Friday, March 16, 2007

Kesti-Pearson Match Game 5, 1-0, Kesti Wins Match 4-1 and is Reno CC Class B Champion

Well, it's all in the title above. By winning our game last night, Steve Kesti (1764) defeated me (Robert Pearson (1600)) 4-1 in a match for the 2007 Reno Chess Club Class B Championship. Congratulations and thanks to Steve for a fun and interesting match!

IMPRESSIONS: As usual, I'll post the game within a day or so, but I felt during and after the game last night that at least it was a better contest than Game 4. Against my attempt to get into a Pirc/Modern defense Kesti chose the placid e4, d3 g3, Bg2 setup as White, not getting into anything critical, but on move 8 I gave him the opportunity to push forward with e5, and when I preferred to sacrifice the exchange rather than retreat, things got really interesting. I did get some play for the exchange, but whether it was enough I can't say objectively without a lot more study. For a long time his Queen Bishop and Rook were stuck at home while I made threats--finally, he made what we both thought at the time was a mistake, but when I won back some material with a 'combination' it may have just led to a lost ending with his two Rooks and passed pawn taking on my two Bishops and Knight, according to some quick analysis with A-player Grant Fleming.

Finally, as so often in this match, I blundered during the later play and the agony was shortened. One thing I must improve to make any progress up the ranks is my play in the later stages--I get tired and start to miss simple stuff. I don't know if it's my chess I need to improve so much as my mental and physical endurance, right now.

Anyway, a pretty good battle. Congratulations to Steve Kesti on his 2nd straight Class B crown!

(GAME SCORECOMMENTS AND REPLAY VIEWER WILL FOLLOW)

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