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Hi brendan and geeker @27-29.
Yes, the link to the 0-65 is messy and the navigation is difficult. There is a line with a choice of round numbers. Sometimes clicking on the result between names brings up the board. I did manage to get to my Rd 3 game v Morley and scroll through. I am fairly sure I was on the 'live' boards only in Rd 1 v Chapman, Rd 3 v Morley and Rd 7 v Ramage. Possibly Rd 4 v Kelly.

jigjag @26
Amazing to hear the connections with those strong players in your area. I had never registered Steve Jones before. In the commentary room he said he had come actually bottom of the 2022 British Ch.! Manchester G.S. is a typical hothouse for chess, though high academic intellect isn't always a guarantee of chess talent. In my teaching career we had a boy who went on to get a first in maths at Cambridge. He tried chess and was useless. Of course you had Nigel Short from that area too.

Spent an enjoyable afternoon watching the Bullet Chess Championship - some really great games and I especially like it because you get to see actual checkmates 😀

Brendan,

Bullet is cool but just too fast for me to keep up with...both brain and eyesight! I'm amazed by how well people can play at that time control.

For something very different, I briefly check on the "Pog Champs 5" on chess.com. Extremely weak chessplayers and obnoxious personalities ("famous streamers", whatever those are) playing a rapid (blitz tiebreaks) KO tournament.

Hi Geeker,

It's way too fast for me as well so I have to keep pressing pause and going back to see what just happened. The commentators will say something like "oh no, he's missed it and blundered a piece" and I'm thinking "wait, who missed what and what just happened?" and before I've even gone back to rewatch it, they've started a new game!

I'm also a bit fuzzy on the rules.
If I'm up on material but I haven't managed to checkmate you before my clock runs out, does that mean I lose?

Brendan,
Absolutely! The clock is a big part of the game at super-fast time controls and "flagging" is a critical strategy. The "dirty flag", where one plays on in a hopeless position until the opponent's clock runs out, is essential (in blitz as well for some). Different mindset which doesn't appeal to me, but then I don't try bullet.

Thanks Geeker, I did wonder if that's what was happening but it was all being done at such high speeds I wasn't sure.

Thanks for that link Geeker, I've just played a few games of 1+0 (lost them all, obv) but good fun nevertheless:-)

I was just looking through YouTube and the Budapest Trap (mate in 6) came up - do you know it?

Brendan, that 6-mover is really improbable! I would *never* play 2. Nd2, but of course 2. c4. Playing for that kind of trap seems silly.

I used to face the Budapest quite often, as a strong player at a chess club regularly employed it, and never fell into any traps.
There's a more plausible "Budapest trap" here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfa3PXq2-sU&t=7s

but even in that main line, White can return the pawn and keep the Bishop pair with a slightly better position.

The mate by Knight in the latter trap *is* something that can snare Black if he botches a Caro-Kann. For instance

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3YTp0naekI

As a C-K player I had to become aware of that kind of situation!