My chess programs (Chess Assistant 18, Chess Aquarium 2020, ChessOK Aquarium 2014, Fritz 12, Fritz 17 and ChessBase 16) were given another look to see if they had any hidden secrets that might be worth further exploration. The answer was no and Fritz 17 has replaced Fritz 12 (from back in 2009!!) as my go to program.
Books...I've been looking through some old books. The improvement ship sailed long ago, so they're all just taking up space. One book that I gave some attention to was the 1941 edition of Rubinstein's Chess Masterpieces by Barnie Winkleman and annotated by Hans Kmoch. For some reason his games just don't appeal to me.
Although the biography is interesting, My Life and Games by Pal Benko is not going to make my list of favorites. Never liked his games, they are too boring. I saw Benko play on many occasions and it was like watching paint dry...that is until he got into time trouble and had to scramble to make all his moves.
I especially liked his final round game against Reshevsky in the 1975 US Championship. When Benko got into time trouble Reshevsky kept his finger on the clock button making it difficult for Benko to press it after making his move. Benko never said anything...he just glared at Reshevsky and hammered his clock button with his fist!
A few years back I posted about 175 Chess Brilliancies by the Scottish player Francis P. Wenman (May 6, 1891 – March 19, 1972). It has 95 complete games and 80 endings (or composed positions) that are little known and quite interesting. I like it, but the one that finally grabbed my attention was Lesser Known Chess Masterpieces 1906-1915 by Fred Wilson and published by Dover back in 1976. You can listen to a most interesting interview with Fred Wilson on Perpetual Chess HERE.
During those years there was a little known series of books titled The Year-Book of Chess by several different British players. They were a summary of all the important events of the previous year. Besides literary reviews, articles and problems, they contained a well annotated selection of games from all the great tournaments of the period.
As Wenman noted, there were books by leading players of that era (Lasker, Marshall, Tarrasch, Rubinsein, Nimzovich, Capablanca and Alekhine), but games by other prominent masters of the period (Schlechter, Teichmann, Maroczy, Spielmann, Mieses, Duras, Janowsky, Reti and Tartakower) were not readily available. Tartakower did eventually publish a two volume collection of his best games; buy them if you find them.
It was the games of those largely ignored masters and a few by the leading players that didn't make it into their collections that Wenman included in the book.
Carl Schlechter was known as The Drawing Master, but in his day he was, like Petrosian decades later, almost impossible to defeat. However, when the conditions were right he produced some pretty flashy games.
Richard Teichmann, blind in one eye, was accused of being lazy, but he won the great Carlsbad tournament in 1911. Then there was the master tactician David Janowsky who is best known as a punching bag for greater masters, but he did produce some stunning games.
And, Rudolf Spielmann who was probably the greatest gambit player of all time, played some really fantastic games.
The virtually unknown Czech Oldrich Duras had a poor knowledge of openings, but he could conjure up some fantastic complications in the middlegame. Jacques Miesis is another under appreciated player, but he was a 19th century Romantic who showed little aptitude for positional chess.
These are the players whose games are featured in the book and that makes it well worth browsing through.
Vienna 1907 was the first Trebitsch Memorial name after Leopold Trebitsch, a wealthy Austrian silk manufacturer who had been vice-president of the club until his death on Dec. 12, 1906, a month before the tournament. The Memorials were a series of twenty tournaments being played in Vienna between 1907 and 1938.
The 1907 tournament included a strong field including such international figures as Oldrich Duras, Jacques Mieses, Geza Maroczy, Milan Vidmar and Savielly Tartakower plus Austrian masters Carl Schlechter and Dr. Julius Perlis.
According to the yearbook, "The result was a triumph for players who favor brilliancy in preference to ultra-modern tendencies, Mieses and Duras admittedly producing some of the most effective examples of contemporary chess from the spectacular point of view." What more could you ask for?
In the following game Wolf sacrifices a couple of Pawns, but doesn't get any compensation. He also set a cunning tactical trap at move 32, but Duras wasn't fooled and easily secured the win.
Oldrich Duras–Heinrich Wolf1–0C651st Trebitsch Memorial, ViennaVienna AUH15.01.1907Stockfish 14.1 (8s)
Ruy Lopez: Berlin Defense 1.e4 e5 2.f3 c6 3.b5 f6 4.d3 c5 5.e3
Even though there is nothing wrong with this old continuation that was
advocated by Dr. A. Kaufmann of Vienna it has disappeared today in favor of 5.
c3, 5.Bxc6 or 5.O-O. xe3 At the time it was believed that this exchange was
forced, but 11...Nd4 or even 11...Qe7 are satisfactory. 6.fxe3 0-0 6...e7 7.c4 7.c3 c6 8.a4 g6 9.d2 0-0 10.b3 equals. Firman,N (2495)
-McShane,L (2614)/Warsaw 2006 7...d6 8.0-0 0-0 9.c3 e6 10.b3 xb3 11.axb3 is equal. Duras, O-Leonhardt,P Nuremberg 1906 7.0-0 7.xc6 Does
not win a P. bxc6 8.xe5 e7 9.f3 9.c4 9.Nf3 -0.16 This recommendation
of Marco is quite bad. After d5 black has a considerable advantage. 9...b4+ with equal chances. 7...d5 8.c3 8.exd5 was preferrable. e7 8...xd5 9.e1 d6 10.c3 ce7 11.c4 c5 White is better. Ashwin,J (2454)
-Tran,N (2218)/Chotowa POL 2010 9.d2 The position is equal. 9.xe5
would lose. xd5 forking the B and N 8...d4 9.xc6 9.exd4 results in
equality after xd4 10.h3 xf3+ 11.xf3 c6 9...bxc6 Not the best. White
now has the better position. The position remains equal after 9...dxc3 9...dxc3 10.a4 cxb2 11.b1 d6 10.exd4 exd4 11.e2 g4 ...Ne3 turns out not
to be as strong a threat as it looks, but the other main alternative, 11...c5,
is not much better. 12.d2 d6 This move loses the game for Black. 12...c5,
or even 12...Ne3, were better. 13.h3 13.exd4 would be a mistake. xh2 14.f2 14.xh2 xd4+ 15.f2 xb2 is good for black. 14...g4 15.e2 e5 and white can only claim to be slightly better. 13...e3 14.f2
Excellent! 14.fe1 14.Rf2 3. 14 allows black to
equalize and it also is a good example of why you cannot trust old
annotations! After this move Schlechter commented that black wins a Pawn as
follows. c5 This is the correct move after which the position
is equal. 14...xh3 This is Schlechter's suggestion, but white gains the
edge after 15.e5 h6 16.exd4 16.fxd4 f5 and black is better. 16...xg2 17.xh6 gxh6 18.e4 15.b4 The only move to equalize. aiming for bxc5.
g6 16.f4 with a fully equal position. 14...c5 15.c3 White wins a P. f5 16.cxd4 fxe4 16...cxd4 17.fxd4 f4 18.c1 with a clear advantage. 17.xe3 Also good was 17.dxe4
exf3 18.dxc5 c6 19.xf3 Black's best chance would be to exchange Rs and
hope for the best in the ending, but in avoiding the exchange things only get
worse for him. b7 19...xf3 20.xf3 xf3 21.gxf3 xh3 and white has the
better chances in the ending. 20.g3 ae8 21.d4 h6 22.c3 d8 23.b4 c6 24.e4 f4 25.e1 df8 26.h2 h4 27.b3+ h8 28.g5 28.e6 would have been even better. After xe4 29.dxe4 h6 30.e5
white has a routine win. 28...4f5 28...xg2 While insufficient to save
the game this would have put up stouter resistance. 29.f7+ g8 30.xg2 4xf7 29.e6 g8 White has a won position, but
according to the tournament book (and analysis by the English Master Leopold
Hoffer) this move sets a little trap. That is not correct because his analysis
was faulty. 30.c3 30.xg7 This might be tempting because according to
Hoffer the N cannot be taken. Even if it is not taken white still wins as
follows... xg3+ 30...xg7 white has a mate after... 31.b8+ 31.xg3
xg7+ 32.h4 32.h2 This gross blunder loses as black has a
forced mate. xg2+ 33.h1 e2+ 34.g1 xe1+ 35.h2 e2+ 36.g3 g2+ 37.h4 f4+ 38.h5 f3+ mate next move. 32...xg2 33.c3+ g8 34.d4
Stops ...Rf4+. g6 35.e6 xe6 36.g4+ f7 37.xf5+ and wins. 30...f6 31.g5 gf8 32.g4 f2 This is a real, and quite cunning, trap
because if the Q is taken then black draws. 33.e4 33.xh4 33.Ne4 xg2+ 34.h1 xg5+ 35.he4 f3 36.h2 Threatening
mate with Re8 f2+ 37.h1 f3 forces a repetition. 38.e8+ doesn't work
because of the discovered check. f8+ 39.8e4 f3 is a threefold repitition.
33...h6 34.xf2 xf2 35.e6 A pretty finish. f6 36.xc6 xc6 37.d4 f6 38.f4 e7 39.d7 Very precise play by Duras in a
complicated game. Wolf resigned. 1–0
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