A bridge too far

The final round was my third ~200 opponent of the tournament, and this time I had the added challenges of the black pieces and a huge minus score. I was playing young Alex Golding (196/2080), which promised a tough test. Though he blows hot and cold, he seemed much more mature suddenly: still too fast, but now I couldn't read his expressions at all and he was nailed to his seat the whole time. Though I felt that I knew his game well enough to have some chances, I wasn't the only one on very good form.

If I was going to emerge unbeaten then I would certainly have earned it, but as I mentioned to a friend, at least the game wouldn't last long either way. Me and my big mouth...

As we trooped to the car, I wondered what sort of witchcraft had allowed him to win this game. The young hacker starting to play like an old man was a scary thought, and it was the sort of grit than Arkell and Hebden have shown on countless Sunday afternoons. But I realise now that as the game went on and on I couldn't withstand the tension; there is an obvious parallel with my last 100+ move game. Moves like 50... Be7, 52... Qe4 and 76... dxe4 betray my nerves. It was unfortunate that I quickly got a position which can only be played for a draw; after his outrageous 40th move I couldn't adjust to the brief chance to take the fight to him.

As epic a struggle as it was, the game wasn't of the quality it should have been given that it brought together perhaps the two most on-form players in the building. Maybe we were tired by now. After outsmarting each other in the opening we got a position which neither side particularly liked or understood; I could have been on the ropes as early as move 11, but by move 15 I had what should have been an impenetrable blockade. The desperate 40. Bxd5!? (which gets a ? for the quality of the move, but an ! for making me play on) really should have rebounded, and even before that I could have violently changed the game with 26... Nxe3!. Later on it required the cumulative effect of many small slips in the rook ending to finally reach a lost position. White too missed his chances, and despite appearances his endgame technique needs some work - witness moves 56 and 85. Losing to 190s is nothing to be ashamed of though, and it was still comfortably my best ever tournament result: 5½/9, a 191 performance and +47 Elo. It's always the one you least expect, I suppose.

Sadly I don't have a magic bullet that will let my readers put 25 points on their grade overnight, but I have a few ideas about what went differently which I will try to share. After that, I have one more game to cover, which was played in the CCF Superleague the very day after this tournament finished.