August 19, 2023, Glen Rock Quads and ICA Open Report

Today, we simultaneously ran two tournaments: the ICA Open and Glen Rock Quads. In all, we had three report writers: Tournament winner Justin Lee for the ICA Open, and Kian Zarineh and Nathan Kuo for the Quads!

ICA Open Championship REPORT by Justin Lee

On August 19, 2023, I participated in the ICA Open. Held monthly, the ICA Open tournaments are open to those rated 1600 and over and feature larger prizes than quads. In addition, these games are longer than the quads, with the time control G/60, d5, and rounds scheduled for 2 pm, 4:15pm, and 6:30 pm.This week, there were 21 participants in the Open Section, with ratings ranging from 1600 to over 2300. In this Open Section, I played three tough competitors: Dylan Kang, Chris Welcome, and Fred Wilson. I was fortunate to score 3/3 points, winning first place. In second place, Yefem Treger, Timothy Xie, and Alan Stolyarov all scored 2.5/3 points, tying for second place.

In the first round, I played Dylan Kang; in the second round, I played Chris Welcome; and in the third round I played Fred Wilson. My games are as follows:

In the end, I scored 3/3 and won first place. As always, I had a great time at the ICA Open, playing against excellent competitors and enjoying the relaxed and welcoming environment. I look forward to participating in this and many more tournaments at ICA.

Section 4 by Kian Zarineh

I played in Section 4 at ICA quads which was with a 45 mins limit and 5 second delay. I enjoy playing with this time control, because it allows me to think longer and make profound moves. As usual, all 3 games have taught me a great deal and I am glad I came to play chess that day even though I had an option to do something else!

My first game was against Arthur. I saw him at other ICA quads in the past and I knew his style of play. He played well in the opening and the middle game. However, in the early end game he blundered 2 pawns. Unfortunately, I blundered a tactic that lost a pawn and an exchange. Then, I had a knight and a pawn for the rook and I pushed my e and g pawns up the board. I played g3, he took my pawn. I took back with a king and I had a pass pawn. He tried pushing his own passed pawn on e3.Then he pushed his own passed pawn to c7. But I already had my passed pawn on e2. He promoted but I sacrificed my bishop for the promoted queen. Arthur could not take my bishop back because his rook was stopping my pawn from promoting. If he took my bishop, I would promote and be up a queen for a rook. He kept checking me and it was a draw by repetition. It was a challenging game but I managed to squeeze out a draw!

The second game I lost to Arjun. I played the Italian opening which led me to a good start in the beginning. He blundered a pawn on b7 which I accepted, then he sacrificed another pawn. I was too greedy and accepted that. Arjun threatened a checkmate and won my knight. I could not stop both of the attacks. As a result, I played g3 to stop the mating threat and attacked his knight on f4. He took my knight on e5 and then I played knight e4 attacking his queen and threatening to win his knight on f4. He checked me on f3 forking my king and rook. I could not go to g2 because of the f4 knight and I went to f1 which was a blunder. He mated me h3.

In my last game my opponent, Zi Chen, played G4 for the first move and it surprised me as I have not seen a high rated player playing this opening before! I won a pawn in the opening but he soon got this back. He blundered an exchange but he would have 2 pawns and a piece for it. My opponent sacrificed his knight on d5 which was a mistake. The second mistake was when he sacrificed his rook. That led me to be up a rook and a knight but he won his knight back. We traded queens and I ended up being up a rook which led me to win.

I was disappointed that I did not win the section that day but every cloud has a silver lining! That motivated me to prepare better for next week's tournament and I hope I will blow all my opponents away next time!

SECTION 3 REPORT: By Nathan Kuo

My name is Nathan Kuo. I like to play ICA Quads because there are always challenging chess players to play with and one never knows who will win the quad!

I was black in this game against Jackson. He opened the game with e4 and I responded with the Caro Kann. He played the advance and then played h4, threatening to trap my bishop with 5. g4 Be4 6. f3 Bg6 7. h5 trapping my bishop. I did not want that to happen so I played h5, preventing the combination. When Jackson played 9. dxc5 he just let my bishop come out ,and it has a threat of Bxf2. I could’ve won a pawn on move 12 by playing Ng6 by creating a fork between 2 pawns, and a bishop. Also, I allow Na4 (in which he played in the game) forking my strong bishop and queen. On move 19, he blundered a pawn in which I didn’t take because I was scared of that pin on the knight once I take it but it turns out I can just play f6 whenever my knight is attacked and just move my queen away and there would be no more pin. I missed this move on the 20th move too for the same reason. On move 23, he blundered a pawn, and this time, I did take. I totally had the advantage in this part of the game, almost winning! On move 27 he blundered yet another pawn because once I take his rook and he takes back with the bishop, I can take a free pawn with Nxe5. At this point, I am completely winning! However on move 31, I did a very bad move, blundering my knight! Now he is winning! On move 30, he blundered his advantage and it was dead drawn, if only my opponent and I had played correctly. On the next move, I pushed the wrong passed pawn and blundered the draw, and the game! This was only because I allowed my opponent to use his bishop to block both of my passed pawns. Now I learned from my mistake and will play better next time.

Congratulations to all winners: click here to view rating reports for QUADS and OPEN!

Our next Quads will be held next Saturday, August 26. Click HERE to register!

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