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. Qc2 c5 5. dxc5 Na6 6. a3 Bxc3+ 7. Qxc3 Nxc5 8. b4 Na4!? 9. Qb3 b5!?; I will dig that game score up and post it.  Future GM Mr. Norwood had an unfortunate encounter with a soccer ball in the off-day whilst attempting a header.

World Open, Philadelphia

Things always come back to the World Open. Here is the July 1986 incarnation at the now-defunct Adam Mark Hotel Players Bar with IM Leonid Bass (left), Linda Carrubba, Michael Wilder (standing) and Joel Benjamin. Good old Leonid moved to Spain (I think, or maybe it was France) at some point in the 1990s. Never saw him again!

We culminate with a 1981 antique – just a photo edit experiment.

I include it mostly for the historical hairstyle.

Fabulous 90s: More Photos

Let’s start off with young Jorge Zamora (now Sammour-Hasbun). I believe this was Needham, MA 1992 – I am in the foreground playing Jorge a skittles game – photograph by Chris Bernstein.

Moving right along, here are two Ivanovs. Alexander Ivanov and the dearly departed Igor Ivanov – I would guess it’s the World Open in some year in the 1990s. Of course it might be the 1980s. 🙂

And now we have GM Jaan Ehlvest with a sharp plaid jacket! Photo by Bill Hook. The site and year are unknown as of this writing.

And now we have a photo with an official caption (bestowed by the photographer, Chris Bernstein): “The Mystical Hertan.” Photo year: 1992.

I believe this photo was probably taken at the Needham, MA tournament. Yes, it’s FM Charlie Hertan! He recently wrote an article in Chess Life magazine about the mysteriously disappeared and presumed dead junior talent Peter Winston. I might “retaliate” someday with a memorial to the known deceased Billy Adam (a junior talent from Syracuse, NY). Billy’s incredibly short, meteoric life was from 1963 to only 1982. He spent his last years in Stony Brook, NY. As a sidenote, I must confess for many years I thought Charlie was an IM. I was *shocked* to see his title as FM in Chess Life.

Boxing News

News update: John Fedorowicz boxed Billy Adam on W 74th Street without training helmets in 1981. John Fedorowicz boxed me a few years later on W 170th Street (with red training helmets).

News postscript: apparently in 1981, Billy Adam’s practice boxing with John Fedorowicz almost turned into a fistfight because I forgot to say “ding” (the end of the round). According to John on Oct 5, 2007, “it became a fistfight when Bill punched me in the month.” He continues, “I ended the fight with a brutal uppercut… you (this author) were laughing.” Good times. 🙂 He adds, “One of your girlfriends uppercut me as well.” I asked who, and he said “Sue”. Ah yes, my Princeton buddy! Sue Kazmaier!!! John adds, “she snapped my head back into a brick wall.” I remember our apartment on W 74 Street and we did have a brick wall, so it’s all coming back!

More Photos

OK moving on. we have the dearly departed IM Victor Frias, photographed March 1994 eating breakfast. Photographer and site unknown as of this writing.

Victor Frias was the referee in the aforementioned Fed-MG boxing match, Washington Heights, Mid 1980s. I will dig up a photo of that classic event.

For something completely different now I present an award I got in 1991 (during my graduation from NYU with an MBA in Stat/Operation Research) from Dr. W. Edwards Deming – considered a Very Important Person in quality control and, as I understand it, revered by the Japanese.  To wit: “The Deming prize was instituted by the Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers and is awarded each year in Japan to a statistician for contributions to statistical theory.  The Deming prize for application is awarded to a company for improved use of statistical theory in organization, consumer research, design of product and production. “

Dr. Deming was 90 years old when I got the award in May of 1991!   The typo in my handwritten last name did not bother me. 

Dr. Deming passed away a few years after (20 December 1993) I received this accolate. 

An award from Dr. W. Edwards Deming, NYU, 1991.

The Fabulous 00s: The 2007 US Chess League

Last Wednesday I stumbled into the Mechanics Institute Chess Club in San Francisco and I was surprised to learn from club manager Steve Brandwein that a USCL match would occur later that day featuring Patrick Wolff, Vinay Bhat, David Pruess, and the “Kid” (Gregory Young) for SF – versus a tough Dallas Squad. I predicted it would all come down to the “Kid” versus the “Woman” (Dallas had a WFM on 4th board, Bayaraa Zorigt (2196)), but that didn’t happen. Kid vs Woman was a draw where Kid was slightly confounded in a Dragon opening as white, selected a very bad line, but Zorigt in turn blew it and could only reach a drawn ending up 2 pawns that were hopelessly blockaded.

Young (SF) – Zorigt (DAL) USCL 07

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 g6 6.Be3 Bg7 7.f3 0-0 8.Qd2 Nc6 9.Bc4 Bd710.Bb3 Rc8 11.0-0-0 Nxd4 12.Bxd4 b5 13.h4 a5 14.a4?

This move looks bad. Maybe the Kid is misremembering a line.

17…bxa4 15.Nxa4 Bxa4 16.Bxa4 Rc4! 17.Bb3 Rxd4?

17…Nxe4!, very obvious, should win with no problems for black.

18.Qxd4 Nd7 19.Qc4 Qb8 20.h5 Nc5 21.hxg6 hxg6 22.e5 Bxe5 23.Rd5 Bg724.Re1 e6 25.Rxc5 dxc5 26.f4 Rd8 27.c3 Qb7 28.Re2 Bh6 29.Bc2 Qe7 30.g3 Qd6 31.Kb1 Bg732.g4 Qd5 33.Qxd5 exd5 34.f5 g5 35.Bd3 Kf8 36.Re1 d4 37.c4 Bf6 38.Kc2 Rb8 39.Ra1 Bd840.Be4 Bc7 41.f6 Rb6 42.Rxa5 Rxb2+ 43.Kxb2 Bxa5 44.Kb3 Bd8 45.Ka4

Of course white could run his king to d3 too. In any case, an easy draw.

45…Bxf6 46.Kb5 Be747.Bf5 Kg7 48.Kc6 Kf6 49.Kd5 Bf8 50.Be4 Kg7 51.Bf5 Be7 52.Kc6 Bf8 53.Kd5 Be7 54.Kc6 Kf6

For some bizarre reason, black was refusing draw offers around this point.

55.Kd5 Bf8 56.Be4 Bg7 57.Bf5 Bf8 58.Be4 Be7 59.Bf5 Kg7 60.Kc6 Kg8 61.Kc7 Kf8 62.Kd7 Bf6 63.Kd6 Be7+ 64.Kd7

1/2-1/2

Pruess lost fairly quickly, making several bad blunders vs IM Stopa (onlookers clucking that he didn’t show up at all, which is a little harsh).

Stopa (DAL) – Pruess (SF)

1.Nc3 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.e4 Bg7 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nxd4 Nc6 6.Nb3 Nf6 7.Be2 0-0 8.0-0 b6?!

The simple 8…d6 followed by Na5 is more natural. There is no need for this move.

9.Bg5 Bb7 10.f4 d6 11.Bf3 Na5?

11…Nd7 or 11…h6 and 12…Nd7 are OK. The text is a major blunder.

12.Nxa5

12. e5! is exceedingly strong.

12…bxa5 13.Kh1 Qb6 14.Rb1?

Again, 14. e5! is best and very strong. Black cannot survive that hit: 14. e5 dxe5 15. fxe5 Rad8 16. Qc1 Bxf3 17. exf6! and wins.

14…Rfc8? 14…Rad8 to hold up e4-e5 is necessary (or …h6 first).

15.e5! Finally. White wins easily.

15…dxe5 16.fxe5 Rd8 17.Qe2 Nd7 18.Nd5 Bxd5 19.Bxd5 Nxe5 20.Bxa8 Rxa8 Black could have resigned already. This sort of game is doubly disappointing in a team format.

21.Bxe7 Qe6 22.Bc5 Qxa2 23.Qe4 Rc824.Bxa7 Qc4 25.Qe3 Qxc2?

A final blunder but it didn’t matter.

26.Rbc1 1-0

This left GM-elect Vinay Bhat to slog it out, up a pawn vs IM John Bartholomew (but with bishops of opposite colors). GM Alejandro Ramirez was saying on ICC it was still a draw, even after numerous Bartholomew miscues just before the first time control. However, one blunder too many occurred.

Vinay did eventually pull the game out; see John Bartholomew’s account. Vinay, although perpetually short of time, demonstrated exemplary technique to use the bishops of opposite colors’ attacking potential.

I hadn’t seen Patrick in years. Nobody knew if he was rusty! People got really nervous when he was late for the game. However, he did arrive safely about 15 minutes late and reached a dynamic Sicilian with equal chances as black. I would even say that his opponent was playing rather strangely and I slightly preferred Patrick’s game after a dozen moves. His IM opponent, Boskovic, proceeded to blunder (a blunder kibitzed by amateurs on ICC well in advance, and one I was most surprise to see on the board) and lost material due to a nice back rank trick and Patrick could have won an easy ending with 2 knights versus a rook. However, he kept queens on (not a good move in time trouble) and his opponent found a trick to win back the two knights for the rook and made a draw with no problems. This match could’ve gone San Francisco’s way if Patrick had steered to the safe ending win.

IM Boskovic (DAL) – GM Wolff (SF), USCL 07

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Bd7 4.Bxd7+ Nxd7 5.0-0 Ngf6 6.Qe2 e6 7.c4 Be7 8.Nc3 0-0 9.d4cxd4 10.Nxd4 Rc8 11.b3 a6 12.Bb2 Qa5 13.Rac1 Bd8! 14.Kh1 Bb6!

A very creative maneuver. Black is fine.

15.Rfd1 Rfd8 16.f4 Ba7 17.f5?! Bxd4 I was on the scene and fully expected the move 17…Rfe8 here not giving any squares. What can white do? Patrick’s choice is more concrete but I did not expect him to give up his beautiful bishop. The computer indeed likes 17…Rfe8 the best.

18.Rxd4 exf5 18…Ne5 is a reasonable alternative.

19.exf5 Qxf5 20.Nd5?!

Bartholomew commented here on his blog site that he loved white’s game after this weak advance. The text is a strange and bad move based on a tactical blackout; 20. Rxd6 is equal.

20…Re8! 21.Ne7+? Rxe7 22.Qxe7 Re8 23.Qxd6 Qc2!

Black should win easily after this nice shot. White’s back rank is fatally weak.

24.Rf1 Qxb2 25.Rd2 Qc3 26.h3 Nc5 27.Qd4 Qa5?

Trade the queens! Black would win slowly and surely. The text is really asking for unpleasant surprises in time trouble. Note that objectively it’s fine (black is winning anyway) – it’s just trickier.

28.Rf5 Nfe4

28…Qc7! is a crafty winning move, eyeing the back rank again.

29.Re5 Rf8 30.Rd1 Qxa2 31.Rxe4 Nxe4 32.Qxe4 Qxb3

Black is better, but now it’s not decisive – just an edge.

33.Rb1 Qc3 34.Rxb7 g6?

34….a5! is stronger. Black could still hold out for a positive result after, let’s say, 35. Ra7 Qb4.

35.Ra7 Qf6 36.c5 Kg7 37.c6 Rd8 38.Rd7 Rxd7 39.cxd7 Qd6 40.Qe8

1/2-1/2

Watch this space for the games and some photos I took of the live action.

Here was the longest game of the match.

V. Bhat (SF) – J. Bartholomew (DAL)  USCL 07

1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qa5 4.d4 c6 5.Nf3 Nf6 6.Bc4 Bf5 7.Bd2 e6 8.Nd5 Qd8 9.Nxf6+ Qxf6 10.Qe2 Bg4 11.0-0-0 Nd7 12.d5 Bxf3 13.gxf3 cxd5 14.Bxd5 0-0-0 15.Be4 Qe5 16.Bc3 Qc7 17.Kb1 f6 18.Rhg1 Nc5 19.Rxd8+ Kxd8 20.Bd4 Bd6 21.Bxc5 Bxc5 22.Qc4 Kc8 23.b4 Bd6 24.Qxc7+ Bxc7 25.Rxg7 f5 26.Bd3 Bxh2 27.Bc4 Be5 28.Bxe6+ Kb8 29.Rf7 f4 30.Rf5 Bd6 31.a3 h5 32.Rd5 Bc7 33.Kb2 Re8?? 34.Rxh5!

The same back rank trick that should have victimized Boskovic in the Wolff game. Bhat now reels the point home very convincingly.

a5 35.Bc4 axb4 36.axb4 Re5 37.Rh8+ Ka7 38.Rh7 Bd6 39.c3 Re7 40.Rh5 Re5 41.Rh7 Re7 42.Rh5 Re5 43.Rh6 Bc7 44.Bd3 Rd5 45.Be4 Rd7 46.c4 Rd4 47.Bd5 Rd2+ 48.Kb3 Rd1 49.Rh7 Kb8 50.Rh8+ Ka7 51.Rh7 Kb8 52.Be4 Rd8 53.c5 Kc8 54.Bf5+ Kb8 55.Be4 Kc8 56.Kc4 Rf8 57.Bd5 Rd8 58.Be6+ Kb8 59.Bd5 Kc8 60.b5 b6 61.Rh6 bxc5 62.b6 Bd6 63.Bc6 Be5 64.Rh7 Rh8 65.Rf7 Bd6 66.Bb7+ Kb8 67.Bd5 Kc8 68.Be6+ Kb8 69.Kd5 Rd8 70.Kc6 Be5 71.Rb7+ Ka8 72.Ra7+ Kb8 73.Kb5 c4 74.Bd7 c3 75.Bc6 Kc8 76.Be4 Rf8 77.Ra8+ Bb8 78.Ra3 Be5 79.Kc6 Rf6+ 80.Kd5 Bd6 81.Rxc3+ Kb7 82.Rc6 Black resigns 1-0

It was a very interesting match indeed.

The Fabulous 1970s – Some Photos

I found some more 1970s photos!  If you can’t get enough of this, there are more here. 

First, from May 1973!  (I only started playing in tournaments in September 1972). Click several times to get it enlarged enough to read.

This amusing clipping from the May 1973 Washington Post mentions a very young NM Mark Diesen (and his father Carl) as well as me (JHS winner of a Metro Area HS Champ). Of course they misspelled my name and my school (Pyle not Pile). But still, it’s funny to see these old things. For example, it talks about the 2nd place US Amateur Team local (local to DC/Md./Va.) squad (in those days, there was only the East Team, not the other regions) consisting of Richard Delaune (he came an IM before sadly passing away at age 47), bridge- and backgammon-player Kent Goulding (Kent wrote a famous treatise on backgammon), bridge player David Hoffner and future World Junior Chesss Champ Mark Diesen.

Jumping ahead to 1975, here is a promising hopeful’s senior high school picture.

Thankfully leaving 1975 behind, in 1977 there was some norm activity in the USA and some really nostalgic photographs.

Here are Andy Soltis (left) and Ken Regan; photo by Nigel Eddis. Click to enlarge.

Trivia fact: only Michael Rohde and Larry Christiansen won the National High School while still in Junior High School, according to this report. Is that still true today? I think so…

The only thing I knew about Andy Soltis was that he liked to keep score in descriptive notation. Although I was quite active in New York City in the 1980s, I never saw him play there (he was a journalist for the NY Post). Two ships passing in the night. The only time I did notice him playing, he had a horrible reverse losing a piece in the opening , trying a Dragon against Joe Gallagher in Lloyds Bank London 1990. London was the same city where GM Larry Evans miserably failed in a comeback bid. There might be a moral here.

Here is the famous April 1977 Chess Life cover excerpt with Michael Rohde; photograph also by Nigel Eddis who deserved some kind of journalism prize for this uncompromising candid shot. It is hard to believe, but only a year and a quarter later I was playing Michael in the US Junior ‘Closed’ [Invitational] in Memphis, TN with my own rating being 2339, although at this stage in my development 4/1977, according to my Chess Life magazine label, I was only rated 2157.

Photos Throughout the Ages

Let’s try some Chess PhotoMosaics(TM).

Upper left: GM Lars Bo Hansen, Berlin 1989 (or Naestved 1988, waiting confirmation). Bottom left: Steve Odendahl (left) playing the author in blitz, Mike Wilder observing; probably and almost certainly the Pan-Am Intercollegiates, NYC, 1981. Right: a strange tableau – John Fedorowicz with beachball. Probably sometime in the 1990s, probably NYC. Click to enlarge.

One more:

Upper left: Jeremy Barth (left on phone) and Mark Ginsburg in an action shot, running Chess Nexus, Inc., Upper Manhattan 170th St and Fort Washington Ave., circa 1985. Bottom left: GM Eric Lobron (left) playing Mikhail Braude, year/loc  NY? World Open? Photographer: Bill Hook. Upper right: from l. to r., John Fedorowicz, Andrei Sokolov, and Alexander Ivanov, probably St. Maarten, 1993? Lower right, Mark Ginsburg and Paige Stockley, New Year’s Eve, Schroeder’s, San Francisco, CA 1999. Click to enlarge.