Afterschool & Weekend chess classes Enriched after-school and weekend activity for elementary school aged children. All levels are welcome from beginners to already serious tournament player The program director is a National Chess Master Ilya Krasik. Winter and Spring Classes Enrolling Now PROFESSIONAL EQUIPMENT HOMEWORK We provide students with all necessary Individual homework assignments to equipment including chess boards, supplement in-class learning. pieces and demonstration tools. CHESS CLUB LESSONS PRIVATE LESSONS Curriculum is according to the Instruction in the comfort of the student's student's appropriate level. home, or convenience of our office. Two convenient locations: Needham, MA Lexington, MA 50 Kearney Rd 9 Piper Rd, Needham, MA 02494 Lexington, MA 02421 Tuesday & Thursday Monday & Wednesday 4:30 PM to 6:15 PM 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM Saturday 10:00 AM & 11:30 AM www.ChessNE.com/Needham www.ChessNE.com/Lexington 844-800-0084 844-800-0081 CHESS HORIZONS HOLIDAYS 2015 What’s in this Issue Chess Horizons Holidays 2015 4 Letter from the Editor Volume 47, #3-4 Nathan Smolensky EDITOR 5 Larry C.’s Chess Challenges Nathan Smolensky P.O. Box 381396 GM Larry Christiansen Cambridge, MA 7 Remembering Harold Dondis 02238-1396 [email protected] FM Christopher Chase 8 Chess at NESSP Nagendranath Natti ISSN 0147-2569. Published by the 9 Mass Open Most Interesting Games Massachusetts Chess Association (MACA), www.masschess.org. Entire contents FM David Griego, Andrew Hoy copyright 2015 by MACA and by the 20 The Square individual authors. The opinions expressed are those of the authors, and do Nathan Smolensky not necessarily reflect those of MACA, its board, or its membership. 26 Mass Open MIG Runners Up Single-copy price, $3.95. FM Christopher Chase MACA membership: Adult: $20 with Chess 30 Ivanov - Vigorito, Mass Open Horizons, $12 without. Junior (under 18): $14 with Chess Horizons, $6 without. GM Alexander Ivanov Subscription rates without membership: $12 32 Winer - Yang, N.E. Open within US (first-class mail $9 additional). Air mail rates: $18 Canada and Mexico, FM Steven Winer $22 Central and South America, $25 Europe, $28 Asia, Africa and the 34 Brattain – Khater, N.E. Open Pacific Rim. FM Mika Brattain Send renewals, address changes, and all 36 Yip-Mahdian, World Youth money (in US funds, payable to MACA), to Membership Secretary Bob Messenger, 4 NM Carissa Yip Hamlett Dr. Apt. 12, Nashua, NH 37 USCL Season Highlights 03062,USA. Include USCF ID number, e- mail and ZIP+4 if known. Or join/renew at NM Ilya Krasik, Nathan Smolensky masschess.org. No refunds. 40 Games Potpourri! Nathan Smolensky 45 Interview: Percy Yip Nathan Smolensky Cover photo: Harold Dondis 46 Solutions / Answers Photo Courtesy Tony Cortizas 47 Places to Play 3 CHESS HORIZONS HOLIDAYS 2015 Note from the Editor Nathan Smolensky MACA Massachusetts Chess Association www.masschess.org Dear Readers, Another issue, another long wait, and for OFFICERS that, I sincerely apologize. Work obligations PRESIDENT for myself and my contributors have been Nathan Smolensky difficult to manage, and my own change in P.O Box 381396 address has led to some distraction and Cambridge, MA 02238-1396 confusion – if you have been sending mail to [email protected] my previous address in recent months, I VICE PRESIDENT could not receive it. To allay this problem, I John Sadoff will be using a P.O. Box, and I hope that it 108 Central St., 1R, Somerville, MA will allow me to better maintain 02143 (202) 725-5465 correspondence – hearing from the readers is [email protected] very important to me. TREASURER - Nathan Smolensky, Editor Bob Messenger 4 Hamlett Dr. Apt. 12, Nashua, NH 03062 (603) 891-2484 Annotation / Player Title Key [email protected] CLERK ! – Strong move !! – Brilliant move Nicholas Sterling 60 Webster Street, Needham MA ? – Weak move ?? – Blunder 02494 (781) 733-0849 !? – Interesting move ?! – Dubious move [email protected] ² ³ White (Black) is slightly better ( ) – COMMITTEE CHAIRMEN ± µ ( ) – White (Black) is significantly better LMCF, Prison Chess, Scholastics: Steve Frymer +- (-+) – White (Black) is winning ‡ Budget, Tournament, Bylaws, ∞ - Unclear - Zugzwang Parliamentarian, Asst. Clerk, Membership Secretary, Iron Man: NM – National Master, any player over 2200 USCF Bob Messenger LM – Life Master, permanently 2200+ USCF Education, Web Coordinator: (may be due either to number of games played as Nicholas Sterling master of 2400+ peak rating). Fundraising, Promotions, Club FM – FIDE Master. 2300+ FIDE. Coordinator – Ed Chiu SM – Senior Master. 2400+ USCF. Webmaster: Tiffany Wang IM – International Master. Norm-based FIDE title. Publications, Volunteers: Nathan Smolensky GM – Grandmaster. Norm-based FIDE title. 4 CHESS HORIZONS HOLIDAYS 2015 Larry C.’s Chess Challenges GM Larry Christiansen Solutions on p. 46. 1. 2. 3. Black to move and win. Black to move and win. White to move and win. 4. 5. 6. White to move and win. White to move and win. White to move and win. Chess Trivia: Second Careers! Nathan Smolensky Match the famous player with his other career! 1. Reuben Fine a. Attorney 2. Emanuel Lasker b. Botanist 3. Samuel Reshevsky c. Insurance agent 4. Mark Taimanov d. Mathematician 5. Paul Morphy e. Engineer 6. Magnus Carlsen f. Farmer 7. Isaac Kashdan g. Psychologist 8. Karl Robatsch h. Pianist 9. Julio Granda i. Accountant 10. Mikhail Botvinnik j. Male model 5 CHESS HORIZONS HOLIDAYS 2015 Verhoest, Hernan FitzGerald-Lara, Henri News in Brief Medernach, and Isabella Sawicka. Nathan Smolensky In individual achievements, Andover superstar NM Carissa Yip broke 2300 on December 12th at the Boylston Chess Club. The 84th Massachusetts Open was held She also tied for first, losing on tiebreakers, May 23rd through the 25th in Marlborough. at the Under 12 section of the World Youth GM Alexander Ivanov won, incredibly, his Chess Championships held in Greece in 21st state title with an outright victory in his November. section. 236 players participated in the A three day stretch in December saw the event, besting the recent high set in 2014. passing of not only Massachusetts icon The milestone 75th New England Open Harold Dondis, who is discussed later in the was held September 5th – 7th in Boxborough, issue, but of Stephen Brandwein, who and saw its Championship section split by passed away in San Francisco on December FM Steven Winer and FM Mika Brattain. 12th at the age of 73. Brandwein rose to 131 players participated in the adult events, prominence as a chess master in Boston in while an impressive 94 came for the the 1960’s, but had been living out west for booming scholastic offering. some decades. The 82nd Greater Boston Open, held in Marlborough on October 18th, saw five players tie for first in the top section with 3.5 points out of a possible four. 2014 co- champions GM Alexander Ivanov and NM Michael Vilenchuk, FM Steven Winer, NM Michael Chen, and Joseph Perl – who gained over 60 rating points for his strong outing – shared the top prize. 110 people attended the tournament. th December 6 saw the H.N. Pillsbury Memorial in Marlborough. IM David Vigorito and NM Alex Cherniack tied for tops in the top section in the 73-person event. 1402 Beacon St., Brookline, MA At the Fall Team Tournament on (617) 487-5259 November 22nd in Boxborough, the team from Newton South High School – Alan Open 11:00 – 11:00 Sun-Thurs. Sikarov, James Rao, Nicholas Komarovsky, and Samuel Burnham took 3:00 PM – 2:00 AM Fri & Sat. first in the K-12 section. The K-6 was taken by “Rook and Roll” – Krishna Mutnuri, Meghana Kancharla, Arjun Girish, and www.knightmovescafe.com Venkatraman Varatharajan. And for the K-3 section was BCCUW – Joshua 6 CHESS HORIZONS HOLIDAYS 2015 Remembering Harold Dondis impressed that they carried Harold out of the playing room on their shoulders. Harold was Christopher Chase a frequent traveler to chess events throughout the United States and across the globe. He was in Reykjavik during the run- up to the 1972 Fischer-Spassky match, where he tried to help the Fischer camp in their negotiations. His role, he told me, was essentially just to answer the phone, but at some point in the chaos of trying to persuade Fischer to play, he feared that an angry, rampaging Fischer was going to punch him. Besides loving chess, Harold was a great baseball fan, supporting at first the St. Louis Cardinals and then the Boston Red Sox. Recently, he started rooting for the New England Patriots. Harold was born in Rockland, Maine, in This article originally appeared in the Boston 1922. He and his family suffered though the Globe, as part of Mr. Dondis’ and FM Chase’s Great Depression, which left an indelible regular chess column there. mark on him. He was educated in the Harold Dondis, the longtime co-writer of Rockland public schools, at Bowdoin this column, has died at the age of 93. On College (class of 1943), and at Harvard Law Dec. 10, Harold suffered a heart attack at the School (class of 1945). His first job out of Boylston Chess Club, while playing the law school in 1945 was at the Boston firm of game he loved. With his passing, we have Rich, May, Bilodeau and Flaherty, where he not only lost this column’s writer of more rose to senior partner and remained for his than 50 years, but the chess community has entire legal career. Among his great legal lost a great benefactor, and I have lost a accomplishments was the honor of arguing a wonderful friend. case before the US Supreme Court. His Harold Dondis was a key founding professionalism was so great that he was member of the US Chess Trust, a nonprofit still working at the firm until the day he fund-raiser for chess.