By Hikaru on
3/26/2008 6:13 PM
Hello everyone, I have been rather swamped with work (when I am not playing 1-min games on ICC) so I won't be posting any of my games just yet. However, I played rather mediocre chess in the French League on the whole. In the first game I drew Etienne Bacrot with white. The 2nd game I swindled Vladimir Baklan with black in an Alekhine and drew. And in the 3rd game I beat French GM Andrei Sokolov with white. At some point tomorrow I will probably post a game or two from the event with annotations. Au Revior, et au bientot!
|
By Hikaru on
3/21/2008 7:41 PM
I have now been in Nice, France for the past two days. Oddly enough, this happens to be the first trip abroad that I have made alone which makes for an interesting and new experience. Originally, I thought I would be staying in Monaco and would have gone and gambled away my life's savings at the Grand Casino in Monte Carlo; however, as it turned out I ended up in Nice instead. The area itself is quite pleasant with a nice ocean breeze and plenty of scenery. Yesterday, I actually ended up walking over to the playing site for the Melody Amber tournament and spoke briefly with some of the players and journalists. Nothing really shocking happened, although it appeared that the game Karjakin-Van Wely was more or less losing from the start according to Topalov and Leko.
Today, I decided to relax and went out and took a few pictures. Other than that, I didn't really do much besides preparing for my game against Bacrot tomorrow. In a few hours I will catch a train to Marseille and will at ...
Read More »
|
By Hikaru on
3/17/2008 12:25 PM
So, nothing much to really report on since my last post. I have pretty much been going about life as usual studying chess and playing transwarp in preparation for France. Yesterday, I actually noticed a rather amusing drawing of myself on a website.
http://czharina.deviantart.com/art/Hikaru-Nakamura-80128083
|
By Hikaru on
3/11/2008 6:49 AM
This past Sunday on March 9, 2008, I attended a commemoration event for what would have been Bobby Fischer's 65th birthday. The event took place at the Marshall Chess Club from 1 PM till about 5 PM. Much of the first several hours was spent with famous talk show host Dick Cavett recollecting his memories about Fischer as well as some very good footage from the three different times during which Fischer appeared on the show. While watching these clips, I couldn't help but notice how normal Fischer seemed during these interviews during 1972-73. However, I also found it very striking that Fischer did not seem to have any other hobbies which he had interest in. If there is one thing I've noticed about chess players nowadays as compared to then is that most have other interests besides chess, I suspect this is why there haven't been any top grandmasters who have gone rather insane in the past 10 years. Other not ...
Read More »
|
By Hikaru on
3/7/2008 8:16 PM
Hello everyone! So since I haven't done a really detailed blog in sometime, I will write one now.
First of all, I would like to address the specific issue of playing Transwarp(C) on ICC. Many people have now asked me why I play it and, more importantly, what purpose it serves. Of course attempting to lock up a position against a computer and then premove for 150 moves is rather pointless after awhile. Some have said that they thought I was doing it simply to gain rating points. However, they were wrong. The main purpose I find that playing transwarp or any computer on ICC for that matter provides a certain mental toughness. After all, playing against a computer and losing 10-15 in a row is much more painful than losing to any super GM 1 or 2 games. Therefore, I find that it is a very good way of becoming mentally stronger.
Secondly, I cannot mention what a bad week it has been for me! So far two of my records have been broken...oh ...
Read More »
|