The USATE (part 1)

Where do I even begin this? How about at the time when I realized I was going to play in the event - that seems as good a place as any.

I first heard about the USATE (that's United States Amateur Team East) through several members of our chess club. Actually, that's not exactly true - I read about it in Chess Life, but I first thought about actually playing in the event when some members of the Pittsburgh Chess Club approached me with tentative plans to formulate teams and road trip to New Jersey. I would say it was 10% that I would play at that time, because we were about to head to Philly and play in the Liberty Bell Open. What I was thinking was - if I win substantial money in Philly, I can afford to play in the USATE, if not - I probably cannot. Well - we know I didn't win in Philly, so I assumed that the USATE was off.

Then I was approached again, this time by Daniel, and he gave us a new proposition - we stay at his parent's house - about a half hour from the site, for free. Now that's what I am talking about! So now it was on - I would be going to NJ for the tourney and the team would be Kevin, Daniel, Adonis and myself. With those three players on the team - I would be on board 4! I agreed in a heartbeat. Actually, I randomly saw Daniel walking on the road on the following day, and agreed at that time, but for our purposes - I agreed in a heartbeat.

In the van on the way out (we left at around 7pm) after the team watched Dark Knight, we tried our hands at some blindfold chess. I am not very good at blindfold chess, but I was able to make it about 20 moves before I was completely lost against Daniel. Then Daniel played Adonis. And they made it to an endgame - Rook and pawns - when Daniel finally pulled off a spectacular tactic to brush off Adonis' King and win his rook. I was actually able to follow most of the game without a board! (I just had to keep on verifying the piece locations.)

We arrived late and headed off to bed. A special thank you to both Daniel's Parents for hosting our team, and Kevin's dad for driving our team.

Game 1. We arrive about an hour early at the hotel - I am so excited because there are literally about a thousand people playing in this tournament. First round pits us against a team consisting of an IM (that's international master!!) and 3 experts. Daniel is playing the IM on board 1. The expert playing me disposes of me rather quickly. I get a bad position and have to drop some material, but I don't get any better and I am lost. I resign, feeling bad about letting the team down, but I don't think I was ever in that game. Meanwhile - Kevin's game is over - he lost, Adonis looks like he is winning his game and Daniel is in a fantastic Knight and pawn endgame, down one pawn. But then the IM sacks his Knight for Daniel's pawn, and tries to take advantage of how close his King is to Dan's other pawns, but the whole thing backfires, and Dan gets a draw against an IM in the opening round! Kevin, Daniel and I go to lunch, and come back to discover that Adonis is still playing his first round match, and he is in a drawn endgame. He tries to win for a while, before he accepts the truth, and we lose our first round 3-1.

Not a great beginning, but we were supposed to lose that round, and our board 1 is now Highly Confident! Man is this thing fun!