Dear Inna Suvorov,I have not played in any chess tournament for a very long time now. I used to play chess with a co-worker of varying shift over the phone, or met occasionally over coffee. We both had magnetic chess sets, and left messages on the answering machine for the moves. We kind of on the same level of skill, with him winning 60% of the time. We completed a game in one week, sometimes longer. Then I lost interest and stopped playing. And after we moved on in different jobs later on in life, we lost track of each others, and that was that. The last time I heard from him, was that he was joining an Internet chess club with opponents from all over the world with equal or higher ratings. He suggested me to join, but declined.
A few weeks ago I read this article in the newspaper about a chess tournament in Mexico the "Morelia / Linares Super GM Tournament". It was Grandmasters only tournament that participated by the top 8 Grandmasters in the world, so the "Super GM" name. Each player played each other twice, 14 rounds in all. Evidently they played in 2 countries, the first 7 rounds they played in Morelia, Mexico and the last 7 rounds played in Linares, Andalusia, Spain. The tournament was amazingly won by Indian chess Grandmaster Vishy Anand. And because of his win, he became the highest rank grandmaster in the world with FIDE rating of 2816. This is better by 15 points over 2 grandmasters with same ratings of 2801: Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria and Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, both participated in that event. This is the first time ever that the best player in the world hold by a "non white", and people in India took a very great pride and joy because of his achievement.
And that piece of news, all of a sudden sparked some interest in me to play chess again. So I did some inquiries and located a chess club near my place, a 10 minutes drive away. They meet 3 times/week from 7-11 pm. I also inquired the British Columbia Chess Federation (BCCF) and got some website addresses about chess in BC and Canada in general. And to my surprise they still have my name on their players list with my old rating of 1875. But that is way too high now, probably my rating now is 1600 or less because of inactivity for a very long time. Although my highest rating was 1985 when I was a member of "Perth Chess Club" in Western Australia.
In Canada, I used to be a member of "Port Coquitlam Chess Club", and competing in regular tournaments there with mixed results. But my best result was second place at "New Westminster Open" awhile back. I joined chess tournaments at "British Columbia Institute of Technology" a few times in the past with also mixed results, no prizes to show for. You need to be in top 3 from 25-35 players competing to have a prize. I played a couple of times at the prestigious "Keres Memorial" chess tournament which is conducted every year in May at the Hungarian Cultural Centre in Vancouver. I had a very strong results from the 2 tournaments I entered that gave me the good rating of 1875. Although still no award or prize to show for, I managed to beat some very good players and felt that I accomplished something. Now come to think of it, I definitely will be going to see this year's "Keres Memorial" tournament in May 18-21,2007. But not playing in it, just watching it, because of lack of preparation I will be just embarrassing myself if I play. Check mated in 5 moves or something. It is a very strong tournament using 7 round Swiss system over 4 days during Victoria day long weekends. Many players from all over Canada and United States come to play.
In the past I had good results from playing chess. I received a few trophies and cash to show for. In Australia I won once the "Fremantle Open". Came in 1st and 3rd in "Western Australian Open" Reserve Division 2 years in a row in a strong fields. My rating then shot to 1985. There was an Indonesian Obstetrician from Jakarta participating with me in those 2 years. He was an avid chess player doing specialized Obstetrics training in Perth, and a very good player himself. I also joined the prestigious "Perth Chess Club" and played a few tournaments there with mixed results. I won the "Perth Muslim Students Association Chess Tournament" once with strong fields. In Indonesia I won 2 years in a row at "Rumbai Chess Club" tournaments in Sumatra with moderate fields. In Canada I came in 1st and 2nd at the "Indonesian Independence Day Chess Tournament" in Vancouver organized by the Indonesian Consulate with moderate fields from Indonesian students at UBC and SFU 2 years in a row. So I have some credentials in playing good chess. I used to play Ruy Lopez variations for playing white pieces and Sicilian Defence for playing blacks. But I am kind of blurred now how to play them effectively.
By the way the most Grandmasters in the world are from Russia with 164, highest rank is Vladimir Kramnik (2801 rating). I do not know why the Russians are so good in playing chess, maybe something to do with their harsh winter. At one time they had more Grandmasters than the rest of the world combined twice over. Imagine that. Canada has 5 Grandmasters, with highest rank Kevin Spraggett (2611), followed by Alexandre Lesiege, Mark Bluvshtein, Dmitri Tyomlin and Pascal Charbonneau. And Indonesia has 4 Grandmasters, with highest rank Utut Adianto (2587) followed by Susanto Megaranto, Cerdas Barus and Edhi Handoko.
(Photo): "Final" at Rumbai Chess Club, Sumatra, Indonesia. This photo was supposed to be in color, but our Rumbai Photography Club of which I was a member, could only process in B&W print.
