So, for the 40th state in my #fiftystatesofchess journey as a 40-year old, I spent a portion of the Labor Day weekend (& a few days before) in Colorado. The oddity was, I intended to rent a car for this trip, but there were no rental cars available since this was a major holiday & I waited too late to try to rent a car.
As Denver is at high altitude (It is called the Mile High City, you know), my uber driver & the front desk both nicely reminded me to drink lots of water.
After checking into the hotel I was staying at on Thursday afternoon, I walked over to Amigos Mexican Food for lunch. It was odd to see a Mexican place only open until 3pm on weekdays & 2 or 3pm on weekends, but as the trip passed on, the amount of pedestrian traffic in the area seemed to be minimal. The quesadillas I had were pretty good, I wondered if any of the other chess players walked over on Saturday or Sunday for lunch. After walking over to Target for some missing supplies, passing a Greenwood Village Traffic Signal with the City logo on the overhead mast arm street name sign, & back to the hotel for a short rest, I walked over to Method CrossFit.
I walked over to Schlotzsky's for dinner as my body wanted to get back to the hotel & just rest. (I had a several nights of not great sleep before the trip, which probably played a part.)
On Friday morning, I got a lyft to Atomic Cowboy, home of Denver Biscuit Company. (there's a few such places, so look southwest of Denver Botanical Gardens & south of the US Mint) The Dahlia is a breakfast sandwich that consists of a giant sausage patty, fried egg, apple butter and maple syrup.
Unfortunately, I made the mistake of letting them pour syrup over the sandwich instead of getting it on the side. After trying to eat the sandwich with barehands, & realizing the syrup felt like glue, I ended up having to eat the sandwich with a fork and knife. It was still a pretty good sandwich!
I realized the U.S. Mint was closed, so my next stop was Denver Botanic Gardens.
I did however, see some parking signs I had never seen before, so I took pictures of these highly unusual signs.
I never heard of a TV Channel getting its own parking spot on the street, though I am not surprised Mayor's Staff does. I am surprised that they are next to each other.
I didn't take a lot of pictures at Denver Botanic Gardens, but it was a very satisfying, relaxing visit. Apparently, Bonsai artists train & style trees, & the tree I took a picture of in this Instagram post is roughly the same age I am! In multiple parts of the Gardens, there were volunteers taking care of different plants. While I only spent an hour there, anyone with greener thumbs (or Poison Ivy) could easily spend hours there.
I next took a lyft to Colorado Railroad Museum. On the way there, I took a picture of a blank out sign configuration I had never seen before. (I work as a traffic/transportation engineer, so I do take pictures of unusual signs, signals, & markings on occasion)
I took a lot of pictures at the Colorado Railroad Museum but I never made an Instagram post of it. I will fail to limit it to 10 pictures or less here.
I dropped by Larimer Square next, trying to find the statue that was marked on Google Maps.
After finding the stature, I walked over near 16th Street Mall & ate at a sandwich shop called Ike's Love & Sandwiches. I ordered a Mario sandwich (#85 on the menu). Halfway through the sandwich, I got the body is overwhelmed feeling, I want to go back to the hotel room & rest, so that's what I did after finishing lunch.
After not moving much for a few hours, I walked over to Viewhouse and ate dinner. I thoroughly enjoyed the chicken appetizer & the burger I ate.
I want to discuss the smoking a bit. I was expecting to smell a lot more cigarette smoke & weed smoke on this trip, even being warned by a new friend that I may experience a lot of smoke. However, I was in places that didn't allow any smoking, & walked near a place that was near a non-smoking part. I actually smelled very little smoke, which was really nice. Now, if I had done more walking within the city limits, I am sure my opinion would have changed.
On Saturday morning, I took a lyft to Snooze, an A.M. Eatery. You see, I loved Snooze when I was in Phoenix, & was happy to return to Snooze in a different location. I had a french toast item with blueberries & it was great. Strangely, my Lyft Driver picking me up dropped someone off & then got stuck next door for over 10 minutes trying to get out.
After I got back, I picked up my chess stuff & went down to the tournament room dressed as Hint Toad to start the tournament versus the top seed 2334 on Board 1. The game was sadly not competitive as he broke through & the game ended in 19 moves.
In Round 2 I faced off versus a 1753, and had to sacrifice my Queen for a Rook & Bishop. However, I hung around long enough, & after he missed a possible mating attack, I coordinated my pieces better & successfully sacrificed an exchange to start a mating attack. I won't show the whole game, but I will show the key positions & the final moves.
I remember thinking for the last few moves how could I convince Black to move his e-pawn, as I had a prepared mating combination going if he did. He finally obliged with 40. ...Nc8-d6 41. R2xd6! Black's best try is probably to try for a perpetual with 41. ... Qc2+ 42. Rd2 Qe4+ when I have to give away the h-pawn to avoid perpetual check. But he played 41. ... exd6 & resigned after 42. Bh6+! I will let you try to work out the final checkmate & provide the answer near the end of the post.
In Round 3, I made a new friend in Ben DeGuire after the game. I had Black in a Petroff where both of us castled long. What made the game interesting was he had one of the worst bishops ever, but I couldn't finish the win because I never saw the finishing route & had to settle for a draw. I don't feel quite as bad as I normally would about it, because I knew I had the better game after establishing his tall pawn & I had something much worse happen to me later.
The game of this blogpost will be Round 4, my win against Brad Lundstrom. (His published rating for this tournament is actually my birth year).
So, entering Round 5, I played against a 1583 person that was playing well above that rating. He drew an 1886, beat a 1967, & beat a 1768 in Rounds 1, 2, & 4 respectively. I played well enough for most of the game to earn a draw & get out of Colorado with a winning record, but then I blundered in the worst way in the ending, trying a pawn sacrifice too late to try to win, & turning an easy draw into a hopeless loss. The Colorado State Chess Club might publish that game (& they have the right to - they have copies of all scoresheets & it is one of their players scoring three upset wins in the championship section) but it may be a long time before I willingly talk about that game again.
Thanks to that loss, I finish Colorado with an even record.
In addition to Ben DeGuire, I made another new friend in John Brezina. He takes photographs for chess tournaments in Colorado & across the world. You can find him at the Parker Chess Club Website.
I finished with 2 wins, 2 losses, & a draw. 22nd/46 in the Championship position. Well, at least I had advantage in the last 4 games, so there's still some good chess play left, I just need to string it together better.
Here are the updated #fiftystatesofchess maps, made with aid from mapchart.net
The tournament was run really well, & there were a lot of players at this tournament. (175 I heard from the TD). One of the lower sections was actually using accelerated pairings for the first two rounds, so that was fun to hear. The DGT boards worked on the back screen so we could see the top boards from each section without having to stand crowding the top boards.
Other Places local to the tournament that I ate at that I liked: Anthony's Pizza & Pasta (the Chicken Parm Hero was fantastic, & Honey Basil Express Loved their Honey BBQ Chicken & Sweet & Sour Chicken.
I conclude with this strange airport story: Security at Denver International Airport flagged my carry-on because one of them didn't recognize chess pieces. The last security person apologized for that when he gave me back my bag after looking at the image & clearing it.
Answer: 42. ...Kg8 43. Rg7+ Kf8/Kh8 44. Ng6# finishes Round 2
And that concludes my 40th state!
