Getting cooked by Swedish chefs
Yeh I know, I need new material. But come on, I love this guy.
My tournament in Växjö (pronounced “Vair-kshh”, as I was quizzed on by the organisers in the opening ceremony) was not an overwhelming success. I finished middle of the field on an even 4.5/9. Certainly an improvement on my 0/2 start, but the second half of the tournament could be classified as a comedy of missed opportunities. Nevertheless, overall I’m not that unhappy to have sacrificed a handful of ELO points for my first Swedish chess experience. My three losses were at the hand of three of the youngest participants in the field: Mads Andersen (DEN), Aryan Tari (NOR) and Svane Rasmus (GER), three talented IMs who were super close to picking up GM norms in this event. Mads is a little older than the other two, but his play in particular really impressed me. He went on to win the tournament with 5.5 points, narrowly edging a big group on 5, and I expect we’ll hear a lot more about him (and the others) in the future. My best, or at least most entertaining, game of the event was against the top seed, GM Tiger Hillarp Persson. Tiger is one of the most unusual grandmasters I’ve met. I first ran into him at breakfast in the hotel on the opening day; I, an economist by trade, had brought a chess book to breakfast to read and relax over my meal, while the professional had brought a heavyweight macroeconomics book! I guess the grass is always greener somewhere else. Not only does Tiger share my interest in economics and particularly inequality, but he is, as he puts it, “very much a political animal”, expressing considered (and strong!) views about many topical social issues on which your average grandmaster would usually steer clear. The 43 year old is also an unusual chess professional for having started extremely late, around 25 years of age (a fact that many find especially shocking at first, seeing as he looks about 30).
Given that we were two of the three old GM punching-bags in the event, one might be forgiven for predicting an energy-saving draw in our individual encounter. And I must confess, going into the game, I would have been very happy just to take a reasonably non-confrontational half-point. However, it quickly became clear that the tournament favourite was out for blood and fireworks (not necessarily in that order), which he himself hinted at over breakfast by declaring, “Let’s have some fun!” Tiger unleashed an inspired and dangerous attack after the opening, which I only managed to diffuse by way of a rare middle game promotion on b1. This was enough to hold the balance, depute Tiger achieving his own new queen. However, the game had a few more twists in store, and by the time I achieved a second (!) promotion on b1, I had accidentally fallen into a winning endgame. Here are my notes on the game that I recently sent off to New In Chess for the next yearbook.
It turns out Tiger has his own blog and he annotated the game over there as well , so for some higher-quality chess commentary, check it out. All in all, not a horrible Olympiad-prep tournament, and an enjoyable start to the Scandinavian Summer. Next stop: Denmark!
