The Back Rank

2 games from the weekend

This weekend I played a 3 round match between a few local clubs. I've posted my games with full annotations from the 2nd and 3rd round at www.chesslog.de/users/loomis, the exact links are: www.chesslog.de/users/loomis/?game=637 and www.chesslog.de/users/loomis/?game=627. Hopefully there are things to be learned from those games.

The second round game features poor play by me culminating in my opponent making a tactical mistake that hangs a piece. I almost win the piece but foul up the idea and then he hangs a rook in time pressure. This game is another example that you don't have to have a positional advantage to have a winning tactic. At least not at the 1700-1900 level.

In the third round game I unsoundly sacked a piece but my opponent didn't properly refute the idea. At the end of the game I took a perpetual when I had a winning tactic on the board. It's kind of a long tactic, but the beginning of the idea was pretty simple and I didn't even consider it. Oh well.

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I've come across more errors in CT-Art, but I'll save the diagrams for a later post. I'm now pretty sure that I won't finish the 1209 problems by the end of the year. I just don't have time to keep up that pace -- at least not while doing other things like playing in tournaments and annotating my games. Here are my current CT-Art stats:

• level 10: 97% (110 problems)
• level 20: 92% (286 problems)
• level 30: 86% (221 problems)
• level 40: 85% (83 done, 121 to go)
• elo: 2243

That's 700 total problems done. Leaving 509 to do. In the last week I did 71 problems. If that is a maintainable pace, it will take me just over 7 weeks to fully finish. There are 6 weeks left in the year (minus vacation time). So I expect to finish within the first two weeks of the new year.

Labels: full game, progress report

posted by Loomis @ 10:02 PM 1 comments Leave a comment

CT-Art, level 30 finished

It's been a little longer than usual since I posted, I've had a shortage of time lately. In the meantime I have finished level 30 of CT-Art and begun level 40. I was disappointed in the number of mistakes near the end of level 30. I understand that when you put together over 1200 tactics problems there are bound to be a few oversights, what is really annoying is when I spend 15 minutes on a problem when I've found what is supposed to be the right answer and the refutation to it in the first 3-5 minutes.

Anyway, I'm going to post the problem numbers and diagrams here in the hopes that I won't waste time on these problems again in the future.

CT-Art problem 573

White to play. I played Bxf6 Nxf6 Nxe6, Nxe6 was rejected by CT-Art even though it is crushingly winning. The Ct-Art solution, Bxe6+, is also winning.

This position is from CT-Art problem 575.

The position is after Rg3xg5 Kxg5 Qg4+, the CT-Art solution continues with Kh7 and Bxf5+, there is no mention of the move Qg5 in the diagram position. This moves save the position for black. I saw all this from the beginning and wasted a lot of time trying to find an actual win, which there isn't.

This position comes from the first problem of level 40, number 618.

The CT-Art solution is Rxe8, planning to meet Qxe8 with Qxd2 and gxh6 with Nf6+. But there's no way to meet Rxg2+. So instead of Rxe8 I played Nf6+ because then gxf6 Rxe8 Rxg2 can be met by Kxg2.

Here are the current CT-Art stats:

• level 10: 97% (110 problems)
• level 20: 92% (286 problems)
• level 30: 86% (221 problems)
• level 40: 85% (12 done, 192 left)
• elo: 2168

In total I've done 629 problems, so 580 to go. I think it will be close as to whether I'll finish by the end of the year, but I'm keeping that as my goal.

Labels: CT-Art errors, diagrams, progress report, tactics

posted by Loomis @ 1:54 PM 5 comments Leave a comment