Tactics Time Chess Newsletter: Chu Chu Train
Published: Tue, 02/11/14
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his position comes from a bullet game played by my good friend Jeff Baffo this past weekend on chess.com.
In the position on the right it is White to move.
Answer below.
Today I would like to talk about Jeopardy contestant Arthur Chu.
Chu has recently been making headlines because of his unusual playing style on the long running and popular game show Jeopardy.
and
are two examples of stories in the mainstream media about him.
Chu has been called a "villian", a "mad genius" and even a "thug", for his playing style, which rejects conventional wisdom and Jeopardy traditions.
For example, instead of playing the clues in order from top to bottom in a row - Chu will jump all over the place, keeping his opponents off guard, because he knows what category he is going to pick, but they do not. Chu's unusual strategy has been successful - helping him to win over 100,000 dollars on the show.
It reminded me how whenever someone "thinks different", or does something they are not "supposed" to be doing, there is often a backlash- even if what that person or team is doing is completely within the rules, AND it causes them to win or be more successful.
I have written before about "Moneyball" and how the baseball purists hated it when it first came on the scene.
Tim Ferriss in his book "The Four Hour Work Week", talks about how he exploited a loophole in the rules to become a kickboxing champion.
Ferriss used a process of shoving opponents out of the ring. He would also dramatically dehydrate himself before weigh in, and then rehydrate before the fight in order to compete several classes below his actual weight.
People were outraged by the way Ferriss played the game, but it was all perfectly legal according to the rule book.
The same was true of Michael de la Maza, and his Rapid Chess Improvement ideas - de la Maza created a program of only studying tactics. The purists HATED the idea of ignoring the traditional models of chess study, even though it helped MDLM to gain hundreds of rating points in a very short period of time.
Now years later, the importance of tactics study is seen by many as "obvious" and a "given", but only a few years ago there was a great backlash and outrage any time the subject was mentioned.
I recently got some "backlash" about my Tactics Time book on the "Chess Reviews" blog - http://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/2014/02/07/the-happy-meal-of-tactics-books
The review called it the "Happy Meal of Chess Books" (which I have to admit I think it pretty clever and funny, and my warped sense of humor kind of likes this title lol)
It almost seemed to me as if the reviewer was saying "How dare this wood pushing, patzer write a chess book! Chess books are supposed to be written by GMs! And Chess Tactics Books are supposed to look a certain way!! TRADITIONS people!!"
I went on quite a lengthy rant on my own blog after I read this review: http://tacticstime.com/chess-books/the-happy-meal-of-chess-books/
I was really touched to see that several TT readers defended the book on a facebook forum related to chess books - https://www.facebook.com/groups/454058311291889/
The times are changing in the chess world, just like on Jeopardy, kick boxing and baseball. I think that so many chess players have adopted the "Tactics, Tactics, Tactics" idea, that if your tactics aren't up to speed you are likely to get blown off the board.
Here is the complete game
[Site "Chess.com"] [Date "2014.02.09"] [Round "?"] [White "jbaffo"] [Black "masterkostas"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "A41"] [WhiteElo "1418"] [BlackElo "1256"] [PlyCount "23"] [EventDate "2014.??.??"] 1. Nc3 d6 2. d4 g6 3. h4 Nc6 4. h5 Bg7 5. e3 Nf6 6. h6 Bf8 7. e4 a6 8. Nf3 Nd7 9. Bc4 Na5 10. Bxf7+ Kxf7 11. Ng5+ Ke8 12. Ne6 1-0 You can play through this game here: http://www.viewchess.com/cbreader/2014/2/9/Game799377983.html
Answer:
After 10...Kxf7 11.Ng5+ Black has no good squares.
If 11...Ke8 12. Ne6 smothered "Queen mates" the Black Queen
If 11...Kf6 12. Nd5# a very pretty mate
If 11.Kg8 the best response 12. Ne6 attacking the Queen 12...Qe8 moving the Queen to the only safe square 13. Nxc7 winning a pawn and forking the Black Queen and Rook.
Happy Tactics!
Your Friend,
 P.S. I heard from my friend Joel Johnson, that is nearing completion on his new "Positional Attacks" book!
Joel writes: "Positional Attacks should go to press this week or early next week - I
am doing the final proofreading and will do one more after I get the
first copy back."
Stay tuned for some TT guest newsletters from Joel :)
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© Copyright 2011-2014 Timothy Brennan, All Rights Reserved.
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I never understood why this traditional way of playing the game has been kind of locked in. ~ Authur Chu
