In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain,
For promis'd joy!"
"To a Mouse", Robert Burns, 1785
Above is one of the few bits of poetry the existence of which I can actually remember from my GCSE English days, when my class read the powerful book "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck. The most well-known line came to mind when pondering my performance at the 102nd Richmond Rapidplay, which has recently been taken over by new organisers (who have a new website to go with it.)
Since the July 2011 grading list came out with my rapid grade at 138, I had to play in the U-170 section, and never did particularly well; my best score was 2.5/6. From January, I had been eligible for the U-135 again, but that month's event came before the grading list, in March I was playing in the SCCU U-18 Jamboree, and in May I had to revise for exams. So this was the first time in 6 months that I could return to the venue, and with 134, I just squeezed into the U-135 as top seed.
Although I am surely better at slowplay than at rapidplay, I think the grade is probably too low, from having to play in Majors and on high boards in the Stoneleigh Trophy all the time. So it would just be a case of turning up, winning games against 6 weaker opponents, and walking off with the £80 first prize? Such was not my thinking, yet a sound plan. However, as Burns wrote over two centuries ago, even the best plans can go awry...
I had a warning of that in round 1, against the junior Samir Samadov (115). Although I won, the opening advantage that ought to have resulted from his poor response to the Scotch Game failed to materialise, and I needed to rely on later oversights to prevail:
Things really went wrong in the second round, against another junior, Zoe Varney (109). Thinking too much for my own good resulted in a spectacular self-implosion:
This tournament has been won with 5/6 plenty of times in the past though! Not to be deterred, I came roaring back with this convincing victory, beating Gabriel Thompson (113) for the second time this year:
For round 4, I played yet another junior opponent; Aditya Verma (117), and a quick repeat of our meeting in the e2e4 Gatwick tournament! I had black again, and this time had a nice position out of the opening. However, I lost that, and then the exchange, but with heroics in my own time trouble, plus some nerves from my opponent, I was still able to win:
Round 5 was my only draw of the event, against the ungraded Stanislav Pastukhov. He does have an unpublished 'shadow grade' of 115, although previous results suggest this is rather low, as he finished on 5/6 in this event. He came into it as joint leader, but it was I who came painfully close to a win, even missing a forced mate in 4. Sadly I couldn't finish off what would have been a brilliant sacrificial bluff:
So now I couldn't win the tournament - I was paired on board 2 for the final round on 3.5/5, but on the top board, the two players (neither of whom I played) had 4.5 and 4. I still had a good chance of money, and I found myself playing not only a fifth junior in six games, but also someone from my school again, although this time our A-team board 4, David Powell (117.) Once again, captain's authority was forcefully exerted with a clean win following his tactical blunder in the opening:
Perhaps I am being a little harsh on myself for this - I performed at 139 (which with 5 juniors, will surely increase somewhat, as this was played on the as-yet unknown July grades) and won £20 with outright third. Still, given my seeding, I feel justified in having hoped for more - and note that neither of the players who finished above me were juniors who I can dismiss as undergraded! Usually I can start a game well, but here I was erratic in my opening salvoes - failing to punish my opponent in round 1, missing some strong lines in round 5, quickly losing an advantage in round 4, and of course hanging my Queen in round 2. That was a strange blunder to make, and I also missed a forced mate in round 5, took a few minutes to spot an en prise Rook in round 3, and allowed a Rook to be trapped in round 4.
I could quite concievably have scored 6/6 from these games, based on the positions I had at one point or another in all of them - so my erratic showing at rapidplay, and downright bad efforts when near the top of a seeding list (remember my decision to play up in the Surrey Congress?) have yet to be cured. Hence, as I embark on adult tournament chess, some more Burns doesn't seem out of place:
"Still thou are blest, compared wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!"
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