The Edmonton Reserves was much bigger than usual this year, with
41 players overall. This annual Open Swiss tournament runs at the
same time as the Edmonton Championship, for eight-rounds through
January and February. The Reserves included several Expert and A-
class players who were knocked out of the early rounds of the Edmonton
Championship.
But even the Experts couldn't catch Rahim Khataw, who shot out to
an early lead with five straight wins, and never looked back. Khataw
finished with the fantastic score of 7/8, which will rocket his rating
up by almost 150 points into A-class. In fact, Khataw had already
secured the tournament victory before the last round started, since
his nearest rival, David Ostapchuk, had to withdraw from the
tournament due to illness. (David had 6/7 and was suppose to play a 2017 player, and I had 6.5/7 facing a 2047 player next round. So basically he had to win, and I had to lose for him to win clear first.)
Round 8 results:
Board 1:
Rahim Khataw (1706) 1/2-1/2 Vlad Rekhson (2047)
Sicilian O'Kelly. Khataw played well against his very strong
opponent, and was up a pawn in a rook ending when Rekhson offered a
draw. Rahim accepted, although I think he could have tortured Rekhson
with the extra pawn for a while. A Topalovian 7.5/8 would have looked
cool on the crosstable.
The game and some background info:
First
I got to mention that I was in a bad mood to being with. My driver
door doesn't work so i've been jumping in from the passenger side for
the past 2 years and on thursday my passenger door was frozen(Canadian winter) and I had to get a screwdriver to prey open the door and got there 20
minutes late and had problems finding parking so I was in a bad mood
to being with. I felt I was better during the game but couldn't find
anything great so I decided on a draw and thus played the Bxh6 move
trading off pawns.
[Event "Ecc Reserves 2006"]
[Site "Edmonton"]
[Date "2006.02.23"]
[Round "8"]
[White "Khataw, Rahim"]
[Black "Rekhson, Vlad"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[ECO "B28"]
[WhiteElo "1706"]
[BlackElo "2047"]
[Annotator "Khataw,Rahim"]
[PlyCount "66"]
[TimeControl "6600+30"]
{76MB, DFritz8.ctg, OEM} 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 a6 3. c3 d5 4. exd5 Qxd5 5.
d4 cxd4 ({
Vlad} 5... Nf6 6. dxc5 {
I still don't like this pawn capture and wouldn't have played it.}
Qxc5 ({Rahim
} 6... Qxd1+ 7. Kxd1 Ng4 8. Ke1 e5 9. b4 Nc6 10. Be2) 7. Be3 Qc7) 6.
cxd4 Nf6
7. Be2 Bg4 (7... e6 8. O-O Nc6 9. Be3 Be7) 8. Nc3 Qd6 9. O-O e6 10.
Be3 Be7 11.
Rc1 O-O 12. Ne5 Bxe2 13. Qxe2 Nd5 (13... Nc6 14. Nxc6 bxc6 (14...
Qxc6 15. Bg5
Qd6) 15. Na4 Rfd8 16. Rc4) 14. Qf3 {Wow, fritz actually likes this
move 🙂} Nc6
15. Nxd5 exd5 16. Nxc6 bxc6 17. Rc2 Rfd8 18. Rfc1 Rac8 19. Qe2 Bf6
20. Qxa6 Ra8
21. Qxc6 Qxc6 22. Rxc6 Rxa2 23. Rb1 h6 24. Kf1 Rb8 25. Rc5 Rbxb2 26.
Rxb2 Rxb2
27. Rxd5 Kf8 28. Ra5 Ke7 29. Ra6 Kd7 30. Bxh6 $2 (30. h3 Rb4 31. d5
Rb5 32.
Bxh6 Rxd5 33. Ke2 Rd6 34. Ra7+ Ke6 35. Bf4 Rb6) 30... Bxd4 31. Be3
Bxe3 32.
fxe3 Ke7 33. h3 Rc2 {Vlad offered a draw and I accepted.} 1/2-1/2
I thought this was a draw and since I was in a bad mood I didn't want
to waste more time seeing if I could get the full point, although I
should have. Like Micah told me after, I didn't have anything to lose
and worst case, it's a draw. Here's some analyses for the position
above. Still a draw in my opinion.
[Event "Blitz:110'+30""]
[Site "Edmonton"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "New game"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "8/4kpp1/R7/8/8/4P2P/2r3P1/5K2 w - - 0 1"]
[PlyCount "43"]
[TimeControl "6600+30"]
1. g3 (1. Ra1 Ke6 2. Re1 Ke5 3. Re2 Rc4 4. Kf2 f5 5. Ra2 g5 6. Ra8
Kf6 7. Kf3
g4+ 8. hxg4 Rxg4 9. Rf8+ Ke5 10. Re8+ Kf6 11. Rb8 Rh4 12. Rb1 Rc4 13.
g3 Kg5
14. Rd1 Rc3 15. Rd5 Rc4 16. Ra5 Kf6 17. Ra1 Kg5 18. Rh1 Rc2 19. Rh8
Rc1 20.
Rg8+ Kf6 21. Rf8+ Kg5 22. Rd8 Rf1+ 23. Ke2 Rc1) 1... Rh2 2. Ra7+ Kf6
3. h4 Ke6
4. Rb7 g6 5. Rb5 Ra2 6. Rg5 Kf6 7. Rd5 Ke6 8. Rb5 f6 9. Rb8 Kf5 10.
Rf8 g5 11.
hxg5 Kxg5 12. Rg8+ Kh5 13. g4+ Kh6 14. Rh8+ Kg6 15. Rd8 Ra4 16. Rd4
Rxd4 17.
exd4 f5 18. d5 fxg4 19. Kf2 Kf6 20. Ke3 Ke5 21. d6 Kxd6 22. Kf4 *
It will be nice to have rating above 1800 and see my name on the top
20 list for Edmonton Chess players. I had 3 chess goals which I wanted to accomplish before my 2
years of CFC memebership and this would be 2 of them. It is nice to
see hardwork does pay off 🙂
Originally posted by RahimKI want to congratulate you on your fantastic victory. It's an incredible accomplishement for a guy called Rahim Khataw.
I'll be happy when I see it. Mar 8 is when ratings are suppose to be updated but they are late a week mostly.
O and I won $50 also. Entry fee was $3. The prize money was donated by our club for this tournament that's why its so little but then again $3 entry fee is really cheap 🙂
I hope your successes continue and you become a master in a fantastic fashion as well. But I remind you that your real challange starts just now.
I entered my first tourney and had a rating about 1800 5.5/6 and in 8 years I could only improve about 150-200 points. The higher you get the harder it becomes to improve your rating even just a little bit. (Almost impossible)
Don't forget to post it on the RHP forums when you get your Master ranking. We are all curiously waiting...
Originally posted by LazyKnight"It's an incredible accomplishment for a guy called Rahim Khataw."
I want to congratulate you on your fantastic victory. It's an incredible accomplishement for a guy called Rahim Khataw.
I hope your successes continue and you become a master in a fantastic fashion as well. But I remind you that your real challange starts just now.
I entered my first tourney and had a rating about 1800 5.5/6 and in 8 years I could o ...[text shortened]... to post it on the RHP forums when you get your Master ranking. We are all curiously waiting...
I'm not sure if I should be happy about this or not? Just sounds sort of like, someone with that name got over 1800? Hahaha, I know what you mean though 🙂
My goal is expert actually, 2000+. I think this is realastic and I can achieve this. Master would be to hard especially given that I started chess at a late age. I'm 23 right now. Now if i was like 14ish and 1800 then master would be reasonable. Gotta start young now days.
Btw, I don't play blitz. Maybe 2 games a month I play blitz on Icc as a guest just to mess around. All I play is OTB, 2 hours each side, and then CC. I haven't play quick 30 min chess at our club for over a year now. I used to play this but just don't have time and I suck at it. Rating is 1530 in 30 min chess.
Originally posted by WulebgrThank you Wulebgr.
Congratulations Rahim. Nice work.
Ratings in Canada sound like the US a few years ago. Now, things are different. The tournament I played in this weekend was rated this morning. Of course, the published rating list comes out every few months, but the website is updated almost daily.
Our ratings are done every 3-4 weeks on Wednesday. So it depends when the tournament is finished and the results are handed it. Sometimes our TD's are late but mostly the CFC rates them late and they come out 2 weeks late on a regular basis.
Even the magazines we get every second month are delayed. The chirstmas edition we got in jan and thus no one bought any chess equipment as presents, and CFC lost money.
What can I say but 🙁 If you say the ratings are going to be done on day X, they should be done on day X. Not day X plus 14 days.
Originally posted by Jean HebertLooks like the new ratings won't come out until Friday.
Yes rating are ALWAYS delayed few days, I agree.
JH
From the CFC website:
"NOTE: Several tournaments were submitted late and others have
problems which will require extra work to enter. Ratings will now be
updated the Friday, March 10 before 5:00 PM EST. Sorry about the
inconvenience."
Ah, the usual torture!!! Mar 8 moved to Mar 10 moved to ...........