Trouble Viewing Games on Grantham Chessworld

Recently some readers of this blog experienced problems with viewing the games. I have made some inquiry and it is truth that some of multiple-game-viewers do not work under Internet Explorer. Should you have any problem like that than you may switch to Google Chrome which doesn't feature similar glitch.
Sorry for this inconvenience.
ID

Grantham-2 lost to Gambit-2

The night, Wednesday 24 of March 2013 will not be commemorated very well in the Grantham chess club. Grantham second team was outplayed in home match against Gambit-2 team. Both top players lost as well Ben Mason on the bottom board.
A recognition goes to doyenne of the team Trevor Palmer who drew his match against Graeme Jennings and Chris Holt who continues in his good performance against John Tassi.

Grantham-2		1½:3½	Gambit-2
David I	161	0:1	Sudar D	160
Hebert A	161	0:1	Subira M	-
Palmer T	150	½:½	Jennings G	158
Holt C	147	1:0	Tassi J	151
Mason B	138	0:1	Roper K	157

Here you can see the games which I have chased so far.

Jim Burnett of Mansfield is the Winner of 38th Nott's Open

Jim Burnett

Another year of Nottingham Annual Chess Congress was played last weekend. 38th year of the tournament with long tradition (in details see the following link) has been played.

Mike Surtees

Open section was won by Jim Burnett of Mansfield Chess Club chased by Claudio Mangione of Grantham Chess Club and Mike Surtees of Bolton.

Claudio Mangione

Claudio plays an interesting fighting chess and keeps improving his game getting stronger and stronger. 
Below you can find collection of his games played in this tournament.

An Interesting Pawn-Break in a Four-Bishops-Ending

Modern correspondence chess is not what it used to be in the seventies of last century. Very little theory (comparing to modern era) and no computers, databases and engines. Just to give you a good example what I mean: The Isaac Boleslavsky's book "Drachenvariante bis Paulsen-System" published by Sportverlag Berlin in 1971 and

Boleslavsky: Drachenvariante bis Paulsen-System

covering such extensive systems of Sicilian Defence like Dragon, Najdorf and Paulsen system in one volume, was just simply A5 format book with less than 300 pages. Try to compare this book with Gufeld & Stesko "Ultimate Dragon" which is focused on Dragon line only and it is published in two volumes of the similar size each.
Well, so if you play correspondence chess today you have to opt for "anti-computer" strategies and to play for ending.
My following post is dedicated to an interesting Bishop endgame with plenty of pawns and all four Bishops on the board. The fact that I won is just a bonus. But there are three interesting motifs which I want to highlight and this is the reason why I publish this ending here.
First, it is a motif of pawn-break. Second motif is gaining the space advantage by restriction and advancing the King into opponent's camp. The last one is a "Zugzwang".
The pawn-break is perhaps the most important part of whole endgame. Once I saw it I became to believe that I could possibly win.
The ending is complex and I did not publish all possible lines which I had analysed, but if you find some interesting improvement of either attack or defence, please make your comment.
Hope you will enjoy as much as I did.

Natalia Pogonina's Photo Session for the TV Channel "Russia 2" | chess-news.ru

http://chess-news.ru

Russian GM Natalia Pogodina convinces the public that top-level chess is not just a domain of ugly men with great brain capacity, but also pretty women.
She took a part in the contest the "Girl of the Month" presented by the Russian TV channel "Russia 2".
You can read more and see more pictures on the following link:

Natalia Pogonina's Photo Session for the TV Channel "Russia 2" | chess-news.ru

Reigning Champion Lost to Ashfield

In the penultimate match of this season, the already-reigning-champion Grantham-1 lost to Ashfield after solid but mediocre performance.
The match was actually lost on the board 4 when Ivan David quite stubbornly kept refusing an offered draw despite the fact that he was running short of time and his advantage which he had had initially, slowly but gradually disappeared. He blundered in complex position when both player had just less that five minutes to go but at this point of game it was Neil Graham who had the upper hand. 
A rather unpleasant result cannot change anything on the fact that Grantham has already won the league.

Ashfield-1		2:3	Grantham-1
Halfpenny G	189	½:½	Mangione C	199
Burke S	166	½:½	Birtwistle N	184
Jarvis D	164	½:½	Payne N	186
Graham N	145	1:0	David I	161
Sayer R	120	½:½	Mason B	138

Lincolnshire League: Grantham Lost in Title Match

Grantham played Lincoln in a title deciding game and ended up on the wrong side of a 2.5-1.5 score line. The title can still be won bit Grantham now need all results to go our way in the last two league matches.

Lincoln		2½:1½	Grantham
Macdonald I	154	½:½	Holt C	147
Ludlow R	158	1:0	Mason B	138
Sherlock P	130	1:0	Wollerton G	135
Bull D	126	1:0	Scarborough J	85

And here is only one game which I have been able to chase so far, Russell Ludlow against Ben Mason.

Chess-Results Server Chess-results.com

Have you already seen this website?
Chess-Results Server Chess-results.com
The tournament archive of chess-results.com soon contains 40.000 tournaments from around the world, from club tournaments up to European Championships and Chess Olympiads. This is made possible by the program Swiss-Manager, a adminstrationsprogramm for chess tournaments, working very closely with chess-results.com.

Chess Informant

Are you looking for a source of good chess information? Well, Chess Informant (of former Yugoslavia and now of the Republic of Serbia) offers better services than it used to be. You can get the Chess informant not only in a printed version with accompanied DVD, but you can get it on DVD alone in four different formats - Chess Informant Expert, Chess Assistant, Chess Base and standard PGN. More information you can find here.

NCA: West Bridgford ½ - 4½ Grantham-1. Two rounds to go, Grantham Already League Champion

Two rounds to go in NCA, Division-1 and the winner of the league is already known. The defending champion, Grantham-1 team, managed to win in their away match against West Bridgford convincingly ½:4½ and even two loses in last two rounds cannot change anything on the fact that Grantham won this league for fourth times in the row. It is a kind of a remarkable achievement having in the view that the team line-up has changed over the years significantly...

West Bridgford		½:4½	Grantham-1
Richmond R	196	0:1	Mangione C	199
Truman H	182	0:1	Birtwistle N	184
Hill F	116	0:1	Payne N	186
Nabbs T	153	½:½	David I	161
Crosdale H	151	0:1	McCarthy	166

The NCA League results in full you can find here.