I really liked the game and a very nice analysis.

You had some interesting suggestions in the endgame and I think I will analyse it a bit more later.
Just my initial thought I was wondering if he could not have held the position with the bishop at f3 rather than on f1 (at around move 50, hard to see).

Well done!

Wow, thanks BK! I appreciate your analysis. I'm going to watch this after I finish my own initial analysis. (I like finding things myself first. :-) ) I put a LOT of effort into the first 40 moves or so, then saw that my position was winning and "relaxed" (You can tell this by the lack of notes I made after this point)

There is going to be a lot of stuff by me on this game, but the first of it is on my training journal now with all the notes I made during the game so you can tell what I was thinking. I'll comment on the analysis later when I actually see it.

Thanks again BK!

If you'd have waited 20 more seconds I think you would have seen me resign. I believe that was the last move of the game, if not, really close to it. :-)

Great analysis, thanks BK. The funniest part was you had the same thinking and timing that I did with Ke5 at the end where you said "no wait it doesn't oh no!" right at the same time that I did. I think I said the same thing, but there were a few more expletives.

I have to admit, it's slightly annoying that you kept seeing the lines I missed first! :-) I calculated out every line in the g5 idea near then end EXCEPT for the gxh6 parts of it and I guess I just assumed that the knight would stop the pawn when it can't. :-( I wish I had seen it though so I could have proven that doubled iso's aren't always bad!!! I hate when people get dogmatic like that and love it when I can prove them wrong. :-)

4. Qe2? was definitely a mistake. I got my lines confused. I remembered seeing Qe2 played in 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5+ Ne7 4. c3 Nf6 5. Qe2 but forgot that it was the 3. Bb5+ line of the Sicilian not the 3. c3 line! That annoys me the most in this game I think is that I had it worked out earlier to play an early e5 to avoid problems protecting e4, but when the time came, I waited one move too long. Oh well, live and learn.

And I did see Rxd5 before I played Rc1. :-) I had planned on playing Rc1 for a while to protect the pawn but then I saw the unprotected Bishop and wondered if there was anything forcing there so calculated it out and saw that it was a good endgame for me. (I thought it won a pawn at first because the c pawn "disappeared" in my head during calculations but I saw the minor piece differences as well)

I thought quite a bit about Bc3 with the threat to g7 like you said, but I thought I could try to solidify my position a little bit more first and try for that later, then it went away after he played Rf7 because of my passivity. I didn't take on f7 because I think it loses the pawn as it's REALLY hard to protect on f7 where I had hopes of holding onto it with it on c7.

It was so frustrating to see this game slip out of my

One thing you missed though was the wonderful 42. Bxg4! which I think was clearly best as if he plays 42... Nxg4 then the pawn will queen so it just wins the pawn. This was another case of me moving just a little too fast because I thought the game would pretty much win itself.

This was also by far the longest chess game I've ever played, all and all it took just under 3 hours to complete.

I put up a copy of my thought processes during the game in my training journal if anyone wants to see it, and my full analysis of this will be up in the games and replays section within the next half hour. I'd love to hear people's comments! And thanks again BK, really appreciate your analysis.

Rob,

I did fail to look at 47.Bxg4 during the game, but the reason I posted that comment in your journal about it is that it doesn't win. Bxg4? Nxg4 h7 Ne5+! Ke4 Ng6

There's a similar trick in the g5 line. g5 Nxh4 gxh6 Nxf5 h7?? (better is Kxf5) Nd6+! Ke5 Nf7 Kf6 Nh8 Kg7 d3 Kxh8 d2 Kg7 d1=Q h8=Q Qd4+

Brett

Huh, thanks BK. I saw that Gooeyjim mentioned this in my other analysis thread, but didn't know there would be a similar "trick" in the g5 line. There are reasons I'm still rated 1450 you know, this being one of them. :-P