Mechanics' Institute Chess Club Newsletter #454

...Chess is not like a school subject where you accumulate knowledge until you are an expert. Improvement comes mainly from the ability to process and interpret the information that comes your way, and put it to work in practice. Knowing how to translate your knowledge into good decisions over the board is where talent comes in, and if you seriously believe you don't have it, you will have a very difficult road ahead of you.

1) Mechanics Institute Chess Club News

2) Carl Pilnick

3) Americans Abroad

4) Around the US

5) News from the Anatoly Karpov School in Lindsborg , Kansas

6) Upcoming Events

Ricardo DeGuzman took first in the 9th Charles Bagby Memorial winning all of his games. Fellow IM Andrei Florean battled to a draw with NM Gregory Young in the last round as both players shared second place a half point back. The 69-player attendance was the second highest in the 9 year series of monthly G/45 events trailing only the 2003 Max Wilkerson Memorial which had 74 participants.

DeGuzman,R - Rozenvasser,A [A48]
9th Bagby Memorial G/45 (4), 2009

Congratulations to Mike Goodall who despite taking chemotherapy treatments during much of the last Tuesday Night Marathon still managed to finish among the prize winners with his score of 5.5 from 8. Mike, who is feeling much better now, didn't lose a single game in the event and gained 32 rating points. Well done!

Payam Afkham-Ebrahimi has been on a role of late. He tied for first with Ramen Farzaneh-Far in the Thursday evening Tanaka Invitational at the Mechanics' . The winners scored four from six in the double round robin event with Steve Gaffagan third with 3 and George Sanguinetti fourth at 1. Payam also defeated Michael Askin 4-0 in a match.

For more information on Thursday evening tournament activity at the Mechanics' go to

The House of Staunton has made available a first class reproduction of the famous wooden chess set that graced the tables of the Mechanics' Institute from 1910s to the early 1970s. The set is available in Boxwood and Golden Rosewood, Ebonized Boxwood , and Boxwood and Rosewood: at prices ranging from $199 to $219.

The House of Staunton, in conjunction with the legendary Mechanics Institute Chess Club, is proud to offer the Mechanics Institute Series Chess set. It features a 4.25" King with a 1.875"diameter base. The Chess pieces are hand carved by our master artisans and crafted out of the highest grade woods. The Chess pieces are heavily weighted with luxurious billiard cloth base pads and a rich French Polish finish. These Chessmen are an exact reproduction of the Chessmen that were produced by the Mechanics Institute in 1916 for a simultaneous exhibition by World Champion GM Jose Raul Capablanca. This very unique pattern of Chessmen is as playable as it is durable. Here's your chance to own a piece of Chess history!

Carl Pilnick, like most of the strong American players of his generation, was born in New York City (December 24, 1923).Carl learned to play when he was 8 or 9 but did not get serious until he was 15 when he joined the Marshall Chess Club. He remembers the late 1930s as a grand time at the Marshall CC. Frank Marshall was still alive and Carl got to play Edward Lasker in various events. Marcel Duchamp came frequently to the club to play but didn't speak much. .

Carl was the Captain of his City College of NYC team in 1942 when he qualified to play in the US Championship Finals. He was not a first hand observer of the famous Reshevsky-Denker incident as he was playing his own game at the time but remembers hearing Denker complaining loudly and that Sammy just walked out. Other participants and spectators supported Denker but to no avail. Pilnick, like many American players of the time, did not have a high opinion of the Tournament Director Walter Stephens who he recalls as "a pompous ass who knew nothing about chess but had money and liked to direct tournaments."

Pilnick felt the incident was typical of Reshevsky who would take any advantage he could get. When Pilnick swindled Sammy into a stalemate later in the tournament (Qf2!) the latter slammed down ...Qxf2 and immediately rushed out of the room. No hands were shaken nor scoresheets signed.

Immediately after the US Championship Carl was inducted into the US Army and served in the Army Air Corp from 1942-46. He completed college and started working in the late 1940s. During this time Carl's chess development was aided by his nearby neighbor Arthur Bisguier, like Carl a resident of the Bronx

Pilnick married in 1951 and has two children. With the notable exception of the 1952 US Open in Tampa he rarely played outside of the Eastern seaboard and mostly confined himself to events in NYC until moving to Los Angeles in 1961. His best results were tying for first with Santasiere in the 1953 Marshall Chess Club Championship and sharing top honors at the 1971 American Open (he won on tiebreak over Evans, Browne and a couple of other players). The victory in the American Open earned him a Chess Life cover (March 1972), almost 30 years to the month that he appeared on the cover of Chess Review ( April 1942).

Carl's favorite game is his win over Mednis in a Queen versus two Rooks ending. His favorite players that influenced him the most were the top Soviets in the late 1940s and 50s.He subscribed to both Chess Review and the American Chess Bulletin throughout the 1940s and 50s and generally read whatever he could get his hands on, especially in the late 1930s and early 1940s. He found Modern Chess Openings and Basic Chess Endings quite useful.

Larry Evans won this 76-player event with an undefeated 10 from 12. Carl Pilnick was fifth on tiebreak with 8 points.& nbsp;

The threats of ...Rxe3 and ...Bxb2 are too much for White to handle.

Denker made this same mistake against Smyslov in the USA-USSR match in 1946. It's strange he repeats himself.

Denker tried 7...d6 against Smyslov. His "improvement" also lands him in hot water.

15...0–0–0 was indicated.

16...Rxd3 doesn't work because of the variation 17.Rxd3 Qxc5 18.Qxb7 Nf6 19.Qa8+ Ke7 20.Qb7+ Kf8 21.Rd8+ Ne8 22.Qb8 Bh6+ 23.f4 Qe7 24.Red1

Marshall Chess Club Championship (4) 1955-56

This event was won by Herbert Seidman with 11 from 15. Edmar Mednis and Anthony Santasiere shared second with 10 1/2. Pilnick had 8 1/2 points. This game is=2 0in Chess Base (presumably from a Spence bulletin) but only the first third of it is given.

Sources: This score is from a Herman Helms column dated January 21, 1956, but with no indication of the newspaper. It was likely either the NY Times or the NY Sun. The first two games were entered using Pilnick's scoresheets.

Hikaru Nakamura turned in one of the finest recent in recent American chess by winning a strong round robin in San Sebastian this past week by defeating Ruslan Ponomariov 2-0 in a blitz playoff after sharing first place in the regular tournament. This performance lifted Hikaru into the top 20 players in the world at 2730.

1-2. Ponomariov and Nakamura – 6½
3. Svidler - 5½
4-5. Vallejo and Kasimdzhanov – 5
6-7. Movsesian, Vachier-Lagrave -4½
8. Granda Zuniga – 3½
9. San Segundo – 2½
10. Karpov - 1½.

A few top tournaments have finished since publication of the July FIDE rating list. Here is how things look factoring these results in.

1. Topalov 2813
2. Anand 2788
3. Carlsen 2772
4. Kramnik 2771
5. Aronian 2768
6. Jakovenko 2764
7. Gelfand 2764
8. Leko 2759
9. Radjabov 2756,6
10. Morozevich 2751
11. Svidler 2741
12. Ponomariov 2740
13. Gashimov 2740
14. Shirov 2734
15. Wang Yue 2733
16. Grischuk 2733 0
17. Nakamura 2730
18. Ivanchuk 2725
19. Dominguez 2720
20. Karjakin 2717

FM Daniel Naroditsky scored 5.5 from 9 in the Leiden Chess Tournament including a win over Ukrainian GM Vovk ( 2567).

IM Dmitry Zilberstein scored 6.5 from 9 in the recently concluded Canadian Open in Edmonton to tie for ninth place in the 203 player field. Among those on his scoregroup were Chinese 2700 Ni Hua. The event was won by Canadian GM Mark Bluvstein on tiebreak over IM Edward Porper whose playing career has been given a new life since settling in Alberta ( he trains the young talent FM Eric Hansen) from Israel. Rated below 2500 FIDE, Porper had an incredible finishing kick at the Canadian Open that would have done Dave Wottle proud. The last four rounds of the Canadian Open he defeated GMs Ganguly and Mikhalevski and drew with Shirov and Adams!!

GM Jesse Kraai, the wise man of the El Cerrito chess commune, continues to improve. Witness his outstanding result at the recent New Jersey Futurity where he score an undefeated 7.5 from 10 in the double round robin competition. We hope to have games from this event shortly.

1. GM Jesse Kraai 7.5

2. GM Joel Benjamin 6.5

3. GM Leonid Yudasi 5.5

4. IM Milos Scekic 5.0

5. IM Dean Ippolito 4.5

5. FM Evan Ju 1.0

IM Ray Robson won a strong US Junior in Milwaukee last week with an impressive 6 from 7 a point ahead of second place finisher IM Sal Bercys.

Other scores in that event organized by Alex Betaneli and directed by Frank Berry were:

3. GM-elect Alex Lenderman 4

4-5. IM Sam Shankland FM Michael Lee 3.5

6. FM Joel Banawa 3

7. FM Eliott Liu 2.5

8. Max Coleman 0.5