Scottish Chess Championship Day 3 - Another Champion

Day three has passed, we are now 1/3 of the way there.  Weather forecast is for hot weather this week.  Given the heat in the hall already, I suspect tomorrow may be unbearable.

Speaking of heat.  Finally got to the bottom of what was wrong with Alex's laptop.  It was overheating.  Once I had cracked open the BIOS (these people who put admin passwords on...) I was able to see it was thermal shutdowns.  One scramble for screwdrivers later (Thanks Jim Anderson!) and we had the covers off.  After cleaning and testing it was still happening,  looks like it is a fatal error.  On the plus side I now need to put chessbase onto my main laptop to give Alex something to put the games into.

This morning, the second champion of the 10 days was crowned.  We only had 2 entries into the Schools Championship so decided to let them play a 2 game match then transfer to the U1850.  The winner of that two game match was Jonathan McKay winning 2-0.

Congratulations!!

There were strange happenings in the hall today.  We had a TV crew filming for the 6 o'clock news.  Yes you read that correctly.  News and Chess!  Somehow I managed to keep out of the shot (Well lets face it, I would have taken up the whole picture....).  I don't know if the link will work from here, It is on the Dundee Chess Club facebook page which is public.  https://www.facebook.com/pg/Dundee-Chess-Club-857280844334413/videos/?ref=page_internal

After my unexpected appearances on the documentary 60 Minutes did on Magnus Carlson, I was keen to keep out of the way.  As I often point out, I have a face for radio!

With Alex's computer down and us being behind on the pgns, I spent most of the afternoon with my head in the laptop trying to enter the games.  I say trying as I am convinced the players were trying their best to disguise what they are doing...  White playing things like Rd2 then Ng5 then Rd2 were the norm.  It wouldn't be as bad if it was just the one scoresheet, but when it is both....

I was that engrossed in doing it, I completely forgot that the Scoresheets they are using in the APA only go to move 60 (I curse the person who came up with that idea!!).  Cue a couple of bemused GMs looking at me pleadingly as they were at the move 58+ waiting for a new sheet.  OOOPS!

The game I did manage to catch was the end of Keti v Martin Petr.  As you all know, I love my endgames.  That was a complete and utter masterclass from Keti.  I cheated and used 6 man tablebases, mainly as I wanted to learn the technique.  I lost count of how many times there was only  or 2 correct moves and despite playing in the increment, Keti found the correct move and got a richly deserved draw.

Game is on the CS website (Round 4 of the APA).  If you like endgames, I would thoroughly recommend taking a look at it.

So day 3 has come and gone.  2/3 of the competition to go and 2 days before I traditionally hit the wall!  I am dreading day 5!!!