CyChess Part 2 of 3

  My second round game in the CyChess tournament was against Brad Shepard. Brad is a retired forest ranger in his 60’s and has a chess club at a church in downtown Ames that meets on Saturdays. I’ve gone down there a few times and played Brad there. Brad isn’t highly rated, but he likes to attack, kind of like Jerry at our club. I’ve found that if I can keep players like this from attacking for long enough, they will give up material just to get the smell of an attack and when their attack fails to materialize, they will give up still more and more material until they have nothing left to fight with. The only risk with this strategy is that sometimes the opponent finds a real attack and then you given a lower rated player a chance to play in his element. I felt that if I didn’t try to punish Brad for each attacking move he made that may not be sound and just keep feeding him rope, I’d have a good chance of winning.

  At the time, I considered the game a workmanlike effort that pretty much played itself. A few days later, I can see I missed a lot more than I should have, but will give my self credit for not making any glaring errors and never being in danger of losing. Some people think they should just crush a lower rated player, but I'm comfortable just keeping everything under control, especially when I start with an extra pawn like this game. Both methods have their drawbacks. I think the best results will be gained by playing to your temperment and in my case slow and steady wins the race.

  John won his game, but Scott lost to the top seed that Jaleb beat in the first round and Jerry lost to Matt Kreigel. Jaleb got a draw against the dangerous Tim Harder. After the first 2 rounds there were 2 players who had 2 wins and 4 players with 1 win and 1 draw (myself, Jaleb, Tim Harder, and Matt Kreigel). The players with 2 points were going to play each other and if they drew, a win would get me a share of first place.