Touching distance

At last we come to the final day of the tournament, and my attempt to run the gauntlet of the Swiss stage. A big success was already in the bag, and there were no prizes to worry about, but since the top two finishers would qualify to play in the norm groups for free next time there was still something to play for! (And if you'd told me that before the start...) However, I would have to get past the top players from the other group first.

First up, I had white against David Spence (207/2192). According to the database, I could be quite sure of facing the Armenian Variation of the Winawer (5... Ba5) again, and with the theory in my head I could expect a huge opening advantage. It was not to be, but that's what makes this game noteworthy: I knew nothing about the line we actually got, and still came within a whisker of putting him away. Though I was satisfied with an honourable draw, at the time I didn't realise just how close the impossible had really been:

Was it really just 28. Qc2 or 31. Qg3 between me and victory? Perhaps, but then what if I'd played on? The belief needed to look for a move like 35. Qf8 in the last variation wasn't there. That must be the next step, but then it has been for a while.

Before stumbling in the face of success, I had been able to tie up a 207 in knots without needing to do anything special. Although he missed several of his best chances, so did Wall in the second round: these people are human, after all! The flaw with his attempt to get out of theory is that I didn't need to do anything clever to get a good game. It happens automatically, and castling queenside gives me an obvious target. Although I was starting to miss a few more background tactics than I had on the preceding days, I think that the most instructive slip was strategic - 28. a5 looks so tempting, but there's no need to play it right away. That said, given how disgusting Black's position looks, it's strange that White has to play so accurately to put it to the sword.

I didn't bother worrying about any of that at the time though. I still had one more game to play...