Jim West On Chess: Bruns-Simonaitis, USATE 2005

Friday, April 27, 2007

Bruns-Simonaitis, USATE 2005

As an author, you are always intellectually gratified when someone adopts successfully one of your theoretical ideas in over-the-board play, especially when the person is someone that you have already defeated with your favorite variation. Such is the case for me in the following contest.

Mike Bruns (USCF 2082) - Arunas Simonaitis (USCF 1991), USATE 2/21/2005

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 f5 4.Nc3 fxe4 5.Nxe4 d5 6.Nxe5 dxe4 7.Qh5+ g6 8.Nxg6 Nf6 9.Qe5+ Kf7 10.Nxh8+ Kg7 11.Bg5 Nc6 12.Bxf6+ Qxf6 13.Qxc7+ Kxh8 14.O-O-O??

This trap can be found on page 22 of my book The Philidor Countergambit where I give 14.c3?? followed by the same winning move for Black as in the game continuation.

14...Bd6!! 15.Qxd6 Qxd6 16.Be2 Bf5 17.g4 Nxd4 18.gxf5 Nxe2+ 19.Kb1 Qb6 20.Rde1 Nc3+ 21.Ka1 Na4 22.Rb1 Qxf2 23.Rhf1 Qd4 24.c3 Nxc3 25.bxc3 Qxc3+ 26.Rb2 Rd8 27.f6 Rd2, White resigns.

"My study of chess was accompanied by a strong attraction to music, and it was probably thanks to this that from childhood I became accustomed to thinking of chess as an art, and have never regarded it as anything else, for all the science and sport involved in it. And, moreover, an art which in some ways is closer to music than it is customary to think. Perhaps chess and music are drawn together by laws of harmony and beauty which are difficult to formulate and difficult to grasp, or perhaps by something else." - Vasily Smyslov