Blunders and Sleepless Nights.
By on 04 Feb 26 16:40
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Last time I mentioned chess players and their good luck charms and rituals.
This time we talk about the night after a bad loss and sleep never comes easy.
You toss and turn, swear you are going to give the game up, replay in your
mind how you went wrong, what chances you missed, what an idiot you are.
Two players from the recent Tata Steel event, Gukesh and Giri, would have
suffered a sleepless night after both played, at that level, terrible blunders.
V. Keymer - A Giri, Wijk aan Zee, 2026
Black played 22....Bxd4?? 23 Rc4 forked both Bishops and Giri resigned.
N. Abdusattorov - Gukesh D, Wijk aan Zee, 2026
Black played 36...Rg5?? dropping a whole Rook to 37.Qxf6+ Gukesh reigned.
Eduard Gufeld relates he could not sleep after losing a game to Aivars Gipslis.
He eventually got out of bed to look at the position that was keeping him awake.
E. Gufeld - A. Gipslis USSR Championship 1966/67
He was looking a position that could have appeared but he rejected
He now saw 39.Re7! Qxe7 40.Bc3 and the threat of a discovered check
winning the Queen or Ng4+ and Nh6 mate would have won the game.
Alas when he played though the whole game again he discovered that the
Black pawn on h7 had move to h5 on move 30. There was no checkmate.
So his sleepless night was the result of a position that never appeared!
But that position still haunted him. The above tale was told by Gufeld in;
The Chess Players Bedside Book. by Keene and Edwards, published 1975.
Time passed and in 2001 Gufeld published his The Search for Mona Lisa
(an excellent book BTW. 100% recommended.)
On page 189 Gufeld again sets up the wrong position with the Black pawn on h7,
Only this time he does not mention the position never appeared, instead he points
it out as a genuine missed chance. That sleepless night must have really affected him.
We open with an entertaining cracker composed by Velimir Kalandadze in 2005
I have brought the study forward on a few moves from the start to show the idea.
White to play and draw.
The solution will be under the Solution Banner below.
In this one, Lushovsky - Griedner, USSR 1976
Should White resign? No. White to play and win
The Velimir Kalandadze study, we start from the composer s original position.
For this weeks RHP game we look at; Two Hoots - bob58 RHP 2023
and we can link this game to the Giri blunder v Keymer given up above.
White to play ignored the threat to the d4 pawn and used it as bait thinking that
after 26....Rxd4 27.Rxd4 Bxd4 28.Rc4 is the exact same position of the Rook
and the undefended Bishops in the Giri game. But there is a missed twist.
The thread accompanying this blog is Thread 204756
