International master John Hawksworth (pictured left, above) on his return to competitive action at the Kingston Invitational after a break of 35 years
After a short gap of 35 years, I played my first rated tournament since the 1990 British Championship at the Kingston Invitational Open in mid-August. Thanks very much to Stephen Moss for inviting me and for the excellent organisation by Stephen, the arbiters and others who helped the event run efficiently and professionally throughout.
Going into the event, I was quite apprehensive, not really knowing what to expect but hoping for a plus score and some improvement in my ECF rating, even if my 1990 vintage Fide rating of 2350 was likely to take a battering. Because nine games in five days seemed like a tall order for a returning pensioner like me, I arranged to take two half-point byes, which turned out to be a smart move to conserve energy.
On the first day, I was happy to start with a reasonably well-played draw (on both sides) against FM Rick McMichael, who I first encountered in junior tournaments in the late 1970s. I then had a quick draw against a promising youngster, Jai Kothari, who went on to win the junior title on tie-break after having led the whole event after six rounds.
After a bye in the third round, however, I was somewhat taken aback to be paired as Black against Qixiang Han, who is only 12 years old but already has a higher ECF rating (2263) than me, even if he is very underrated on the Fide list (2070). Luckily, he didn’t have his best game, blundering a pawn in the opening and allowing me a relatively easy win despite one inaccuracy near the end.
In the fifth round, I was back in the veterans’ enclosure with White against Surrey county captain Clive Frostick, whom I actually played in the 1982 Varsity match (we drew) as well as in earlier junior events. Being a morning game, I was able to prepare in depth for Clive’s a6 Queen’s Gambit Declined, meaning that my first 14 moves were all homework. This gave me only a slight advantage on the board, but a big lead on the clock.
Nonetheless, Clive defended very actively in the middle game to generate counterplay and the fairest result would have been a draw after some swings and roundabouts in the computer evaluation. But luckily for me, Clive was down to just a minute on the clock and made an unsound piece sacrifice that allowed me to win, despite him coming close to a perpetual with a queen sacrifice at the end that only just failed, nearly giving me a heart attack in the process!
After another energy-preserving half-point bye in the sixth round, I had 4/6 and was promoted to third board, where I had Black against 19-year-old German WFM Luisa Bashylina (pictured above), who had played for Kingston/CSC in the 4NCL earlier this year. In my preparation, I noticed some potential weak points in how she played against the Nimzo-Indian, where she generally went for lines with 4. e3. I therefore prepared in some depth against that move, only to see her confidently play 4. f3, which I had only looked at briefly! Fortunately, things still worked out well in what turned out to be my best game of the event.
Rather unexpectedly, I therefore found myself with 5/7 and playing on top board of the Open section in the penultimate round. My opponent was the co-leader on 5.5/7, Norwegian FM Jacob T Grave, who at 2366 was not just the highest rated in the event but also the strongest player (based on Fide ratings) that I had faced since returning to competitive chess last September. It’s fair to say I was happy with a draw and indeed offered one with White after only about 10 moves, but he decided to play on. This turned out to be justified as he gradually outplayed me to reach a queen and bishop ending with equal pawns but a clear advantage to him due to the weak dark squares in my position.
Jacob sacrificed his bishop to get two connected passed pawns but then, playing just on increment, allowed me a trick to win one of the advanced pawns and block the second one after it reached the seventh rank. The position was then equal, but he kept on trying to win until I found a perpetual check to force the draw.
A lucky escape for me and pretty nerve-wracking to have to play on increment for the only time this event. My hands were shaking too much to record the final moves, which the arbiter told me off for afterwards. I was used to club games where you don’t have to record moves after you are down to less than five minutes, but apparently this does not apply to Fide events with 30-second increment. Of course, there were no increments when I last played a serious tournament in 1990 as we were still using analogue rather than digital clocks in those days. In fact, we would have adjourned after 40 moves in those days, often after a crazy time scramble, but then got an extra hour for your next 20 moves, which generally led to more precise endgame play than you see today.
After that drama, I was hoping to play a quiet game in my final round as Black against Tom Villiers, but the gods were not wanting to let me off that easily. My opponent seemed to blunder a pawn in the opening but, rather than acquiesce to this, he went all in by sacrificing an exchange and a pawn to get a knight to a dangerous attacking square on d6. This more or less forced me to sacrifice my queen for three pieces, after which I had a notional material advantage (rook, bishop and knight vs queen) but my king was still stuck in the centre.
I really had no idea what was going on in this final position but, fortunately, my opponent felt the same and offered a draw, which I gratefully accepted as I had only 30 minutes on the clock and didn’t want to spoil a good tournament with a last-round loss if I blundered something later. The computer actually says White is slightly better in the final position, so I felt slightly vindicated in chickening out.
Overall, therefore, I finished with an unbeaten 6/9 (or 5/7 excluding byes) and equal fourth place in the event, which certainly exceeded my expectations. I still lost a few Fide rating points but not nearly as many as feared, while probably gaining about 25 ECF rating points. More importantly I played at least a couple of decent games, as well as having my fair share of luck. Hopefully this good form (and luck) will carry over into club and county games in the coming season!