Today, we had 70 people competing in the Glen Rock Quads - a competition record! Participants ranged from unrated players to national masters (more on that later). One of our participants had huge shoes to fill: Ridhima Mishra is the sister of Abhimanyu, who was the youngest player ever to achieve the title of Grandmaster! However, she was the lowest rated player of her section, meaning one point out of three, with the win being against a player rated 100 points higher, can be considered a success!
Due to higher rated players consistently coming to our quads, the level of games I can display on a weekly basis improve considerably. NM Yefim Treger (who was on the losing end of last week’s featured game) won a very competitive top quad with 2/3 points! In addition, Yefim agreed to share with us his match against Corin Gartenlaub.
This match started with an exhilarating opening battle where Corin (white) played the Scotch Game. Yefim, however, deviated from the main line and played 4. ... d5. After the expected 5. Bb5, the threat was clear: win the trade the knights and fork the king and rook. Rather than playing a safe move like Bd7, Yefim took the pawn on e4, seemingly allowing black to continue his plan. However, by trading queens after losing his knight, Yefim denied white his castling privileges, and immediately won back the material with 7. ... a6. The middlegame was played at a much slower pace, with a draw being the most likely outcome. By move 38, Corin had three isolated pawns, with one of them being a passed pawn. Yefim, meanwhile, had one pawn island of three pawns - but no passed pawns. In short, this game was destined for a draw - until Corin blundered with 39. h4?? He must have expected Yefim to capture the pawn so that he could capture the f-pawn, breaking up the pawn island completely. However, Yefim advanced the said f-pawn with check first, meaning he simply won the pawn without giving anything in return. After a couple of moves, two mistakes in a row followed. First, Yefim played 42. ... Bxf2+ instead of h2, meaning, if Corin were to capture the bishop, both players would promote to queens. However, Corin fell for the bluff and played Kh2 instead, meaning Yefim was up two pawns and a win was inevitable.
Although the Shevelenko siblings come to all of our classes, tournaments, and camps, they do not feature in many of our reports - until today- as Leon won Section 3 and Emma finished second in Section 13!
After having a rough week in camp, which ended with a loss to Ari Lukasty, Leon got a chance at a rematch. That match transformed into a rook endgame where Leon lost a pawn with less than a minute on the clock. Though down a pawn, he kept fighting and finally exchanged all the pawns leaving Ari with a single passed pawn left. The position was:
His final try was Rh3, Kc2, Rc3 drawing the game by forcing a stalemate.
Leon’s second match proved to be the decisive one of the tournament as that win, combined with favorable results in other matches, meant 2 points was enough to win the quad. In that second game, Leon utilized both knights and the h-pawn to create an attack on the kingside. After the opponent traded queens and lost a pawn, Leon managed to put the opponent into zugzwang!
Meanwhile, Emma finished the day with two wins, with one of the wins resulting from a fried liver attack where the opponent lost a rook under pressure! In the decisive second match against Rishi Hardikar, however, although Emma was up a knight and was able to perpetually check the opponent’s king, Emma’s king was “in the corner and very weak”. Therefore, after Emma’s checks dried up, the opponent immediately delivered the knockout blow.
Congratulations to all winners: click HERE to view rating reports!
Our next Quads will be held next Saturday, July 15. Click HERE to register!
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