European Championship 2012 - last round

Wish I could forget the last round. It was an opening disaster. We prepared a tricky Sicilian line to avoid the possible preparation of my opponent against my usual French. The only problem was that he played a different line and since I'm not familiar with Sicilian structures I blundered and lost in 10 moves. Oh my. I should have focus and play normally anyway, but I can learn from this mistake. It's a pity that it happened in the last round, but that's life. I have to try harder next time...

European Championship 2012 - 10th round

Probably I played my most interesting game today. I prepared a long line in the Modern Benoni with White but it turned out that my opponent prepared from the same book and since it was his main line, he read a bit more... actually he prepared an interesting novelty which he held back to play it later against a GM and not to reveal it now. But I will show it anyway - just for you...

It's a well know position in the Modern Benoni. Now my opponent prepared ...Ne5 f4 and f5!? with interesting complications

In a complicated middlegame I couldn't remember my preparation and I made an incorrect sacrifice instead of playing normal moves in an equal position. After some inaccuracies on my opponent's side I was still OK but in the end he consolidated his position and I was lost. Objectively the sacrifice was bad but it's still very interesting and gives Black some headache to come up with the best moves. So all in all it was an interesting game, but my opponent was better prepared and won a nice game.

Tomorrow is the last round and I will prepare some surprise...  :)

European Championship 2012 - 9th round

After some players retired from the competition there was an odd number of players remaining and I was not paired in the 9th round, so I had another day off. I spent the time with preparation for my remaining two White games, and I also used the time to have a new haircut just for fun. And here I have to stress something: PEOPLE IN PLOVDIV DON’T SPEAK ANY FOREIGN LANGUAGES.

Waitresses generally speak only the very very basic: beer, chicken, money or not even that. Sometimes asking "dark beer" is already too complicated. If we ask them something else or just want some information they don’t understand. I tried French and Serbian too but in vain. Of course neither the hairdresser spoke any languages. Then I went to a wine store and the young salesperson spoke only Bulgarian. Of course the situation was the same in Rila, but OK, that’s the countryside.

Jozsef won his first game against an Israeli player Yonatan Levine – it was a classical French Advance variation where Black was suffering a lot and blundered in the end. Today I’m paired with the same player and again he will be Black… ehh.

Preparation at home

Me preparing

The ethnographic museum in the old town

European Championship 2012 - 8th round

Today I played against IM Leon Lederman from Israel. He plays the Nc3 French and after Nf6 he continues with Bg5 the Alekhine-Chatard attack. To avoid playing his favourite line I prepared 3... h6 which should be good enough for a draw and it might annoy a player who likes this Bg5 idea. In the game I realised that I had a hole in my preparation and I suffered in the opening but somehow I managed to simplify to an equal looking endgame. Then in my effort to destroy the opponent's connected passed pawns I ran into a forced line where I had to sacrifice a rook for a knight and a pawn. The endgame was an easy loss but overall I played OK with 2-3 mistakes so I wasn't upset very much... :)

Later we went to see the Old Town

Watchdog

Old town, old car

Konstantin, Jozsef and me having dinner

Old town

Roman theater from the 2nd century in Plovdiv

European Championship 2012 - 7th round

Jozsef played his shortest game so far, unfortunately it was an easy loss as he ran into the pet line of his opponent. I got my home preparation on the board up to move eleven:

This is already OK for Black and after mass exchanges we got this on the board:

Here I chose Nb6-Bd7-Ke7 developing plan but after White's b3-a4 push I ran into problems as the further a5 push looked unpleasant. In the complications afterwards I lost a pawn and it wasn't a typical drawn rook endgame so I resigned after the time control.
The better plan would have been Nb8-Nc6 controling important squares.

After the game we had another big walk in Plovdiv:

Plovdiv (pLOVEdiv :) old town

Plovdiv hillside

Plovdiv main square

European Championship 2012 - 6th round and rest day

Jozsef made his fourth draw against stronger opponents which is already a very good result but of course he is now eager to win. In the 6th round I played my worst game so far. I had the opening advantage with White against a Dutch setup but miscalculated in a complex position and then I went down very quickly.

Vladimir Pogosian - my Armenian opponent

Jozsef against his Bulgarian opponent Stojan Lubomirov Ivanon

Maybe I was tired, I couldn't focus on the game, so it was good that we had a night in a bowling club, we did some karting and then on the free day (26 March, Monday) we went to the Rila Monastery some 200 km to the west from Plovdiv.
Now after almost 48 hours withut chess we are back to the analysing board - the second half is about to begin...

On our way to Rila

Snowcapped mountains close to Rila

Rila Monastery - on the UNSECO world heritage list

The most sacred orthodox monastery

Rila Monastery

Rila Monastery 

Life in Rila

European Championship 2012 - 5th round

VICTORY!  :)
...and actually that was an easy one. Finally I was paired with someone of my strength. In chess strength is measured by ELO points and approximately 200 points difference means one category stronger opposition. My level should be between ELO 1800 and 2000 on my better days while the world champion has 2800. My opponents were between 2000 and 2500 so far and although I didn't agree in theory I was suppose to lose those games.... :)

Victory!

Now the ice is broken and I'm back on track. Next round I play against a 2100 rated Armenian player today then in the evening there's a bowling and karting event organised for the players at www.lautakarting.bg. Monday is rest day and the 7th round will be on Tuesday.

Martinitsa tree on the main pedestrian street

European Championship 2012 - 4rd round

I will show you why and how chess can be soooo painful:

Manelidou - Pein

In this position I played Black and I was fine. My home preparation appeared on the board and I felt comfortable. White's bishop on c1 is not doing much but locks in the rook on a1 and the kingside is already weakend by the g4-g5 push. White's plan is to capture my bishop after Qh3 - that I can sacrifice for capturing  some important pawns - so I calculated a loooong line:


16. ...Ne7 17. Qh3 Bb5 18. Re1 Bxe2 19. Rxe2 Qxd4 20. Be3 Bxf2+ 21.Bxf2 Qxb2 22. Rb1 Qa2

Now it's easy to see the deadly hit, but six moves before it wasn't obvious. White only needed to calculate 1-2 moves ahead...

Bxg6!! 1-0

16... Rac8 was the way to avoid disaster. The moral of the story is that you should not calculate long lines if you cannot do that properly.  :) So again I have zero points from a good starting position. Better luck next time.

After this painful loss I went sightseeing a bit. I couldn't look at chessboards for a while...

Plovdiv center

The Maritsa river

Relaxation. Reporting back home

European Championship 2012 - 3rd round

During the tournament our daily schedule looks like this:

8:00 Waking up

9:00 Breakfast

10:00 – 14:00 Preparation. Narrowing down our choice of opening by checking the most recent MegaDatabase and analyzing the best variations with computer. Ideally I can prepare up to move 10-14

15:00 Start of the round

19:00 – 20:00 Finish of the round

20:00 Dinner

22:00 – 00:00 The pairings are available for the next round so we can have a quick look at our opponents’ games to see what we need to prepare next morning… We also check the results and most interesting games of other Hungarians and the top boards.

Me in front of Novotel Plovdiv, the venue of EICC 2012

Today I lost my game with Black against Alexander Yakimenko (2223) from Russia. My preparation for the Queen’s gambit declined varition was very good and again my home analysis appeared on the board. The first new move to me was on move eleven but that was bad so after that I even had a small advantage. Later my opponent started to push against my kingside and I started to see phantoms – he had nothing but I made mistakes in my calculations and my position has collapsed.

All in all I’m still optimistic about my play. In the first game I was always a bit worse and I had no realistic chance to score even half a points. In the second game the draw was possible and now in the third I had the better position at some point. OK, it’s still 0/3 but there are eight more rounds to go, and the most difficult opponents are in the first few rounds, so it can only get better!  J

The sensation of the day was Jozsef’s second draw against an international master, this time with the Black pieces. In a 5 hours long nerve wrecking game first he simplified to a drawn endgame then he miscalculated in time pressure but finally he managed to save the draw in a completely lost position. I couldn’t believe my eyes, neither poor IM Smirnov. Congratulations!

Jozsef saved a draw after an epic struggle

Hungarian top GM Csaba Balogh had a draw today

GM Tukmkov helps GM Mamedyarov to understand why he couldn't beat the 300 points weaker IM Filip Lucian 

European Championship 2012 - 2nd round

Before the second round I was not sure what to play. My opponent seemed to play the Slav as well as the King's Indian but today he started with d5 and then e6 so I went for a Catalan. Since I didn't prepare very deeply I ran into an unknown line and I made a few mistakes but my opponent wasn't always precise either so we had a balanced game. I was a pawn down but I controlled the a-file and e-file with my rooks. In the endgame I couldn't hold anymore and had to resign right before the time control. It was OK and tomorrow will be surely better.  :)

The sunny Plovdiv from our apartement

Jozsef made a draw against IM Batlag! Congrats!

The playing hall with my opponent FM Antal Tibor Kende on the left

Arriving to Plovdiv and the 1st round

I left Sarajevo 6 in the morning to pick up Jozsef in Belgrade before noon. Belgrade was a bit tricky because I didn’t have a map so I just memorized the location of the hotel at home. But reality is always so much different than a 2D map so it took more than 30 minutes to find the hotel and another 30 minutes to find the highway to Nis. From there on it was straight 500km to Plovdiv. 

Entering to Bulgaria

 The opening ceremony was a bit boring chesswise – folk dancing and singing. We were waiting only for the pairing of the first round so we could start preparing for the next day. Finally we got the pairings at around 11pm. At that time I was already very tired but still I started to browse the databases.

Preparing at "home"

I had the Black pieces against GM Frank Holzke (ELO 2508) from Germany and I found that he plays the French Tarrasch opening.

Black against GM Holzke

I prepared a line up to move 12 and to my great satisfaction it appeared on the board so I had a good position and lost no time in the opening.

The prepared line appeared on the board

I had a balanced game up to move 22 when he already started to attack my e6 weakness so I decided to fight a brave battle instead of bleeding out slowly and I sacrificed a rook for a knight and some positional advantage. Unfortunately my time was running short and it turned out that the sacrifice was not completely sound. On top of that I missed a strong move by my opponent, my queen became overloaded and I had to give up a full piece for nothing. The game was over but it was a good game and in my first game against a grandmaster I didn’t feel I was destroyed – I was outplayed and that’s OK.

Tomorrow my opponent will be a Hungarian international master, Antal Tibor Kende (ELO 2350).

The playing hall

Jozsef and me before the first round

The playing hall during the first round with GM Holzke in blue

Jozsef played against GM Valery Popov

European Individual Chess Championship - 2012 Plovdiv

I'm about to leave Sarajevo tomorrow morning, the EICC 2012 in Plovdiv, Bulgaria is 10 hours drive away. After the Charleroi open this is my second serious FIDE tournament but this one is FAAAR stronger. There are 15 GMs with 2700+ ELO and the average rating is 2444! Out of the 350 participants there are maybe 10 players of my strength the rest are way stronger. My best ever result in a tournament game was a draw against a 2100 player but there are more than 300 players over ELO 2100 here. So much about my winning chances but I go for fun and for real tournament experience.

Wish me luck!

The complete list of participants, pairings, results are on this site

Official tournament website