What happened to 2011?

Seems like it was here just yesterday. And suddenly you look around and it’s February 2012.

The last thing I remember is standing on a mountaintop overlooking my hometown in Tennessee. The next morning I awoke in the intensive care unit in a Chattanooga hospital. Turns out I had the good luck to collapse with an EMT standing nearby. He, my sister, and some visiting cousins got me into an ambulance and then in a helicopter airlift to the hospital.

I’m not sure what happened, but I’m recovering nicely (but slowly), thanks. Unfortunately we’ve had other family emergencies over the past couple of months. Things like that happen to all of us, but they seem to gang up on old folks. (My hat’s off to Korchnoi, still ticking at 80, to make 81 next month.)

But I’m back now and hope to get in a few posts each month. And I apologize to readers—if any of you are still out there—for not getting some sort of notice up before this.

I’ll start back with an easy game. It appeared in a recent TWIC. Shades of Milner-Barry and George Thomas.

And yet another rook sac on the knight at f6 brings a quick knockout. The patent on this expired years ago.

Catching up with Klaus Nickl

Back in the 1980s Austria’s Klaus Nickl was a formidable opponent in Blackmar-Diemer thematic correspondence tournaments. After I included several of his Lemberger Countergambits in my last post I decided to see what sort of chess he’d been up to recently. No straight BDGs turned up, although Nickl seems to still be quite active over the board. As he approaches his 70th birthday (he was born in 1942) his ELO has fallen a bit from a high of just over 2250 some years ago.

He had a very successful outing this past July in the 9th International Senior Tournament in Ramsau am Dachstein, Austria, finishing clear first, with 6 points in 7 rounds, ahead of several FIDE Masters. I have no games from that event, but found an interesting one from the European Seniors this past April. It’s a Veresov. It’s also a BDG by transposition. You can try, but you can’t get away from the BDG.

The Hübsch: Such a Pretty Little Gambit

These days every chess player has his favorite refutation of the Blackmar-Diemer, but still some consider it the better part of discretion simply to avoid it. One way to do that is via the Hübsch Gambit: 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.e4, and now rather than 3…dxe4, satisfying White’s desires, Black plays 3…Nxe4.

It’s not easy to make progress against this, even though GM Tartakower lost with black in the stammpartie of this line (see below). The other day I came across a video that does a good job of presenting some key lines in this variation from black's viewpoint.

You can take a look at this video here: JoshSpecht - Opening Analysis: Hubsch def. vs. BDG [14:36].

And here’s the Tartakower game. I hate to see my favorite grandmaster lose.

Tartakower Plays the BDG

Tartakower was one of the few grandmasters who was willing to give the BDG a try now and then. (That's only one of many reasons he has long been my favorite GM.) Here's one of his games where Black declines the gambit with an inferior line. Tartakower - Raizman Paris Christmas Tournament, 1954/55 [Game 261c in Diemer's book, his notes after Tartakower] 1.d4 Nf6 2.f3 d5 3.e4 dxe4 4.Nc3 e5 5.dxe5 Qxd1+ 6.Kxd1 Nfd7 7.Nd5 c6 8.Nc7+ Kd8 9.Nxa8 Nxe5 "...eine Idee des französischen Meisters Raizman, mit der er in der letzen Runde des internationalen Weihnachtsturniers in Paris 1954/55 GM Dr. S. Tatakower überraschte, dessen Kommentar im Turnierbuch ich folge..." ("an idea of the French master Raizman, with which he surprised GM Dr. S. Tatakower (whose commentary in the tournament book I follow) in the last round of the international Christmas tournament in Paris 1954/55 ..."} 10.Be3 c5 11.Ke1 Bd6 12.Rd1 Ke7 13.Nc7 Bxc7 14.Bxc5+ Kf6 15.fxe4 Nbc6 16.Nf3 Re8 17.Be2 g5 18.Rf1 Kg6 19.Bd6 Ba5+ 20.c3 Ng4 21.Rd5 h6 22.Nd4 Bb6 [22...Ne3 23.Nxc6 Nxd5 24.Nxa5+-] 23.Bxg4 Bxg4 24.e5 Nxd4 25.Rxd4! [25.cxd4 Be6 26.Rb5 Bc4 27.Rf6+ Kg7] 25...Bxd4 26.Rf6+ Kg7 27.cxd4 Be6 28.b3 Rc8 29.Kd2 Rc6 30.Rf2 a5 31.Kd3 Bd5 32.g3 Rc1 33.Ba3 Rc6 34.Be7 a4 35.bxa4 Ra6 36.Rc2 Rxa4 37.a3 Ra5 38.Rc7 Rb5 39.Bb4 Kg6 40.Rd7 Be6 41.Rd6 Kf5 42.h3 h5 43.Ke3 Rd5 44.Rb6 Rd7 45.Bc5 Kg6 46.Ke4 Kh7 47.h4! gxh4 48.gxh4 Bd5+ 49.Kf5 Kg7 50.Kg5 Bf3 51.Rf6 Bd1 Black offered a draw here. 52.Bd6 Rd8 53.Rf1 Bg4 54.Rb1 [54.Rc1 Rc8 55.Rxc8 Bxc8 56.Kxh5 f6] 54...Bf3 55.Rb3 Bd5 56.Rc3 Kh7 57.Rc5 [57.Kxh5? Rg8 threatening Be6 and Bg4#] 57...Be6 [57...Rg8+ 58.Kf6] 58.d5 Bg4 59.Rc7 Rd7 60.Rxd7 Bxd7 61.Kxh5 Ba4 62.Bb4 Bb3 63.d6 Be6 64.Kg5 1-0