We all missed Bg7#! Oh well. Good game, guys.

Thanks Bkildahl. I do take small issue about your "too fast in the opening" statement. After the fourth move we had transposed into positions I was pretty familiar with, otherwise I would have taken more time. I had actually obtained similar positions where I played Bxe6 a few times before. Otherwise, I really enjoyed your commentary- although it was painful to watch the ending a second time Of course, hitchhiker did a video too so I'll have to relive the horror yet a third time . This time control was a lot easier to deal with than 5 minute chess- I've noticed as I've aged (I just turned 54) that my playing is probably better but definitely slower and here as soon as the time got short, my brain froze and my calculation went out the window. Oh well- more games to come and perhaps I can redeem myself.

Thanks again!

Tremendous commentary, Brett. Awesome.

Good game, kamus and estrass!

-BH

The commentary was very cool....nice to listen to.
Thx for that
Bg7# oh my god...didnt see that too when I watched the game the first time.
Forced mate, winning endgame and a blunder which changes all. I am a little bit sorry for you kamus but I have to admit that such things also have some entertainment value

Very well done! Interesting how we all think about different lines in certain positions.

Well, if you are entertained then it's not a complete loss. Let's give due credit to estrass though, he hung in there and kept his cool in time trouble and found the peskiest moves- in this case perseverance overcame a losing position- a lesson for us all..

Indeed.
I mean he managed to finish the game with only seconds on the clock.
It is easy to say that K+Q vs K is an easy one but if one has only 5 secs on ones clock it can be a different story

Gratz! to estrass

Thanks so much for posting this vid, I'm really excited about following the this!!!!!! H.G.

Wow, that's like a two point turn-around, from a win for White to a win for Black. Anything can happen in quick time controls.

Chess is a weird game, one person sees one thing, but not another. For example, at 19:15 I thought that White should play (after 18...Rac8) 19. Qf7 (my idea was Bg7 mate straight away which was missed by others), it seems that a rook has to scoot over to g8, there are two ways to do this; a) 19...Rxd1+ 20.Rxd1 Rg8 21.Nfg5 Nd5 (guarding the h7 square via x-ray) and after 22.Qxc7 and how does Black stop Nf7# or Qxh7#, the other way, b) 19...Rg8 right away meets with a similar fate, 20.Nfg5 Nd5 but now, simply 21.Rxd5, the queen still cannot be taken as it would be mate, and the threat is Nef6 (this is why the other knight went to g5) followed by Rd7 blocking off the Black queen's x-ray defense of h7.

Seems that Black is quite stuck in these lines. The more I look at it, the more problematic it becomes, for example, if (in the second line) Black plays 21...Bxe4 the 22.Rd7 wins on the spot. If he tries 21...Rcd8 then 22.Qxc7 and mate is threatened on both f7 and h7. Pretty tricky.

I'm looking at the from the position before 19.Qf7, so I might be missing something, but I don't think so.

Great, just looked at this again and I realized that if Black plays Rg8 White simply checks on f6 and it's over. Damn, finding long wins and overlooking the quick ones . Still, interesting tactics all around.

As it turned out, the line played by White worked out well, but I didn't see what White would do after 20...Kg8. True, White has a discovered check with the knight, but what can he do with it? He can win the exchange after Nd6+ but that beats the heck out of mate.

I dunno. I guess all roads lead to Rome, but I thought the immediate 19.Qf7 was a more forcing line and I've been taught to follow forcing lines if they look favorable.

Thanks for the presentation and thanks to the players for playing. This is actually an exciting little tournament. I wish I was home more so that I could catch these and annotate them. I get so messed up with the different time zones. I've turned into my father, it's like "Okay, it's One O'clock here, what time is it there?" - "Hey Dad, I'm on the other side of town! It's the same time!" Maybe I'll be able to catch one or two before this thing is over.

Good luck to both players - and thanks to Bkildahl for taking the time to give commentary!