Blog

[imagefield_assist|fid=8405|preset=frontpage_200x200|lightbox=true|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=200|height=200]By Spencer Finegold

The Saint Louis Arch Bishops faced-off against San Francisco's Mechanics on Wednesday, and there were no real surprises on any board. Though our opponents had a worthy line-up with GM-FM-FM-FM, they were no match for our big three plus one. I guess one could consider the Mechanics our rival as they too have a wonderful chess club in San Francisco, but The Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis is of course nicer, and our victory over them karmically proved it.

GM Hikaru Nakamura showed up about 15 minutes late for his game against GM Josh Friedel, which would explain how Nakamura had only 30 minutes more than his GM opponent by the end of his victory?! Nakamura whipped out his first ten move quickly to equalize on time.

[imagefield_assist|fid=8384|preset=frontpage_200x200|lightbox=true|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=200|height=200]Last Wednesday, the Arch Bishops played our rival, the Chicago Blaze. Our previous encounter in week two was interesting in that we had our starting rotation: GMs Hikaru Nakamura, Yury Shulman, Ben Finegold, and myself (Spencer Finegold) and somehow only managed a draw. The difference this time around was that we were playing without Shulman on board two, who somehow lost with White in the second week, and to make matters worse they injected GM Mesgen Amanov to their line-up for this week’s showdown. All of the games were suspiciously played, as we were probably worse on all four boards at one point or another, but we managed a less-than convincing 2.5-1.5 victory to which I can recite the tautological phrase: "A win is a win."

[imagefield_assist|fid=7896|preset=frontpage_200x200|title=|desc=|link=none|origsize=|align=left|width=200|height=200]By GM Ben Finegold

Week six of the USCL was sad for the Saint Louis Team. We were without our powerhouses Hikaru Nakamura and Yury Shulman, as they are at the Olympiad defending the honor of the USA! One of our reserves, Executive Director, Tony Rich, is also at the Olympiad, and, Spencer Finegold had just gone to the oral surgeon and had his wisdom teeth removed (we could not seriously think of playing Spencer on Board 4 missing his wisdom) so, it was difficult to find four warm bodies for the match! We were paired against the East-leading New England. New England does not have any GMs, but they have a solid team, and, like the Chicago Blaze, have outperformed thus far this season.

[imagefield_assist|fid=6887|preset=frontpage_200x200|lightbox=true|title=|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=200|height=200]By Spencer Finegold

Week five was shaping up to be a tough one for the Arch Bishops. With GMs Hikaru Nakamura and Yury Shulman off to the Olympiad, our board three, GM Ben Finegold, was bumped up a couple seats and some bench players had to fill in behind him. Instead of our usual rating average of 2500+ we were down to a mere 2345 and, for the first time, lower rated than our opponents. With a little luck though, we were able to wade through the beginning of our Nakamura/Shulman-less stretch and hold a draw (white won on every board!).