Thursday, June 26, 2008

More Pictures from the US Chess School

This is a really fantastic chess camp.

Mornings are spent looking at looking at the kids' own games. Each kid brings one heavily annotated loss to camp; maybe 2-3 present each day. Kaidanov is a big genius at recognizing general problems each player is having-- some examples from this group: not thinking enough about the opponent's counterplay, being overly optimistic, missing in-between moves, and making premature exchanges (current running count for everyone in the first 3 days of camp: 39 premature exchanges). He's very good at keeping all of these issues in mind and pointing out when the same types of mistakes come up in other ways, like during problem-solving or guess-the-moves activities.

Other topics so far: positional exchange sacrifices, material vs. initiative, sicilian for black: najdorf/scheveningen, prophylaxis. Lots of guessing the moves and problem solving.

Upcoming topics tomorrow and Saturday:
Sicilian for Black: how to handle anti-Sicilian systems.
How to play complex technical endgames.
How to play complex sharp endgames.


The group works on a laptop projected on a screen.



A blitz break
David Adelberg watches Joseph Moon play.
Luke Harmon
Jarod Pamatmat, Luke Harmon, Kevin Wang


Basketball before lunch.

David Adelberg
Sasha Velikanov
Joseph Moon

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