Chess Basics, Letter 1 (rev. 12/28/1996) ########################## from Heiner Theofel Some words about me: -------------------- I'm 43, married, 3 children, mechanical engineer, and live near Stuttgart, south-west of Germany. Chess I've learned with 6 from my father. Later - with some breaks - I played OTB as pupil and as student, then for some years correspondence chess (ICCF, Higher class). Then I 'gave up' my chess career and threw away all my papers when I moved. The only things remaining from my 'former chess live' is a newspaper-photo, were I was sitting at the board in my first tournament (12 years old) and a newspaper article from my simultaneous win against GM Pachman, 20 years ago. The only game score from earlier I found in the journal FERNSCHACH: Theofel, H. - Jokel, A., 1984, ICCF,EU-H French Defence [C16] 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 Ne7 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.bxc3 b6 7.Qg4 Kf8 8.h4 h5 9.Qd1 Nf5 10.Bg5 f6 11.Bf4 fxe5 12.Bxe5 Nc6 13.Nf3 Nxe5 14.Nxe5 Rh6 15.Bd3 c5 16.Bxf5 exf5 17.Qf3 Be6 18.Kd2 Rc8 19.Rh3 Qc7 20.Rc1 Kg8 21.Rg3 Kh7 22.Rg5 g6 23.Qg3 cxd4 24.cxd4 Bf7 25.Nxf7 Qxf7 26.Re1 Qd7 27.Qe5 Qc6 28.Qe7+ Kh8 29.c4 ! dxc4 30.Re6 c3+ 31.Kc1 Qc7 32.Qxc7 Rxc7 33.Rxf5 Rd7 34.Rf4 Kg7 35.Rfe4 Rh8 36.Kc2 Rf7 37.f3 Rc8 38.d5 Rf5 39.Re7+ Rf7 40.d6 Rc6 41.Rf4 Rxe7 42.dxe7 Re6 43.Re4 Rxe4 44.fxe4 Kf7 45.Kxc3 Kxe7 46.Kc4 Ke6 47.Kb5 1-0 My '2nd chess career' began 4 years ago: my children started to play in little tournaments from the club in our little village. And since then I'm coaching the youth section of our club. Beginning with a few pupils, our weekly sessions have a good frequentation now. Two of them, Jens Babutzka (CBase participant) and my son Jan, are also IECC-members. About notation, diagrams used in CBasics: ========================================= In my messages I will use the English algebraic notation (as you learned in our newbie-program). For a given position on the board I use a description as follows: White: Kh1,Bd1,Nf1 (3) / Black: Kf5,Qd3,Bd4 (3) / White to move can reach a draw! --------------------------------- Task 1: Find out the move sequence! Answer: 1. ... --------------------------------- Or I will use such a type of an ASCII-diagram (capital letters = White, small letters = black, K,k = King, Q,q = Queen, R,r = Rook, B,b = bishop, N,n = kNight, A,a = pAwn): +-----------------+ 8 | r n b q k b n r | black: 7 | a a a a a a a a | NN 6 | - + - + - + - + | 5 | + - + - + - + - | 4 | - + - + - + - + | 3 | + - + - + - + - | 2 | A A A A A A A A | white: 1 | R N B Q K B N R | NN +-----------------+ a b c d e f g h Or a mixed mode like follows: +-----------------+ black: 8 | n K - + - + Q r | Kh1,Qa4,Rh8,Ba5,Na8,Nb5,Pe7 (7) 7 | + A + - a - + - | 6 | A + - + - + - + | 5 | b n + - + N + - | White to move 4 | q + B + - A - + | 3 | + - + N + - + - | 2 | - A R R - + - + | 1 | + - + - + - + k | Kb8,Qg8,Rc2,Rd2,Bc4,Nd3,Nf5,Pa6,b2,b7,f4 (11) +-----------------+ white: a b c d e f g h --------------------------------- Task 2 (puzzle from S. Lloyd): Find mate in ONE move in the above diagram! Answer: 1. ... --------------------------------- Game: HT - CBP =============================== As a main topic of Chess Basics, we play game(s) 'Heiner Theofel - CB Participants'. This is not part of ftp-versions of Chess Basics letters, but after completion of a game the full notation and annotations will be given in a later issue. ------------------------------------ Participants in Chess Basics may.. - send answers to tasks/questions that appear in the letters (marked with ----. Please cut away these marks and text outside marks, because I don't want to read my own text again and again, to find out where participant's remarks are) - ask anything else about our actual topics - contribute own games (with own comments, if you want / diagram of key position would be good) - send your proposal for our game 'Heiner Theofel - CB Participants'. Everything that seems worthwile for all will arise in one of the next letters. Anything else I can hopefully answer directly, sooner or later.