Southern California Open Chess San Diego 2014

Hi there,

I am sitting in our hotel room. Evan and I just had breakfast. Evan is playing in the 2 day and his first round starts at 9:30. Due to a not so stellar performance at his last tournament, his rating dropped under 1400. The good news is that he is able to play in the U1400 section this tournament. We will see if that is a good thing or not. Evan seems to perform better playing up, but he is expected to do well in this tournament. Hopefully the pressure does not get the best of him.

We arrived yesterday after visiting my Aunt in San Marcos with the hopes of enjoying the day by the pool. The accommodations here are not ideal, but we will make it work. When we first arrived, we ran into a good friend Simone Sobel from the West Valley Chess Club. It was nice to see a familiar face and shortly thereafter we ran into Timur Gareev. We lent him our room for a nap while we headed to the pool.

We watched a few games and turned in for an early night. . My plan is to catch up on my reading, watch a few games and follow the 2014 Sinquefiled Cup. Live footage can be found HERE

Sadly, round 1 did not go so well. Evan lost to someone lower rated. But he won his second game and is on his third. After his loss, I had to stop every instinct I had to question him about his game and remember to just be MOM. I told him that sucks and reminded him that it was just one game and he had 5 more games to play. I also did what any other good jewish mother would do and I fed him.

Evan went on to win round 3 and then both rounds 4 and 5 placing him in second in the standings. We had a really nice dinner and turned in for the night.

The next morning, Evan woke up feeling happy, refreshed and ready to take on the day. He was scheduled to play board 1 and was paired with the leading player who had 4 out of 4. The game was close and Evan was even up a pawn, but due to a missed tactic where his opponnent picked up two pawns, the game ended in a loss for Evan.

Evan was disappointed but did not let it get him down. We relaxed in the jacuzzi and played some video games and came back for the last game which Evan easily won. Evan ended in Third Place winning him $150. Our good friends Timur and Marck took us on a little adventure. We were taken to a small, quaint meditation center in Downtown San Diego followed by a "Happy Feet" Chinese foot massage. We all slept like babies during our massages. A great way to end a another great chess trip. Until the next tournament......

#sandiegochessopen