Fritz 16 - He just wants to play!
Fritz 16 is looking forward to playing with you, and you're certain to have a great deal of fun with him too. Tense games and even well-fought victories await you with "Easy play" and "Assisted analysis" modes.
The (relative) Agony and Ecstacy this week are my own from the World Senior Team Championships in Radebeul near Dresden which took place from July 7th to 15th.
Following the withdrawal of Nigel Short and later John Nunn, my team England I were seeded 4th behind the USA and the two best of the many German teams: Germany I with Philipp Schlosser on top board and the Lasker Chess Foundation with Alexander Graf and Artur Yusupov on the top two boards.
Somewhat to our surprise we defeated the USA early on but we drew with Lasker after I managed an unlikely escape against Graf and after leading going into the final round, were defeated 1½ : 2½ by Germany I The outcome was that the USA were first ahead of England and Lasker with us second on tie-break.
A good start in Dresden, beating the top-seeded USA squad, but 2nd in the end | Photo: Alex Yermolinsky
Losing the final match was a bit sad but certainly not Agonising and the nearest we got to this unfortunate state was actually away from the chess board on the journey back.
This was supposed to be the relatively straightforward Dresden to Frankfurt to London but waking up on the Monday morning we discovered that the initial flight had been cancelled overnight “for technical reasons” and we'd helpfully been rebooked on a flight just before 7am the next morning.
John Emms and I went to the airport anyway and after lengthy discussions and a certain amount of dialectic, it was agreed that we'd be rebooked on a later flight from Frankfurt and take a train there. Then another option was suggested: to go south to Las Palmas and then back to London and to avoid the faff of changing trains with luggage we went for that.
Stewart Reuben and Sheila Jackson had arrived at the airport after us and also (apparently) took this option but after we arrived in Las Palmas and checked, it turned out that they weren't on the passenger list for the London flight.
Since we'd been booked by Lufthansa to travel by Eurowings to Las Palmas and then British Airways to London there was immense scope for the various apparatchiki we approached to deny all responsibility. We started with Iberia BA's handlers at the airport and were then sent supposedly to Lufthansa which turned out to be Eurowings. We then sought the Lufthansa office and after a tragi-comedy lasting more than an hour going up and down in lifts between the two levels (Arrivals and Departures) and searching to the furthest ends of both finally located the Lufthansa office (which handled other airlines too and went by some other name).
There a wonderful woman — Paloma I believe — sorted us out over the next half hour or so.
In the rush at Dresden, Reuben and Jackson hadn't actually been issued with any paperwork for the Las Palmas to London leg and it turned out that they had indeed been booked on a London flight but one only a short while after we arrived in Las Palmas and so, what with reclaiming our luggage and checking in again, totally unrealistic.
The excellent Paloma tried one BA number and then another and we were finally all able to fly back to London together though by the time I got home — and some of them would have taken longer — it was already later than 11 pm on London and so past midnight in Germany.
Leaving this minor Agony aside, we move on to the chess board and a couple of my games starting with the save against Graf which was certainly awful for him.
Click or tap the second game in the game list below the board to switch
In computer chess there is no getting past Komodo, a two-time ICGA Computer World Chess Champion. Find out how Komodo can take your game to the next level!
ChessBase Account Premium annual subscription
At the airport, in the hotel or at home on your couch: with the new ChessBase you always have access to the whole ChessBase world: the new ChessBase video library, tactics server, opening training App, the live database with eight million games, Let’s Check and web access to playchess.com
Did you enjoy the column and instructive analysis by GM Jonathan Speelman? Do you wish you could have a world-renowned grandmaster analyzing your play? You can!
To submit your games just upload a PGN or ChessBase file, along with your name and e-mail address. Send one success story (Ecstasy) and one loss (Agony).
Tell why you chose them, where or when they were played. Please also include your email address, so Jon can reply, and preferably a photo of yourself for our article.
If your game is selected Jon will contact you personally, and not only will you get free detailed commentary of your games by one of chess’s great authors and instructors, and former world no. 4 player, but you also win a free three-month ChessBase Premium Account!
A three-month Premium subscription to ChessBase Account means you get:
