Alberta Chess Report

Alberta Chess Report ● August 2013 20
announcements from Tournament Director
Atheer Jawad and Organizer Frank
Kluytmans. This is a good time to
commend the job done by the two of them
which made the tournament the
participants feel comfortable and allowed
them to concentrate only on their play.
GM Hansen wins strongest
Alberta Championship in history
By: Vlad Rekhson
(all the games described above are
available in the PGN file at:
www.albertachess.org/ACR.html)
The 2013 Alberta Closed Chess
Championship was the strongest in history.
The tournament which took place in a
Round-Robin format over the Easter
weekend had the following participants:
1. GM Eric Hansen (Calgary, 2588 CFC,
2557 FIDE)
2. IM Edward Porper (Edmonton, 2492
CFC, 2418 FIDE)
3. IM Richard Wang (Edmonton, 2460
CFC, 2376 FIDE)
4. FM Vladimir Pechenkin (Edmonton,
2417 CFC, 2357 FIDE)
5. NM Alex Yam (Calgary, 2380 CFC,
2275 FIDE)
6. NM Vlad Rekhson (Calgary, 2135 CFC,
2093 FIDE).
From this list it is clear that there are two
participants who clearly stand out. The
first one is of course, GM Eric Hansen.
After he became, Alberta’s first ever
Grandmaster, Eric’s successes around the
globe were impressive and numerous, so it
appeared that winning the provincial title
was a no-brainer. Still, a few obstacles
had to be conquered. While Eric has a
surprisingly dominating score against IM
Edward Porper, even going back to Eric’s
more modest years; a couple other
tournament participants have given Eric
trouble in the past. IM Richard Wang
actually defeated Eric in their last
encounter during the 2012 Canadian Open;
A tournament which Eric won in a
convincing fashion. NM Alex Yam lost to
Eric in their last game, but he previously
gave Eric plenty of trouble.
The other participant who clearly stands
out from the list is yours truly. In fact,
how did I even make it to such a
tournament? To answer that, we need to
stop for a moment and discuss the
qualification process to the AB Closed.
The regulations of the event state that four
participants qualify by winning qualifying
events, while two more qualify by rating.
It so happened that the first five players
were the highest rated who potentially
could have participated, while I was the
only one whose rating was clearly not high
enough. Instead I won my spot by
winning the Southern Alberta Open. That
tournament was clearly not as strong as the
other qualifiers, but still had a couple of
masters, which I was lucky enough to edge
based on better tie-breaks.
Needless to say that heading into the
event, becoming the new Alberta
Champion was not a goal which I set for
myself. In fact, I was quite worried of
being wiped out in every game and
finishing with zero points. I figured that
while even scoring half a point was going
to be somewhat of an achievement, my
minimum goal was to score at least 1/5,
thus matching my last appearance in the
Alberta Closed back in 2011.
Round 1, Friday, March 29 th .
The first round took place on Friday
evening following some short opening
As the pairings were done a week ahead of
time, most players came into the event
fairly well prepared, thus there wasn’t
much need for last minute preparations.
IM Richard
Wang-GM
Eric Hansen
½-½
Eric had to
meet one of
his main
potential rivals right away. This game was
mostly based on home preparation as the
two played out a known variation until
Eric’s new move 21… Be6. The game
only lasted 3 more moves as Richard
offered a draw and Eric felt that he didn’t
have any real chance to play that position
for a win.
IM Edward Porper-FM Vladimir
Pechenkin 1-0
Unlike the previous game, the next game,
entered new territory on move 5! This is
not unusual for those two as opening like
1. b3 have been a common occurrence
between the two. IM Porper implanted a
knight on e6 and by the time that it was
taken it looked like Vlad’s position would
be quite difficult to defend.
NM Yam-NM Rekhson ½-½
As I entered this tournament, I figured that
my first round encounter was going to be
my best if not the only chance to score
anything in this event. Alex opened with
his typical c3 Sicilian but surprised me
already with 6. dxc5 which is of course a
possible move in this variation, but for
some reason not something that I expected
Alex to play, even though as I found out
later, that is actually his main line.
I played theory for a while, but started to
go astray after 15…Be6? I got into trouble
on the e file and was trying to hang on. I
set up one trick, which Alex actually fell
for as I was able to win a pawn with: 28…
Nxc6. Alex was putting up quite a bit of
resistance, but the endgame was still won