Soft in Brussels
by John Richards
Finding myself working in Brussels for almost three weeks recently, I decided to try
and fill in some of the spare time with some chess. Now, Brussels is not as well
provided with chess tournaments as, say, London, but a search on the Internet revealed an ideal
candidate. On my first weekend (27-28 September 1997), there was a large international rapidplay - 11 rounds
over two days - sponsored by a Belgian software company, Soft in Brussels. After some
speculation about why a company should give itself such a strange name, I decided
this was going to be worth a go.
The tournament was to be held at the Buro and Design Center, near the Heysel stadium.
Heysel, the scene of the tragic European Cup Final where 39 Juventus supporters were
killed, is also the site of the famous Atomium: the giant balls and spokes structure
built for the 1958 World Fair and now one of the great symbols of Brussels. I had
been to the Atomium on a previous visit, so knew that Heysel was just a few stops
away on the metro. Setting off early on the Saturday morning I hit an immediate problem
at Heysel - thick fog! The Atomium - which is so big it can normally be seen from
several miles away - was completely invisible, and I had no idea where the Buro and Design
Centre was. I trudged into the greyness, reckoning I could see no more than 50 metres,
and eventually bumped into a car park attendant shivering in a small hut. "Excusez
moi monsieur, où est le Buro and Design Centre, s'il vous plaît?", I said in my best
O-level French. "Là-bas", he grunted, and indicated with a Gauloise-stained hand
and a Gallic shrug into the foggy murk behind him. No, really, I'm not making this up.
I set off in the general direction he'd indicated and a few wrong turns later I was
there. A huge sign on the side of the building advertised the chess tournament. On
normal days I would have been able to spot it from the Metro station - it was just today
you had to be on top of it before you saw it.
No Smocking
I paid my 600BF (£10.50) entry fee and was given my copy of the tournament
booklet which advised me that there was "No Smocking in the Playing Room". Grateful that I'd
forgotten to pack any smocks I hunted for the first round pairings. My current lowly
BCF of 162 proved to be handy as it translates to an Elo of 1896 and there were a number
of under-1900 grading prizes on offer. It also meant that I came just under halfway down
the list of players in ranking order (61st out of 106) and so was likely to meet a
star in round 1 when the top half is paired against the bottom. Six GMs and nine IMs
were in the line-up. The GMs were Mikhail Gurevich (Belgium), Leonid Gofshtein (Israel),
Vladimir Chuchelov (Belgium), Rongguang Ye (China), Paul Motwani (Scotland) and
David Bronstein (Russia). The IMs included England's Gary Lane, who is now based in
Brussels.
My first round opponent proved to be IM Richard Polaczek, but my pleasure at getting
a go at an IM was destroyed on sitting down for the first round. I was Black on board 9; Polaczek
arrived and shook hands. As we were getting settled, I heard someone say to the
White player on board 10, "Make sure he signs your scoresheet". And then, suddenly,
David Bronstein was sitting down next to me. He shook hands with his opponent, and then
turned and shook hands with me and my opponent. I realised that I had come that close to
playing one of my all-time chess heroes and I'm afraid to say it took a little off the
gloss of playing a mere IM.
Fingerfehler
Polaczek beat me, of course, but not by much. This started a cycle of losses with
Black to the top players, alternating with wins with White against the weak ones.
In Round 4, one of my Whites against the bunnies, I had a lucky break.
Black played ...dxe4,
threatening my queen on d3. I intended to take back
with my knight on c3. Reaching over, I picked up his pawn and then pulled back
to grab the knight. Horror! I had grabbed my own pawn from e5 instead of the Black one
on e4 and I had a perfectly legal move with the e5 pawn.
Of course, the game would then be all over as my opponent would
just take my queen. I mumbled "sorry", and my opponent let me off! A fatal mistake
for him as I was not gentlemanly enough to give him a second chance.
Round 5 saw me playing a strong player (2178) again, but the computer decided to be nice to
me for a change and gave me a White. I almost made the most of it, reaching a won rook
and pawn ending, but with only 2 minutes to my opponent's 20. I'm afraid to say I
chickened out and offered a draw. Sober reflection afterwards convinced me that it was
totally and utterly won - if only I'd had time to think.
Round 6 and I'm Black against a strong player again - this time a 2145. A promising
position went to pot when I grabbed one too many pawns and my opponent turned out
to have the attacking instincts of Julian Hodgson. Still, 2.5 out of 6 at the end of
the first day wasn't too awful but my score with Black was worrying (0/3). I was in joint
64th place and realised that I didn't need to worry about how to get the first prize
of a computer back home. Also, a number of my opponents for the u-1900 grading
prize were on 3 or 3.5.
At the top end, Gurevich and Van der Stricht had 5.5. Gofshtein, IM Luc Winants, Ye,
and my first round opponent, Polaczek, were on 5. Motwani and 8 others were on 4.5, and
Gary Lane and Bronstein were on 4 with 10 others.
I can see clearly now
Sunday morning, the fog had lifted and I could actually see where I was going - the sun even made a brief
appearance. I had White against the only unrated player in the score group. Suspecting
a wolf in rabbit's clothing, I checked the tournament table. He'd got to 2.5 by losing
the first three and then beating some weak players, so I had high hopes of an easy
game. It proved not easy at all for 21 moves until he missed a simple mate in two on h7.
Merci et au revoir! Back to 50%, I was now in joint 46th place and first equal amongst
the under 1900s.
Round 8 was a disaster. Playing a 1987, I defended well, won a piece and went on to
the attack and lost on time. This is getting silly. Thank God it's the lunch break.
It didn't get any better in round 9. Playing a 1745, I got yet another Advance French,
with my opponent playing ...cxd4. This was the third time in the tournament and I
was getting paranoic feelings that my opponents were swapping information about me.
I lost a pawn, then won it back and was well set with a passed pawn on the 6th.
I won another pawn and contrived to lose my pastie to leave a level ending. Forced to offer
the draw as I was down on the clock (yet again) and was relieved to find it accepted.
A vicious swindle
Round 10 found me with Black against 16 year old Florence Vermeulen,
who possessed a very sweet smile and a rating
of 1568. She made her rating look a joke as she trotted out
a solid opening and middle game extremely fast. I won a pawn only to find
she could create a pair of storming passed pawns, which I managed to stop but at the cost
of the exchange and burning clock time. I had bishop, knight and 3 pawns against
rook, bishop and two pawns, but even more worrying was that I had only three minutes
to her ten. By this time, the TV cameras had circled round and there was a big crowd
waiting to see the delightful Florence crush the Englishman.
The time situation was getting worse and the crowd was drawing in for the kill. Suddenly,
I had only one minute left, and Florence still had three. I managed to swap the knight
for her bishop and thought I would now have drawing chances if it wasn't for the fact
she could just run me out of time. Then, we reached this position.
I played 1...h5+ and was delighted to see the move I was praying for: 2. Kh4. I slapped
in 2...Bf2, and hit the clock fast. There was an audible groan from the
crowd and Florence slumped in her seat as though she
had just been hit by a bag of wet sand. I mumbled "sorry" as I shook her hand and then
realised the spectators were looking very upset at what I had just done to poor
little Florence. Several large Belgian men dived in to show her how she should have played
and I dived for the exit just in case, pausing only to deposit the results slip.
5/10 and I was again in with a chance, being level with three other contenders
for the under-1900 prizes. At the top end of the tournament, Luc Winants and De Graeve
were joint first with 8 points, half a point ahead of Gurevich, Ye, Gofshtein and
Cappon.
The author wins a prize
I had White in the last round; a good omen as I had 4/5 with White but 1/5 with Black
and that one point was the one I had just fluked against Florence. But I proceeded to
play poorly yet again and lost without much of a struggle. But the other contenders
for the u-1900 prize were also doing badly and I was amazed to find myself in a tie for
second. My winnings were 400 BF (about £7), 200 BF less than the entry fee!
Luc Winants and De Graeve both won their last round games to finish on 9. Gurevich was second
on 8.5. Gary Lane, Mohandesi and Cekro finished on 8. A play-off was held to decide who
got the first prize of a computer, said to be worth 80,000 BF. Winants won, leaving De Graeve to console himself with
the second prize of 20,000 BF (£350).
Gary Lane got me a lift back into town in the taxi of an off-duty taxi driver (who'd also
been in the tournament). I'd never spoken to Gary before that day (though we had been
in the same tournament at Paignton last year, he'd been first and I'd been in last place!)
He turned out to be a great guy and gave me a tour of bits of Brussels I'd never seen
before, including the Greenwich chess pub - a 'must' if you visit Brussels.
All in all, it was an excellently run tournament. The use of computers to make the pairings made
everything run smoothly, after an excruciatingly long delay before the first round.
Playing abroad is good fun, and the Internet makes it much easier these days to find out
what events are coming up.
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