Lesson: we went over the problems on the desperado worksheet. Then we got a new worksheet on simplifying to a won endgame.

Progress Reports

The gaps in the chart represent tournaments that were not attended. 

Notable steady progress was made by Cavan and Alex. Q and Simon also have made sporadic progress. Thomas made a little progress until  Nov 8th when he decided he didn't like worksheets.

Soren was a rising star until he stopped coming. Most made steady progress. Jack made good progress when he was on task, but recently has had problems paying attention.

Final Ratings of the fall session

Merit	Name	13-Dec
32.5	Cavan	932
8	Q	675
20.5	Simon	644
16.3	Thomas	478
	Alex	426
	Jack	234
	Santiago	230
	Soren	223
	Eldrych	217
	Audrey	170
	Hunter	156
	William	132
	Harrison	125

Lesson

Today we learned about the desperado. If you know you're going to lose a piece, can you take something out with it? This is often similar to a zwischenzug move. Do you remember what that means? The in between move. We had a worksheet with 7 problems.

Schedule

Next Wednesday is out last meeting of the fall session. We'll have a spring session that begins Feb 21 and runs through May 8. That's 11 lessons with one week off during spring break week.

Ratings

Name	6-Dec
Cavan	914
Q	654
Simon	631
Thomas	492
Alex	394
Jack	223
Soren	223
Santiago	214
Eldrych	200
Audrey	170
Hunter	149
William	132
Harrison	125

TOURNAMENT RESULTS

Congratulations to Cavan, who brought home the third place trophy.

NAME    1 2 3 4 Bef Aft Chg Merit

Cavan   W W L W 881 917 +36 32.5

Simon   L L L W 640 620 -20 20.5

Rating changes did not change the rank of any players.

PUZZLE OF THE DAY

I ran across this nice example of "overload" today.

Find White's best move.

Solution: Bd7 threatens Qf8+ if the Queen moves and unguards f8.

It also threatens BxRe8and QXNc7. Black cannot stop all the threats.