Week 34.5 – Club News and Bobby Fischer’s #7 Grandmaster

As stated before, the LCCC chess league is a go and will be bigger and better than ever!  Twenty-eight players have signed up to play at this writing!

September 9, at 9pm is the deadline for entry. If you have not let us know you want in by then, the best you can hope for is an alternate spot should someone drop out.

The league will start on a later Monday in September to be announced later.

In addition, September 9 will be the re-birth of the Ladder Tournament! All the current active members will be placed on the ladder in random order to get it started again. That alone will have entertainment value and club camaraderie written all over it!

How will the random order be done? Well, the law firm of Dewey, Cheetem and Howe will oversee the accounting firm of Lybad, Hyde and Skimoff – as they place the players on the ladder.
I’m sure it will be fine.

Now for Bobby Fischer’s number seven grandmaster of all time (circa 1964 list):

Jose Raoul Capablanca
“The glamour boy of world chess. Capablanca had been champion of Cuba at age 12. And from that time until his death in 1942, he had the totally undeserved title (as Petrosian does today) of being the greatest living endgame player.

Well, I recall a game he played against Vera Menchek in which he made three colossal blunders in the endgame. [Editor Note: Vera was an attractive woman and Capa was quite the ladies man. Fischer may be acknowledging that fact with the next statement.]

While, not typical of Capablanca's play, it is representative of the fact that Capablanca did not know the simplest Rook – Pawn endings. The story goes that he played over thousands of Rook and Pawn endings, but I cannot believe this is true.

Capablanca was among the greatest of chess players, but not because of his endgames. His trick was to keep openings simple, and then play with such brilliance in the middle game that the game was decided – even though his opponent didn’t always know it – before they ever arrived at the endgame.

Capablanca never really devoted himself to chess,   and seldom made preparations for a match.
(Ed. Note: Fischer's pet peeve - natural talent that other's had. Fischer had talent too, but he also worked extremely hard to get where he got. To many, the game just came easier to them than it did even to Fischer.)

His simplicity was a myth. His complete lack of book knowledge forced him to push harder and try to squeeze the most out of every position.

Every move he made had to be super-sharp so as to make something out of nothing. His play was forced. He had to try harder than everyone else because he had so little to begin with. He matured early and played his best chess in his twenties.”

Wow. No wonder Fischer never considered Cuba for exile. It would not have been a safe haven for him. Capablanca’s name is a god-like there.