The biggest blunder ever!

Yeah that's right. I'm an idiot. This last Saturday was the 14th Annual Pir Maleki tournament which I was so incredibly excited for since about December. I was going to be carpooling with some buddies up to the tourney and I was going to meet them about 6:45am Saturday morning. I set my alarm for 4:50 but I didn't pay close enough attention and set it for 4:50pm. My fiancee woke me up around 7:00am and I was completely depressed I had missed the tournament.

It really hit me hard that I had missed it. I felt that the last few months were just a waste and Saturday was just a horrible day for me overall. I did, however, finish Circle 3 and start Circle 4. I'm very pleased with my Circle 3 results and incredibly impressed with my Circle 4 results thus far. It's hard now that I'm doing Circle 4 because of the volume of problems per day. It's rough when you work a full time job and also have to spend quality time with your significant other. I'm not complaining about either of those things because I need money, and I love spending time with my lady. It's just a little rough to spend so much time on chess tactics training at the moment. I know it's going to be worth it in the end as I will be much more tactically inclined.

Anywho, I don't really have much else to write about other than I've won several more No-Limit tournaments on Saturday. I figured since I wasn't playing chess, I might as well play some poker and clear my mind from my stupid mistake. Here's a pic of my Circle 3 results. Enjoi!

Incredible come back.

Tonight was a pretty amazing come back for me in the world of chess. I have actually been focusing a little more on my tactics lately and have been getting really nice results thus far with Circle 3. It feels good to know that I have support from the guys who say I'm doing it old school with CT-ART(referring to a comment made by Blue Devil Knight). I feel I wouldn't be doing the Seven Circles any justice if I was doing it using a different program with simpler problems. But that's a topic for another post...

So tonight was the usual Coronado Chess Club meeting. Same ol' people, different day ;]. I felt confident tonight and maybe that's why I played so well. My first round opponent was a low 1300 player whom I had a draw with in the first round of my most recent tournament, the UNM Octagon. The game was well played and I used the concept of "Real Chess"(yes, I've been reading the Novice Nook and yes I'm a newb to it) and managed to hold the score the point. My second round opponent is an 1800 USCF player whom I've never been able to even get past the opening with. Again, I sat and played logically and came out of the opening a pawn up and I carried the initiative the entire game. It has been the best game I've played to date and I wish I would have taken notation. One observer said I played like a class A player. Made my night...

All in all, it was a very great night of chess for me! I've decided to put poker on the back burner for awhile and focus on my chess. I have a pretty big tournament next saturday which I'm very excited for. I should also be done with Circle 3 before then so I'll keep you posted on how that goes!

I'm doing a little better.

So I'm a few days into Circle 3 and I have small progress. I finished Level 10 problems with 94% accuracy and Level 20 problems with 80% accuracy which is a pretty considerable amount better than my first circle. Other than that, I'm not really paying much attention to chess. I really need to get back into it like I used to be, but it's hard when I have poker on my mind.

Speaking of which, I won a freeroll tournament on Carbon Poker this last weekend. A freeroll is a no-limit tournament that you play for... well... FREE! The prize is a small amount of money to play on the site with. There was 668 players registered for the tourney; 2 hours and 43 minutes later, I was declared the winner for a hefty first place prize of $15! w00t! that's more money than I ever won playing in a chess tournament! haha. My goal is to turn $0 into $10,000. We shall see how that goes.

Circle 2 finished!

So it's that time again; I've finished the second circle in this lovely tactical foray! I must say, I'm not incredibly impressed with my overall results. Actually, I did a little worse this time around than in the first Circle. I blame this on my own lack of motivation. When you have lack of motivation, doing tactical exercises becomes like a chore. I'm going to try to make Circle 3 much more worth my while. Anywho, here's the results from Circle 2: