Canadian Youth Chess Championships 2011 - Richmond Hill, Ontario

Hey guys,

Haven't blogged in a full year but that's okay will start again soon.

This year, the CYCC was held in the Sheraton hotel of Richmond Hill, Ontario. The tournament hall was professional, the playing schedule was well organized and the overall tournament was a huge success.

I was seeded 6th but at this age I've grown to realize that rating is not that important and I didn't really play Chess while focused about elo. My aim was first, but if not - I'd do my best.

Round 1

Our room's air conditioning was pretty cold and I didn't get much sleep, so I had some tiredness while playing my first opponent. I was playing black against a 1600 rated player in the exchange Caro-Kann as 6th seed. I sacrificed the exchange for an extra pawn on the 2nd rank which allowed me to complicate the position and put a lot of pressure on his rooks and king. I finally found a tactical blow after the 4 hours of a slow position. 0-1

Round 2

After a quick eat, I came back to face Simon Gladstone as white. He prepared for me a little in the French, and I forgot some theory in the Bd3 line. Black quickly equalized and I realized he had a better endgame. I offered a draw after the queens were exchanged. 1/2-1/2

Round 3

A little better sleep this time, but I was a little sick and feeling feverous because of the room temp. I finally fixed the airconditioning and felt a little better later on. I was paired up against Richard Leu (2046 CFC) as Black. I had a decent position with a pair of bishops in a closed d4 line with fianchettoed kingside for black. I soon started to open up the position and breaked his center, I won a pawn and then a piece while he was in time pressure. 0-1

Round 4

This was a key game, as I was paired against the top seed in the U16 Open section, Nikita Gusev. He seemed to have good results in the positions he was familiar in his mainline Sicilian positions so I prepared the c3 variation. After a couple of natural mainline moves, he misplaced his knight and allowed me to get a more developed position. After some repeated moves, he offered me a draw but because he was .5 ahead of the tournament, I declined but forgot about the 3 move repetition rule and he claimed a draw after 3 repeated moves. 1/2-1/2

Round 5

During my preparation, I realized that to likely win the tournament I had to win my next 3 games with 2 blacks. In this round, I was paired black against Aquino Inigo (2088 CFC). I had to play very seriously and cautiously because I could not afford a draw nor a loss. After hours of prep, he played a familiar Gruenfeld line and I played very quickly, with 1:24 on my clock and about 10 minutes on his after the 20th or so move. He sacrificed a pawn but could not complete the attack, I found a winning end game tactic which caused a blockade so that his rook could not capture my pushed pawn. I queened and he resigned. 0-1

Round 6

This was a very crucial round, as it was my only white for the last 3 round of the tourny. While Tanraj Sohal was 2nd seed of the tourny, I had no choice but to play for a win if I wanted the champion title. He went into a Sheveshnikov side-line which we both didn't know much theory on. To my point of view, I had a decent position as I controlled the d5 square and his king was unable to castle sitting on e7. He opened up the position but my bishop was stronger than his knight and eventually he gave up a pawn for some compensation for my back rank. I found h4 which freed up my king and allowed me to keep the pawn in a QvQ up a pawn endgame. I dawdled around for 30 moves but finally got my king to safety and queened my pawn. 1-0.

Round 7

Coming into this round I was tied for first with Nikita Gusev (5.0/7.0) who drew his previous game. I was black against Mike Ivanov and found that he had a very interesting repertoire. Not only was his openings hard to prepare against, but he was overperforming this tournament and I had to be very aggressive to win this game. He played something that I didn't prepare for but had experience with it in the past, a variation of the Caro-Kann. I thought that I had a good kingside attack planned but I realized there was nothing I could do against his fianchettoed bishop. Soon I found myself to be in an inferior position while also in time trouble. I found a chance to open up my c file and soon my pieces became more active. He missed a tactic which would've gave him a better position and sacrificed a pawn for the initiative instead. At this point, I had a winning position as I locked his g2 bishop in and had a good defense against his attack. Seeing that Nikita's position against his opponent wasn't looking bright, he offered me a draw thinking that I would most likely accept. But unfortunately I didn't have time to evaluate Nikita's position and declined. Moving with 30 or so seconds on my clock and 5 minutes on his, I was focusing my best and trying to move swiftly. I glanced to my left and saw Aquino and Nikita shaking hands as I realized Nikita had lost this game. This meant that if I drew my game, I would become national champion leading my section with just 0.5. I quickly reoffered a draw.

Little did I expect him to decline, as he was ambitious to see that my time was very low and he could also place 1st if he won our game. But this was the correct position for him as out of pressure of time and tournament, I blundered my two knights for a rook! I was furious with myself but realized I still had a decent position where it was hard for white to take advantage of my defense. I would be able to hold a draw without much problems. I kept my composure and continued to play with my time deficiency but a few moves later, I blundered the exchange and now I was down a full piece. I was panicking now, as I thought I had completely messed this game up and I was just so close to becoming the National U16 Champion. I told myself that I would play 'til mate, possibly getting extremely lucky and exploiting a mistake of his as his time was ticking as well. He got a little greedy and saw an opportunity to sneak into my position, but I found a tactic that trapped his queen! His queen was now contained, and with only a few minutes on his clock, it was not easy to find a way out. Although if he had more time, he probably would've found a winning plan and beat me, but he offered me a draw and I immediately accepted! 1/2-1/2

I was very excited to win my first CYCC and after a very busy and stressful tournament. I'll be going to the WYCC 2011 in Brazil this November so be sure to come back for a good read. ;)

I might've not been the strongest player in my section, but with a bit of luck and ambition I pulled through to become the 2011 CYCC U16 Open Champion!

Full results can be found here: http://www.2011cycc.ca/match-stats

Alberta's Results:

All results are posted in sectional order.
There were no playoffs for 3rd place. Placement was determined using the
Buchholz chess rating tiebreak system.

Kaixin Wang - Tied for 4th place U8 Open - 4.0/7

Patrick Tolentino - Tied for 3rd place U10 Open - 4.5/7

Jamil Kassam - Tied for 3rd place U12 Open - 4.5/7

Richard Wang - 1st place U14 Open - 6.0/7

Patience Tram - 5th place U14 Girls - 2.0/6

David Zhang - 1st place U16 Open - 5.5/7

Nicka Kalaydina - Tied for 1st place (3rd after tiebreaks) U16 Girls - 5.5/7

David Miller - Tied for 3rd place U18 Open - 4.5/7

* As an ending note, I would like to thank the organizers, volunteers, the parents and the players that made this tournament possible as I found it to be very successful and well directed! The tourny was run very smoothly and the schedule was on time. Players and parents were very happy with the location and convenience of the playing site and area. Although there is a huge controversy about the prize distribution of the CYCC, coming from a player's perspective, I think that money is not a must, but a very nice bonus, especially to the players that are going or went to tournaments such as the NAYCC, WYCC and Pan-Ams. =] The money is not important, and if it isn't distributed to the players I hope it is used to aid tournaments and opportunities for Canadian juniors! Personally I think that second/third place in WYCC should be getting a little bit of support from the CFC from the surplus of the CYCC, but it has never happened before and I hope it will!*

Cheers,

David

Canadian Youth Chess Championships 2010 Recap

Hey guys,

I haven't blogged in half a year, because after the WYCC I haven't been focusing on chess a lot and haven't been blogging at all.

This will just be a very brief recap of the Alberta team in the CYCC 2010, I'll be posting more about the tournament tomorrow.

I (7th seed) played on par with some higher rated players in my U16 section, but I ended up with only 4.0 where I scored some depressing losses in good or dead-drawn positions. Unfortunately I had lost a critical 6th round game in an almost winning position, and could not qualify for the world's as I was behind the tied 3rd players with 0.5.

Richard Wang (1st seed) was tied for first in the U12 section with 3 others after round 7, and had won his first tiebreak game, but there are no results on the web yet, so I'll have to wait to edit this post for later reference. His performance is not ideal, as he is 400 points above the second seed but had lost to a 1900 rated player which almost caused him to falter of the top of the standings. I'm very excited to hear good news about his playoff wins tomorrow!

Nicka Kalaydina (1st seed) won her U14G section with 5.5/7, only dropping one game to a previous WYCC contender, Rebecca Giblon. Luckily for her, Rebecca had lost her last game which gave Nicka a .5 point lead to win the tournament. Congratulations!

Eric Hansen (1st seed) had been leading his tournament after his win against second seed Aman Hambleton in round 3, but his opponents' preparation and his own lack of sleep had led him to have draws against weaker players in the last two rounds, which unfortunately concluded his CYCC with 2nd place and 5.5/7.

Yuekai Wang (6th seed) was not having the best tournament start, as he had drawn both a 1360 and a 1650 (approx ratings), and had not gained any superiority in the tournament ladder. But he managed to win his 5-6 round games which gave him a chance for top 3 in the U14 section if he had beaten second seed Tanraj Sohal. Unfortunately, he was tricked in a good position, and ended up with 4/7.

Jamil Kassam (2nd seed) was having a pretty good tournament in the U10 section, but when playing 1st seed Yuanchen Zhang, he accidentally flagged in a much better position. He came out strong after that loss and ended up with 5.0/7 in 4th place, with a very high tiebreak score as well.

Ian & David McCoullough both performed much higher than their ratings, and David had scored a very nice win in round 5 where he was losing but brought it back with a good pin&win. They finished in 10th and 14th, respectively.

Patrick Tolentino had very nice positions against many of his opponents, but he had given up some of his chances in the game and did not win all of them. This is his first CYCC as a U8 contender and he got 7th place out of 15 with 4.0/7!

Overall we did score pretty well, but considering our seeding in the standings coming into this tournament, we could've done better. But there are also many other factors that influences how we played, not just our rating level.

Anyways, it's already 1 AM, so I'm going to go sleep. I'll edit the post tomorrow with updates on results and additional statistics so stay tuned!

WYCC PICTURE :( And VIDEOS!

Wow. Turns out I only have one photo for round 7-11. Sorry guys! Credit goes to my dad for taking the all of them.

Round 8



Videos! I want to upload them, but they take up so much space! I'll upload them on YouTube because it's faster and better than blogspot. The YouTube channel is http://www.youtube.com/user/DZchess Since it takes a long time to upload, I'll probably only be uploading a few per day.

Stay tuned or subscribe to the channel. Andrei Botez's videos of the CYCC can be found on his Facebook page. :)

FM Eric Hansen Canada's Best Blitz Player?

Lol I played this nub in bullet, 1/0 and this is what happened.

White: FM Eric Hansen
Black: GM David Zhang
Time Control: 1 Minute No Increment
Site: Chess.com Live Chess

1.d4 c6
2.c4 d5
3.Nf3 Nf6
4.Nc3 e6
5.cxd5 exd5
6.Bg5 Bd6
7.Qc2 h6
8.Bh4 O-O
9.e3 Bg4
10.Bd3 Nbd7
11.h3 Be6
12.O-O Qc7
13.Rad1 g5
14.Bxg5 hxg5
15.Nxg5 Kg7
16.Bf5 Bxf5
17.Qxf5 Rh8
18.e4 dxe4
19.Ncxe4 Bh2+
20.Kh1 Qf4
21.Qxf4 Bxf4
22.Nxf6 Nxf6
23.Nf3 Bd6
24.Rfe1 Rae8
25.Kg1 Ne4
26.Re3 f5
27.Rb3 b6
28.Kf1 c5
29.dxc5 Bxc5
30.Rd7+ Re7
31.Rxe7+ Bxe7
32.Nd4 Rd8
33.Ne6+ Kf6
34.Nxd8 Bxd8
35.Rd3 Bc7
36.f3 Nc5
37.Rd5 Bf4
38.Rd1 Be5
39.b3 a5
40.h4 Ke6
41.Kf2 Bf4
42.h5 Bh6
43.g4 b5
44.Re1+ Kf6
45.Rd1 fxg4
46.fxg4 Ne4+
47.Kf3 Nc3
48.Rd4 Kg7

0-1 Defeating FM Hansen as black.

Ending result:




Sorry about the WYCC photos, I will get them in tomorrow!

WYCC PICTURES!

Hey everyone! I'm back, and this time I have the internet speed necessary to upload my 10 gigs of photos. Of course I'll only be uploading a few from each round shooting players and the tournament hall. Maybe some scenery.

The day before round 1:

Team meeting:







Round 1






Round 2







Round 3





Round 4




Round 5 and 6







And that'll be pretty much it for the day, I'll be updating with the round 7-11 and closing ceremony photos tomorrow! Stay tuned!

The Finale of the WYCC

Round 11 I was paired white against Slovakia's Lukas Hajek, rated 1762, but he beat two experts with his French defense. Since we start 10:00 AM, I didn't bother to prepare much except look at the main line. Coincidentally he went into the mainline but after Nh6, Nc2, Qb6, o-o, he castled, and let me play g4, forcing him to h6 and letting me double his pawns. I tried to go for an early complication and attack, and pushed my g-pawn threatening to open the file, I completely underestimated the idea of taking my pawn, and then my d4 pawn was hanging! At this time I was very nervous, knowing that it was at least -+ and that I would have to pull a miracle to win. I temporarily sacrificed a piece, and he blundered by taking my knight which actually leads to a forced mate in 13! I obviously didn't see the whole mate in one time, but I worked my moves step by step and eventually found a very nice combo that lead to a forced mate. 1-0, and I finished with 6/11 and tied for 43rd. I'm quite happy with my score because I finished with the highest out of all the Canadian U14 players. Thomas Kaminski was playing great but unfortunately had some blunders in his last rounds, he scored 5.5/11 and placed 61st. David Itkin from Toronto scored 4/11 and tied for 112nd.

The tournament went nicely, even though I wasn't happy with our hotel. The walls were very thin, and there were four girls opposite of our room who kept on shouting and laughing until 12 AM everyday. I thought the food was pretty good, and service was as well, but most people couldn't speak English and it was hard to communicate.

As I expected, Richard Wang drew his last round and got 3rd! He was 27th seed but obviously performed much higher than his rating. Good job! Canada did very well, I think all of our players scored 3.5+ and a lot of players scored more than 50%!
This was my first WYCC experience and I look forward to more international events!

I'll be posting all of my games with brief annotations after a week, so stay tuned!

See you all until my next tournament! Thanks for viewing. ;)

WYCC Rounds 9 and 10

Round 9 I was paired white against Baglan Esat, another underrated 1762. His actual performance might be 1900. I played Bb5 against the Nc6 sicilian, and he definitely prepared or knew the opening well because he played 11 moves into theory very quickly and confidently. I tried to attack the kingside with h4, but I shifted my focus to the queenside which was an error. He exchanged too many pieces and it was a dead draw in the end. 1/2-1/2

Round 10 I was paired against Arat Ufuk Sezen as white. He was rated 1884 and from Turkey. I suspect since the Turkish team has strong coaches, I was prepared against very easily. I played the Caro-Kann again, where this time he played d4 Nd2 and transposed into a Larsen-Bronstein variation. We both castled queenside and I tried to break in the centre, but left too many dark squared holes which he took advantage of. He 3 way repititioned the position with his dark squared bishop, because if I didn't accept, he would win a pawn and threaten mate. 1/2-1/2

In general, I think I'm having a bad second half. The first half I was definitely playing well, but after the 6th round, I started playing very lazily and carelessly. My last round is important since I want 6/11. So I'm white probably and will play for a win no matter what. If it's dead drawn then it's draw, if it's lost it's lost. I'm not doing that well, but wish me luck!