Keep calm and carry on

 Not satisfied with my below-par showing at the CCF slowplay tournament, I decided to play on Easter Monday at the Surrey Congress' rapidplay tournament. I played the slowplay there last year, and would have done so again if not for the fact that it wasn't run. I've heard it suggested that it's because the one-day events (a big junior competition took place at the same time, thankfully in a different hall!) only make back the money lost by the three-day, but I don't know for sure.

 In any case, by the end I was quite sure that it was entirely the wrong decision to play at all. I had a horrible event, and with the exception of one game below, I have limited my comments to an even more precursory form than is usual for my rapidplay competitions. Things seemed to be going alright early on, but by the half-way stage, I was completely shattered and collapsed to miserable defeats in the last three games.

 Things started badly with the draw for round 1, which gave me black against the top seed, IM Nigel Povah (214s.) That said, I got stuck into the game, and missed some good chances before finally succumbing to his attack. Perhaps he was just easing himself in after playing no rapidplay games in 9 years, for after drawing with my final opponent in round 2, he blitzed the field and won with 5.5/6:

 Round 2 was the only game that really interests me, although this is hardly surprising given that it is the only one in which I got a full point. Playing David Powell (135) once again, I did the unthinkable - played a Queen's Gambit and won in serene positional style:

 My third game seemed to be going the same way, as I set out to give John McKenna (*149) a demonstration in how to play against an Isolated Queen's Pawn. But the breakthrough proved elusive, and when it finally appeared in a King & Pawn ending, I miscalculated and passed it over:

 Nonetheless, that was as good as it got. In round 4, I managed to throw away a clear positional advantage and big clock lead against the 139 Stanislav Pastukhov, even missing a clear win at one stage, and drifted into a lifeless Rook ending with two missing pawns and an inevitable result:

 Round 5 was a total disaster, and yet it was going to get worse! I had black against Alex Golding (142), an exceptionally promising junior. Losing was disappointing enough, but to a 9-year-old in this feeble manner?

By the final round, it is quite obvious that I had run out of steam completely, and put up no resistance to Jonathan Pein (152) whatsoever:

 A shambolic end to an appalling tournament, I think it's fair to say. I used up so much energy trying to give Povah a fight, then grinding down Powell and McKenna, that I had nothing left for the final three rounds. My play against Pastukhov, Golding and Pein was full of mistakes, and they progressively got worse - in round 4 I got to a winning position before faltering, in round 5 I had only reached a manageable position, and in round 6 I didn't even get that far.

 It makes me sound not a little repetitive, but I still think it's a matter of style. My first chess book was My 60 Memorable Games, and it is surely no coincidence that I have always held Fischer's manner of play to be the optimum - clear, direct and aggressive, neither fearing complications nor actively seeking them. I can sometimes mimic this to a degree, but I forgot in recent weeks that aggression doesn't necessarily have to be directed against the enemy King, and I have been endlessly landing in complicated positions by seeking sharp continuations. A distaste for so-called 'irrational'* positions (like in my games with Ball and Haldane, for example) isn't the end of the world, but by getting into them so often I have been compromising the ideal of clarity. That's why I can be quite optimistic about my second-round win, which was a revelation of sorts - despite getting no real opening advantage, I kept up some pressure on the Queenside for the whole game, and forced my opponent to crack under the strain, polishing him off without allowing any counter-chances and simply not needing to get involved in the reams of calculation that I often trip over. Long-term the task is to brush up on this ability, but as short-term fixes go, an adjustment of temperament isn't bad. I just need to calm down!

 The weirdest part of this sorry tale, however, is the epilogue. I'd already agreed to go with a friend to CCF's evening blitz tournament, although I was not expecting great things after this humbling. I barely had time to return home and have dinner before I was off again, and with the day passing in such a blur, a second disaster would have been easy to forecast. But no - I had a fantastic event, scoring 5/7, and a win in my final game would have given me clear first regardless of other results. That wasn't to be, but I still had a performance of almost 180. (Crosstable here if you're interested.) Beating a 166 and 178 in consecutive rounds with the Nimzo-Indian was particularly sweet, whilst my losses came in a Fantasy Caro-Kann and a 6. Bg5 Najdorf. Need I say more?

 I decided that the best remedy for this showing was to have a break for a little while, but I shall be playing tomorrow for Wallington's 1st-team in the Surrey Trophy, my debut in the top division of the county league.


* Geller identified this as a weakness of Fischer too, but he didn't, so far as I know, strictly define what he meant. I have long taken 'irrational' positions to be those where logic, and the usual guiding principles, cease to apply, and everything has to be calculated out manually. Obviously, playing super-sharp lines is not a good idea when you are so bad at this skill!