WA Open 2019 | Introduction | Back from my Hiatus

I have some exciting news! Although my performance in my first 2 events, the WA Open and the PNCC club event, were abysmal, I learned a lot about my strength's and weaknesses's at the event. I woke up this morning with a text from John Rossell asking me if I wanted to attend the National Open in Las Vegas.

At first, I was hesitant. I had just gone 2.5/7 in the WA Open, and in the PNCC event I hung my Queen. I've been performing pretty badly for my rating; 1300's don't hang queens, I dont care what you say! But in hindsight, I've only been back into chess for less than a month and the amount of time I have to study, although plentiful, isn't consumed by the myriads of other activities and endeavors I pursue that aspiring players are using on chess. This is no excuse; I've created this blog to make my study more serious, encourage actively entering my games online so my readers can view the games - it's a snowball effect.

But, alas, he coaxed me into going, and I'm excited! This is my first big chess event and I feel like a little kid again. I went a little cold for the Washington Open, but I'm going to be doing tactics up the ass and studying openings left and right for this event so that I can at least perform half decent. I don't know what section I'll be playing in (as of 2:29 on June 1st), but I'll update this post when I have more information! My biggest problem with chess is that it makes my bodybuilding schedule more difficult, but I've learned to adapt and push all my workouts in as much as possible on days I'm not playing chess, and try to only do cardio on the days I am playing as weight lifting is much more strenuous, but with everything in life, it's all balance. In short though, I'm going to the Las Vegas National Open!