A short report  about  Spaghetti's 8th Freestyle

About us

Alberto

I am a 45 years old school teacher that lives and works in Palermo (Sicily). I'm married and i have  two young daughters that already play chess better than me. I'm weak on the board but I think I can say I'm a "computer chess specialist and experienced Freestyler" (as Arno Nickel wrote in his report).

I started to play in  playchess engine room in 2001, trying (almost daily) to get  better results from my book\hardware setup. This one was my fifth PAL-CSS Freestyle but i have played many other tournaments in engine room, both in engine or centaur mode. I like to mention the Freestyle Online League (FOL)  a "long term" freestyle tourney that,  due to the very high quality of games,  was a good training for PAL.

About three years ago I also started to play correspondence chess, my ICCF rating now is around  2200, but .... give me time :)

I think that the correspondence  experience is important to become a stronger centaur as the freestyle is a sort of much faster corr game.

What I love in freestyle is that everyone (even an amateur as I am) may have the opportunity to play at very high level in exciting challenges against best professional players.

Why "Spaghetti Chess" ? Well I love italian food of course (another one of my playchess nick is "Pizza Margherita") but the term "spaghetti" is also related to the "italian style"  ...  thinks to the "spaghetti western" genre in film history ;-)

Spaghetti Chess at work ;-)

Rodolfo

I  am Rodolfo,  43 years old, I live and work in Parma. I'm married with Simona and I have a 18 years old son.

I play chess since only 3 years and I am  a great chess fan.
I enjoy the freestyle very much also for the beautiful relationship that there is  with Alberto and Eros  ... we are a true team!

Eros

Briefly introducing myself, my name is Eros Riccio, I am 30 years old, I live in Italy, in Lucca.

I started playing over the board chess at the age of 14, and now and then I still enjoy playing some "otb" tournaments, my current fide rating is 2203. Anyway, my favourite forms of chess are engine chess and correspondence chess.

In the Playchess engine room you can find me with the nicks Auryn, Great Ozzie, and Ultima. With this "last" nick (Ultima in Italian means last one) I played the 8th Freestyle, and as a paradox, I was first with it.

In correspondence chess I recently got my ICCF "Senior International Master" title. The most important tournament I am playing at the moment is a "Candidates Tournament", which is the Semifinal of the World Championship. I also play Corr Chess on FICGS.
 

Setup

In main tournament I used my two quad core (Q6600 running at 3.4 Ghz), mainly with Zappa , Rybka and Hiarcs. In the final stage Clemens Keck kindly offered me the control of his skulltrail (8 x 3.4) that I used with zappa (about 5000-5500 Kn\s)

As can be seen in the "about us" section, I joined forces with my friends Eros Riccio (yes, the winner !) and Rodolfo Gallo (nick Rodo).  Although we were  playing separately in the qualifications, we always where in audio contact trying to help each other.

In the final stage the help of Rodolfo was decisive (grazie Rodo !), particularly in round 4, 8, and 9. (see below)

Quick notes to some final stage games

1st round
Spaghetti Chess – Ultima 1/2
The game against Eros was quite strange. It was not a mutual agreement draw but something very close to that.  First I have to explain that Eros sent me his outstanding book before the qualification stage and that I used it as "main" book along the whole tournament (well ... I have also to add that this was the main reason of my good performance).

We were playing with the same book, almost same hardware and, the most important thing, maybe no one of us "really" wanted to win! So we simply follow a line in the book that led to a draw.

2nd round
Spaghetti Chess – Komodo1 1/2

In main tournament Komodo1 played the accelerated Dragon and I couldn't win. Obviously I had prepared something against his Dragon but he surprised me playing the Caro-Kann and, once again, I had to accept a draw with white.

Since the Komado1 "case" the result of the game was irrelevant, but I am very sorry about his withdrawal.

4th round
Spaghetti Chess – Flyingfatman 1-0

I analysed during the night the Spaghetti Chess-Komodo without finding anything good for white. I was sure that Flyingfatman would have played 1...c6 as usual and after 3 draws I had to play for a win. So Rodolfo convinced me to take some risk playing the Advance Variation of the Caro-Kann (a quite aggressive line after 4.Nc3, 5.g4 etc).

Out of book the position was very unbalanced and unclear. I haven't yet analysed in depth, but during the game I had the feeling that black would have done better giving his Bishop for the knight (14... Nxe5 15. Nxb6 Qxb6 16. Qxd4 Qxb5) rather than play 14... Ba5+. I followed mainly Zappa (I had the impression  that Zap had a better understanding in this game), Rodolfo helped me of course checking the candidate moves with Rybka. Sure was not an easy win :)

9th round
Rybusia – Spaghetti Chess 1/2

I think that the Rybusia-Spaghetti Chess was a  very interesting game. The opening was very well prepared from Rybusia Team and after 13.h4! I had the unpleasant feeling of having fallen into a trap.

I was influenced in my opening choice by two games played by Rodolfo during the qualification. I would have played as in Rybusia-Rodo but I fear that the white had found some improvements.

In addition I also feared 15.0-0-0 as played in Regina H-Milch-Rodo.

So during the preparation I deeply analyzed 12...g6 (played in Rybusia-Etaoin Shrdlu with a quick draw agreement) and I concluded that it was a good alternative to 12 ... exd5.

After 12... g6 the engines see as main alternative Nxd5 or Bxg6, h4 is the fourth choice (and zap even gives a small advantage to black!):

[Rybusia - Spaghetti Chess, 8th Freestyle Tournament rapid 2008
r1bq1r1k/pp1n1p1B/2pb2p1/3np1P1/3P4/2N1PN2/PPQB1P1P/R3K2R w KQ - 0 1

Analysis by Zappa Mexico II:

1. = (0.00): 13.Nxd5 cxd5 14.Bxg6 fxg6 15.Qxg6 Qe7 16.Qh6+ Kg8 17.Qg6+ Kh8
2. = (0.00): 13.Bxg6 Nb4 14.Qb1 fxg6 15.Qxg6 Rxf3 16.Qh6+ Kg8 17.Qg6+ Kh8
3. =/+ (-0.44): 13.Ne4 Bc7 14.h4 Kxh7 15.h5 Kg8 16.0-0-0 Qe8 17.Rh4 f5 18.gxf6 N7xf6 19.hxg6 Nxe4 20.g7 Kxg7 21.Rg1+ Kf6 22.Qxe4 Bf5 23.Rh6+
4. =/+ (-0.52): 13.h4 Nb4 14.Qb1 Kxh7 15.h5 Kg7 16.hxg6 fxg6 17.Rh6 Qe8 18.Nh4 Rh8 19.a3 Nd5 20.Nxd5 cxd5 21.dxe5 Nxe5


Analysis by Rybka 2.3.2a mp :

1. = (0.02): 13.Bxg6 Nb4 14.Qe4 fxg6 15.Qxg6 Rxf3 16.Qh6+ Kg8 17.Qxd6 Qf8 18.Qg6+ Qg7 19.Qe4 Rf8
2. = (0.00): 13.Nxd5 cxd5 14.Bxg6 fxg6 15.Qxg6 Qe7 16.Bc3 Bc7 17.a3 a5 18.Qh5+ Qh7 19.Qxh7+ Kxh7
3. = (0.00): 13.Ne4 Bb4 14.h4 Kxh7 15.h5 Kg8 16.a3 Bxd2+ 17.Nexd2 exd4 18.hxg6 f5 19.gxf6 N7xf6
4. = (-0.25): 13.h4 Nb4 14.Qb1 Kxh7 15.h5 Kg7 16.hxg6 Rh8 17.Rh6 exd4 18.Ne4 Ne5 19.Nxe5 Bxe5]

So  obviously my analysi was not accurate, I missed the natural "human" move  13.h4!
 

that soon put me in big trouble. I immediately realized  that white had a very strong attack and I spent 20 minutes before answering 13 ... Cb4, trying (once again with the valuable help of Rodolfo) to go deep in the variations and   searching a way to a draw.

The  critical move was after 24.0-0-0, the engines here suggested: Bg4 (that loses after 25.exd4 Bxa3 26.Bc3 Rf4 27.Nf6+ Rxf6 28.gxf6 Bf8 29.Qg5+), Nd3+ (i had no time during the game for a deep  analysi but i judged that would have lead to a better endgame for white) and the unclear Dd7.

It took me 20 minutes to realize that the safest was Qd7

I played it quite confident of being able to hold the position but I was surprised again by 25.f4 (I was expecting Nxd6). I dont know if f4 is better than Nxd6  but any unexpected move, when you already are in time trouble, is very unpleasant ;-)

The ending was very exciting. I had few minutes (sometimes even seconds so talking about zeitnot is almost an euphemism :)) and of course I was very happy about the draw. I'm still not sure if white missed a win somewhere but I believe it was in any case a beatiful game. My congrats to Rybusia team!