Sunday, November 01, 2009

GM Josh Friedel Plays the Ulvestad


I have annotated two games with the Ulvestad Variation of the Two Knights Defense (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 b5). You can also download the PGN. The first is a game of GM Josh Friedel's from the recent Unive Open in Hoogeveen, the Netherlands (which was much more interesting than the closed "Crown" event there won by Tiviakov with the only win of the entire tournament); the second one is a game from Olaf Ulvestad himself (played just over 50 years before). In both White tried the most common move in amateur play, 6.Bxb5, keeping things in true Ulvestad territory rather than transposing to the Fritz Variation after 6.Bf1 Nd4 7.c3 Nxd5. And in both Black achieved a brilliant victory.

GM Friedel finished seventh out of 63 at Hoogeveen, which disappointed him (see "Josh Friedel on a Stylish Win but a Mediocre Result" at the USCF site). But he did deservedly win the brilliancy prize for Friedel - Migchiel de Jong, as he discussed at ChessVibes.



In the game Vedder -Friedel from the same tournament (which I annotate) it is interesting to see Friedel switch from the more standard 5...Na5 to back to the Fritz-Ulvestad since his loss to Nakamura in the final round of the US Championship (see my notes to Nakamura - Friedel, US Championship 2009). I hope that other GMs follow Friedel's lead, since the Fritz-Ulvestad is a fascinating line of which I'd like to see more in high level play. Katar has posted a nice video on it titled 2 Knights, Ulvestad at Chess.TV (which does not offer embedding, unfortunately). I previously posted a webliography devoted to the Two Knights Defense, Fritz-Ulvestad Variation but neglected to consider videos on the subject, such as Katar's or the one below by Matt Pullin from YouTube (which does allow embedding). Katar's is much more complete and very well done, so be sure to check it out.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm pretty sure Friedel has always played ...b5, Na5 was a rarity in his game against Nakamura I think.

Michael Goeller said...

Can you cite some games, because I did not find any ECO C57 games in a search, other than the Nakamura game.

Michael Goeller said...

TopNotch at ChessPub offers these Friedel ICC games as proof that he has not switched to the Ulvestad but, if anything, switched back to it:

[Event "ICC 3 0"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2003.09.21"]
[Round "-"]
[White "CIS"]
[Black "Sea-Hawk"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ICCResult "White checkmated"]
[WhiteElo "2736"]
[BlackElo "2744"]
[Opening "two knights defense: Ulvestad variation"]
[ECO "C57"]
[NIC "KP.01"]
[Time "01:03:34"]
[TimeControl "180+0"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Nf6 4. Ng5 d5 5. exd5 b5 6. Bf1 h6 7. Nxf7 Kxf7 8. dxc6 Bc5 9. Bxb5 Ng4 10. O-O Qh4 11. Qf3+ Ke8 12. h3 Rf8 13. Qb3 Nxf2 14. d4 Bxd4 15. Be3 Nxh3+ 16. Kh2 Nf2+ 17. Kg1 Qh1# {White checkmated} 0-1

[Event "ICC 5 0"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2003.10.14"]
[Round "-"]
[White "Sage"]
[Black "Sea-Hawk"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ICCResult "Black resigns"]
[WhiteElo "2370"]
[BlackElo "2302"]
[Opening "two knights defense: Ulvestad variation"]
[ECO "C57"]
[NIC "KP.01"]
[Time "22:50:42"]
[TimeControl "300+0"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Nf6 4. Ng5 d5 5. exd5 b5 6. Bf1 h6 7. Nf3 Qxd5 8.Nc3 Qe6 9. Bxb5 Bd7 10. O-O Bd6 11. d4 e4 12. d5 Nxd5 13. Nxd5 exf3 14. Bxc6Bxc6 15. Re1 Bxd5 16. Rxe6+ Bxe6 17. Qxf3 O-O 18. Bf4 Rab8 19. Bxd6 cxd6 20.b3 d5 21. h3 Rfc8 22. c3 Rb7 23. Rd1 Rbc7 24. Rd3 g6 25. g4 Kg7 26. h4 a5 27. Qf4 Kg8 28. Qd4 Ra8 29. h5 gxh5 30. gxh5 Kh7 31. Rg3 Rg8 32. Qd3+ Kh8 33. Rxg8+ Kxg8 34. Qg3+ {Black resigns} 1-0

[Event "ICC 3 0"]
[Site "Internet Chess Club"]
[Date "2006.01.30"]
[Round "-"]
[White "Killabeezonatak"]
[Black "Sea-Hawk"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ICCResult "Black resigns"]
[WhiteElo "2595"]
[BlackElo "2589"]
[Opening "two knights defense: Ulvestad variation"]
[ECO "C57"]
[NIC "KP.01"]
[Time "23:57:25"]
[TimeControl "180+0"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Nf6 4. Ng5 d5 5. exd5 b5 6. Bxb5 Qxd5 7. Nc3 Qxg2 8. Qf3 Qxf3 9. Nxf3 Bd7 10. O-O Bd6 11. Re1 O-O-O 12. d3 Rhe8 13. Bg5 Nd4 14. Bxd7+ Kxd7 15. Nxd4 exd4 16. Ne4 Be5 17. Nxf6+ gxf6 18. Bd2 Rg8+ 19. Kh1 Rg4 20. Re4 h5 21. Rxg4 hxg4 22. Kg2 Rh8 23. Rh1 Rh3 24. Bc1 f5 25. Kf1 Bxh2 26. Kg2 Bd6 27. Rxh3 gxh3+ 28. Kxh3 Ke6 29. Kh4 Be7+ 30. Kg3 c5 31. Kf3 Bh4 32. Bf4 f6 33. Bb8 a6 34. Ba7 Kd5 35. Kf4 Bxf2 36. Kxf5 Bh4 37. Bb8 Bg5 38.
Bc7 c4 39. Bd8 cxd3 40. cxd3 Bc1 41. b3 Kc5 42. Bxf6 Bb2 43. Ke4 Kb4 44.Bxd4 Bc1 45. Be3 Bb2 46. Kd5 Ka3 47. Kc4 Kxa2 48. d4 Ka3 49. d5 Be5 50. Bc5+ Kb2 51. d6 Bf6 52. d7 Bd8 53. b4 Kc2 54. Kd5 Kb3 55. Kc6 Ka4 56. Bb6 Be7 57.Ba5 Kb3 58. Kc7 Kc4 59. d8=Q Bxd8+ 60. Kxd8 Kb5 61. Kc7 {Black resigns} 1-0

Mark Ginsburg said...

Sage is strong. I've played him on ICC a lot. In my games, he plays like Yasser Seirawan but I'm not sure who it is.

The Ulvestad looks highly dubious. It is a good target for a centaur (human+engine) to debunk.

-Mark

Anonymous said...

I don't agree that the open was more interesting then the crown group. Yes there were a lot of draws, but there also were also a lot of interesting games. No short draws.

Michael Goeller said...

Well, that may be true for you, but I think for most amateur chess fans the openings used and the excitement generated by games in the Open group was much more interesting. It was precisely the differences in performance there that made the games interesting for most fans.