Sunday, March 23, 2008

My "First" Classical Competition

Up and until now, I've been keeping a very very low profile on my own chess competition running at the chess club at Ryde Eastwood RSL every Wednesday night.

This is actually the "first" chess club competition that I'm participating. Officially, according to the March list, my classical ratings currently stand at... *drum roll*.....

4g NSW Tan, C

Doesn't really clarify things, does it? :)

The 4g means that I need only to play 5 more rated games to get my rating off the ground and running (according to Bill Gletsos, playing 9 rated games is the requirement)

Before this, the records show that I've only played in 4 (??) games in the last 2 years although for the life of me, I can't remember what those games were about. I think they were all losses which means my current classical rating is probably <1200s at the moment, if not lower. I seem to recall losing to Theresa in one game but that's about it.

Anyway, my next opponent this week is Dennis Hale (ACF rating: 1591) . And I have the Black pieces.

Dennis is a gracious elderly gentlemanly chap who plays chess very well. When I first started playing at Ryde Eastwood, he regularly crushed me..... no, make that, obliterated me ..... like kicked-my-ass real good, if you know what I mean. :)

The reason I happen to know this is because last week Bill Gletsos gave every player in the room a list comprising the schedule/rounds/pairings (many thanks to Bill for making the extra effort!).

One thing that has worked out in my favour is that the week after that, I have a bye round which is welcome news to me because the very next day (4th April) is my finals exam for my studies! The bad news is that I've not studied for my final exams which is now less than 2 weeks away and that means that I've no time to prepare for my game against Dennis on Wednesday.

In last week's game, Dennis had a draw with Arthur Hyunh (ACF rating: 1837) so he is definitely improving. I've no doubt Dennis is going to open a can of whup-ass on me this week, metaphorically speaking. *laughs*

4 comments:

  1. eager to hear the good news.

    ...sorry, got to run, i am running out of time on earth! warmly, dk

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  2. thanks for the vote of confidence, dk.

    i doubt i'll win given the studies i have to prepare for so i'll just go in with no special preparation and play as i go.

    cheers

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  3. good luck on the exams as well as the chess. there is nothing that says he has to win, so you might pull a huge upset. if not, at least you can laugh about it, which is better than i can do...

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  4. thanks, cl!

    i'm actually quite worried about my studies as I've been slacking off.

    tonight's my clash with Dennis and i'll post an update after the game. as Black, I'm going to go all out and go for the win instead. if i lose, i wanna go out with a bang.

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