Kings Gambit Solved? (article)

Originally posted by nimzo5
I don't know if it's still common parlance but Qc2 in the Nimzo used to be called the Capablanca variation. I would consider that a pretty important main opening.

Here are listed some other variations named after Capa

http://chessforallages.blogspot.com/2008/01/capablanca-variation.html

Hi V.

These are variations and I must confess those in the Caro Kann, Queen's Gambit,
Grunfeld's Defense and Queen's Indian Game I've never come across.
(don't bother posting them, I'm not that interested in the QP openings.
And I go my own way v the Caro.).

You forgot his fun killing line in the Goring Gambit which I do know.
(he was not the first to play it, most likely as in the above variations, but he
saw into it a lot deeper than those who went before.)

I said main line openings. I know of no book called the Capablanca
Defence, The Capablanca Attack, The Capablanca, The Capa-Indian,
Play the Capablanca Gambit!!

Yet lessers players, Alapin, Winawer, Bird, Caro and Kann, Evans, Goring,
Greco, Philidor, Max Lange, Marshall, Colle (I mentioned him Robbie) Robatsch,
Grob, Benko, Petroff, Reti, Chigorin, etc etc.....
Check an MCO, Capa's name does not appear in the Index.
(a gamble there because I don't have BCO's or NCO's)

Capa met the Marshall OTB he did not work it all out in his study.

Hi P.

(Capa v Speilman)
Looking at a game you have just played for an improvement is common
practise. He may have seen the idea OTB. It hardly proves midnight oil.

(Speilmann by the way stated that Alekhine would not win one game from
Capablanca during the 1927 match.) 🙂

You mentioned ' "My Chess Career" (published 1920, before he became
World Champion.)
Yes it is a pretty vain piece of work, he gives himself and his moves a very
glowing write up. But it was honest writing.

By all accounts he was very vain. (in his later years to hide the fact he had put
on weight he actually wore a man's corset.) He wrote it how he saw it.
He said he was at the peak of powers as far as seeing combinations, planning
in the middle game and working out the endings.
He then added something like because he was at the top of his game
he can only go downhill from here.
His only weakness, he confessed, was the openings.

Towards the end of the book he mentioned giving lessons to someone and booked
up on openings to explain them better to his student.
He said he learned more about the openings than his student and felt the time was spent.

I'm not the greatest Capa fan in the world and there was a lot of myth building
going on by his supporters.

Capa never set traps for instance.

Yet in ' "My Chess Career" he admits setting a trap for Bernstein.
Bernstein - Capablanca, Moscow 1914.

"Because I had first played R-B4, Dr.Bernstein was lured into a fatal trap."
Is the exact quote. (that R-B4 is descriptive - the move is 23...Rc5)

That was the famous Capa game that ends with Qb2 and all the back rank tricks.


Capa has just played 29....Qb6-b2. Bernstein resigned.

The Black Queen has stood on b6 from move 14 and some write about this
game as though Capa saw it all from then. Rubbish.
Berstein had a perpertual, Capa tricked him and won beautifully.

Fred Reinfled calls 23...Rc4 an usually subtle trap.
(the word 'trap' had to be dragged out of him. It came through gritted teeth.)
then adds:

"Black's peculiar order of moves have misled Bernstein."

"....peculiar order of moves..." It was a trap. A brillaint fantastic trap
leading to one of the most famous moves in chess history. 29.Qb2.

(it was an exhibition game so perhaps Bernstein felt obliged not to go
for the perpetual and Capa for the same reason thought up the trap
for sheer entertainment. What a showman!) 😉

Capa was a great player but the openings were his 'weakness' which
were masked by his superb middle and end game skill.

And this bit.

"So your argument is invalid."

We are not arguing, we are discussing chess, something of late which
has not happened in the Chess Forum.

Coincidentally today's chessgames game is Lasker v Capablanca - and Capa retreats the bishop in a Winawer, back to e7, which I don't remember seeing that often 🙂

Can someone explain what's going on in the last 20 moves or so. The last capture is at move 41 and then I see a lot of movement, but no progression on either side. What are the threats/plans?

Originally posted by greenpawn34
Hi V.

These are variations and I must confess those in the Caro Kann, Queen's Gambit,
Grunfeld's Defense and Queen's Indian Game I've never come across.
(don't bother posting them, I'm not that interested in the QP openings.
And I go my own way v the Caro.).

You forgot his fun killing line in the Goring Gambit which I do know.
(he was not the ...[text shortened]... ss, something of late which
has not happened in the Chess Forum.

Greenpawn`s logic is absurd to say nothing more (if it isn`t jest of course).

Everyone who is not mentioned in MCO does not study openings, according to his logic.

To say nothing about speculations that Capa watched some other OTB tournaments during New York 1927 tournament (and saw the game with that new variation).

And to call "honest writing" PR books like "My Chess Career".... no comments.

Originally posted by Pacifique
Greenpawn`s logic is absurd to say nothing more (if it isn`t jest of course).

Everyone who is not mentioned in MCO does not study openings, according to his logic.

To say nothing about speculations that Capa watched some other OTB tournaments during New York 1927 tournament (and saw the game with that new variation).

And to call "honest writing" PR books like "My Chess Career".... no comments.

"Everyone who is not mentioned in MCO does not study openings, according to his logic."

This is an inaccurate representation of his point. Obviously Capablanca knew openings, but he was by no means an opening theoretician, and opening play is nowhere near the most distinguishing characteristic of his play.

This is merely a discussion, not a black-and-white assertion about Capa's opening prowess. No one has claimed that Capablanca played random opening moves with no sense or purpose, nor has anyone claimed that Capablanca was a world-renowned opening theoretician.

He was a world champion, he knew the game the way world champions know it, and the particular elements of the game he preferred to focus upon were areas other than opening preparation. I believe this is what GP was saying, but I will graciously stand corrected if I am bungling the interpretation as well.

Hi P.

The players who have openings named after them are usually the lads who have
put the effort in, burnt the midnight oil, to fashion it into an OTB weapon.
There are a few exceptions (poor Damanio for example who advised DO NOT
play 2...f6) but as he was the first to mention it they stuck his name to it.

Nothing startling from Capa, But you get the feeling if he wanted to he could
have found a few TN's in his time or opened up a new route.
(By all acounts he found studying a bore.)

His game v Nimzovitch St.Peterburg 1914.
When he came up with the idea OTB of fianchettoing his KB and saccing his a-pawn
to get at White's Queenside. It was a pure Benko concept played 14 years before
Benko was born.


Nimzovitch - Capablanca after 13 moves.

Saccing pawns to use the tempo gained to build an attack on the King had
been known since Morphy. This idea to use the time gained to get a positional
grip on the position was a head of it's time.
Reinfeld left it out of Capa's best games, So did Golembek.
Capa included it in his Chess Career leaving out many games that people
rave on about. He knew there was something here and wanted to show it.

I still say Capa write honestly as he saw it in 'My Chess Career'.
He was one of the most gifted players in history. Gifted players can rarely
put into words how they got good.

Yes it's pompous and brash but he was good, you cannot argue with that.
Chess came naturally to him with little effort. He wrote how he saw it,
how he felt, what else could do?

You keep slagging it off but give no example.

A debate works like this, I say something and you offer an alternative point.
sniping with twisted logic comments is not debatting.

Tell me why you do not like My Chess Career so much, which part is lies.

-----------------------------------------

"....speculations that Capa watched some other OTB tournaments during
New York 1927 tournament (and saw the game with that new variation). "

You said Speilmann played his TN v Capa in round one.
Capa obviously looked at it after the game and came up with an improvement
and used it when met again.
I never said anything about him looking at other games.
He looked at his own game.

Originally posted by Paul Leggett
"Everyone who is not mentioned in MCO does not study openings, according to his logic."

This is an inaccurate representation of his point. Obviously Capablanca knew openings, but he was by no means an opening theoretician, and opening play is nowhere near the most distinguishing characteristic of his play.

This is merely a discussion, not a black as saying, but I will graciously stand corrected if I am bungling the interpretation as well.

I don`t know if Capa can be classified as "opening theoretician", but it`s fact that he has introduced many original opening ideas and he almost never got hopeless position from opening (except a few games like his well known opening blunder vs Saemish in 1929 - compare it with theoreticians like Nimzowitch for example). I find bizzare greenpawn`s Claim that such a player did not study opening. Also Alekhine in his New York 1927 tournament book has made interesting analysis of Capa`s play, including conclusion that Capa plays no more 1-2 opening as White and Black, during one tournament but these openings are well prepared.

Speaking on "My chess career" - I did not claim there were lies, but definitely Capa exaggerated his opening ignorance to show how great talent he is. It was important to persuade readers that Capa is the best contender for World Champion title.

But if we compare Capa with other authors & their self-PR (like Nimzowitsch with his "The Immortal Zugzwang Game" ) maybe he was honest. 🙂

Hi P

It does look like somewhere along the line we agree on Capa.
I never said he did not study openings, I said his opening rep was narrow
and it was the weakest part of his game,

The famous Lasker - Capablanca exchange Lopez St. Petersberg 1914.
Most writers claim that Lakser used psychology by adopting a drawing
line when he needed a win.
The fact is Capa had played the Black side of the exchange Lopez a few times
in the past and Lasker spotted that Capa did not play it too well so hit him
with 4.Bxc6 and proved a point.

Also his loss v Reti in 1924 where he appeared (at his standard) not to know what
was going on showed that that he never really kept up to date with what other
players were doing opening wise.
in 1923 Reti and played 1.Nf3 18 times winning 14 of them.

Capa's OTB skill had got him out of slighlty inferior positions in the past
so he relied on that more hard graft in his study.

In the 'The Unknown Capablanca' you will find games by Capa with a vast variety
of openings, (including 2 Latvians - Capa losses one falling into a Latvian trick.)
Usually he just picked his way through the opening and outplayed his opponent.

Sometimes he would take a gamble to get his opponent out of the book.
So it does appear he knew what some book moves were and was willing to
accept a slightly inferior game knowing he could turn it around.
That book BTW contains some classic and uknown (hence the title) masterpieces.


I'm not sure if Capa's prose was aimed at proving he should have a shot at the
world title. In 'My Chess Career' he does say backers came forward around
about 1913/14 but Capa refused saying he was not yet good enough.

You maybe right though, perhaps Lasker read the book and thought this Capa lad
is brilliant because he unoffically resigned the title to Capa in 1920. 🙂

But the chess world wanted blood and Lasker needed the money so they played a match.

Agree the Nimzovitch Zugzwang game has a fair amount of hype attached to it.
We are in good company there.

Edward Winter states: "Nimzowitsch went on a propaganda blitz" about 2 years
after the game was played. Before then it had remained quite unknown and ignored.

http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/zugzwang.html

Also it's not really a Zugzwang. As discussed in the above link.

Zuggers means if you move you lose. If you can 'pass' then you will be OK.
if Sämisch could be allow to 'pass' Nimzovitch would still win with R2f3.

Originally posted by greenpawn34
Hi P

It does look like somewhere along the line we agree on Capa.
I never said he did not study openings, I said his opening rep was narrow
and it was the weakest part of his game,

The famous Lasker - Capablanca exchange Lopez St. Petersberg 1914.
Most writers claim that Lakser used psychology by adopting a drawing
line when he needed a win.
be OK.
if Sämisch could be allow to 'pass' Nimzovitch would still win with R2f3.

Not sure if opening was the weakest part of Capa`s play.
At least Alekhine after study of Capa`s games concluded that
1) Capa is making most of his mistakes in the middle game
2) it`s not easy to catch Capa in opening stage, because of
a) good opening preparation
b) successful play encountering novelties (his well known game vs Marshall encountering Marshall Attack is the most illustrative example).

The result of their match in 1927 speaks itself.

Well we can politely disagree on that one.
The good news is that it has got me going over the games of the Alekhine
Capablanca match again. (especially Cap's first win - It's the kind of brilliant
attack Alekhine was famous for.)

The Marshal game. There is another riddle exposed by Edward Winter.
He has unearthed a Marshall Gambit played and printed 25 years before
the Marshall - Capablanca game possibly played in Havana of all places!

http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/marshallgambit.html

There is also a Marshall game (undated) which Winter suspects may have
been played before the Capa game.

Then there is the case of the missing note!

Shamkovitch suggests that Marshall could have tried 15...h5!? in that game
and offers analysis to show it could have drawn.

No mention of 15...h5!? in 'My Chess Career' but.... in the tournament book
written before 'My Chess Career' Capa states:

15...h5 was perhaps the best way to keep up the pressure.’

Curious.

chess is already becoming less a game of skill but more a game of memorization and referencing old games. With computer processing power growing rapidly, online play for sure will die.

Originally posted by Pacifique
Not sure if opening was the weakest part of Capa`s play.
At least Alekhine after study of Capa`s games concluded that
1) Capa is making most of his mistakes in the middle game
2) it`s not easy to catch Capa in opening stage, because of
a) good opening preparation
b) successful play encountering novelties (his well known game vs Marshall encounteri ...[text shortened]... ll Attack is the most illustrative example).

The result of their match in 1927 speaks itself.

"b) successful play encountering novelties (his well known game vs Marshall encountering Marshall Attack is the most illustrative example)."

A superb point often overlooked! In my mind, he is the last guy one would EVER want to try out a novelty against in a tournament game.

To Marshall's credit, he played it against the biggest target he could find, but also the guy most likely to successfully distill the essence of the position and find a solution.

Originally posted by greenpawn34
Hi V.

"And I go my own way v the Caro"

which way would that be?

This thread has gone off on a strange tangent from an April fool's joke to arguments over Capablanca. 🙄