The Chess Mind

With one round to go, Ray Robson leads the U.S. Junior Championship by a point with a very impressive score of 5½/6. The crucial game was played tonight, when he faced IM Alex Lenderman. Lenderman had White, and with a win he'd have created a three-way tie for first between the two of them, together with fellow IM Salvius Bercys. It was a wild game, but while Lenderman had the draw in hand at one point he pressed for the win, which ultimately backfired. With one round to go, here are the standings:

1. Robson 5½
2. Bercys 4½
3. Lenderman 3½
4-5. Shankland, Banawa 3
6. Lee 2½
7. Liu 2
8. Coleman 0

Fortunately for the tournament's drama, #1 plays #2 in the last round, so even though Robson has White anything is possible.

Meanwhile, again for your entertainment, here's an exciting game from round 4 noted by local correspondent Allen Becker:

[Event "U.S. Junior Ch"]
[Site "Milwaukee, WI"]
[Date "2009.07.14"]
[Round "4"]
[White "*IM_Shankland"]
[Black "*FM_Lee"]
[Result "0-1"]
[WhiteElo "2564"]
[BlackElo "2384"]
[Opening "King's Indian: Orthodox, Aronin-Taimanov, 9.Ne1"] [ECO "E98"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. Nf3 O-O 6. Be2 e5 7. O-O Nc6 8. d5 Ne7 9. Ne1 Nd7 10. Be3 f5 11. f3 f4 12. Bf2 g5 13. Rc1 Kh8 14. Nd3 Rg8 15. c5 Nf6 16. cxd6 cxd6 17. Nb5 g4 18. Nc7 g3 19. Nxa8 Nh5 20. Kh1 Bh6 21. Be1 Nc6 22. Nf2 Qh4 23. h3 gxf2 24. Rxf2 Bxh3 25. gxh3 Qg3 0-1

It has been years since I played the King's Indian in tournaments, but I always love to see the kitchen sink attack win in the Mar Del Plata Variation. Black's position might be fundamentally unsound, but it just takes a momentary lapse and White gets mated. (As far as I can tell, it only took the one error, 21.Be1, and White was dead.) A very nice game by Lee!

More tournament info here.