Turning 64

[Nick Ivell]

Happy birthday to Malcolm Pein. He publishes his fine win against Anand in the Telegraph today.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Thought this was a reference to your good self when I saw the thread title!

[Richard Thursby]

I might be showing my age, but it's almost impossible think of such an event without reference to a song by a certain fabulous British musical quartet.

[John Upham]

I might be showing my age, but it's almost impossible think of such an event without reference to a song by a certain fabulous British musical quartet.

Both Malcolm and myself have done this in 2024.

I first met MBP in the first week at University College, London in September 1978 at the junction on Union Street and Gordon Street entering the then UCL Union building.

Malcolm was starting three years of Chemical Engineering and myself, Chemistry.

We played in the ULU (University of London Union) Championship in February 1979 at the top of Senate House.

In the final of five rounds I was paired against Malcolm and had to win with Black to win the championship as MBP was 0.5 ahead.

I chose a sharp line of the Gruenfeld and reached a level position and should have taken the draw.

I decided to sacrifice a Queen for Rook and Minor piece and went on to lose.

Congratulations to Malcolm for all that he has achieved especially in the advancement of chess in England.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I first met MBP in the first week at University College, London in September 1978 at the junction on Union Street and Gordon Street entering the then UCL Union building.

Malcolm was starting three years of Chemical Engineering and myself, Chemistry.

We played in the ULU (University of London Union) Championship in February 1979 at the top of Senate House.

I have come to know the sprawling (towering) building that is Senate House quite well recently.

Any chance you can remember exactly where "at the top" it was?

Was the tournament in a small room, or in a big hall (and how many people, roughly)?

University of London Union might have had quite a lot of entries from across the London universities.

How long did that championship keep going for (presuming it is not still going)?

[John Upham]

I first met MBP in the first week at University College, London in September 1978 at the junction on Union Street and Gordon Street entering the then UCL Union building.

Malcolm was starting three years of Chemical Engineering and myself, Chemistry.

We played in the ULU (University of London Union) Championship in February 1979 at the top of Senate House.

I have come to know the sprawling (towering) building that is Senate House quite well recently.

Any chance you can remember exactly where "at the top" it was?

Was the tournament in a small room, or in a big hall (and how many people, roughly)?

University of London Union might have had quite a lot of entries from across the London universities.

How long did that championship keep going for (presuming it is not still going)?

It was 45 years ago and I really don't recall which room we played in.

The event took place over the weekend of the 9th, 10th and 11th of February, 1979.

In the course of the event I managed to beat M. Shepherd, John A Freeman and drew with Philip G Maguire and one other win which I cannot locate.

I was on 3.5/4 and MBP was on 4/4 and I played the QGA (rather than a Gruenfeld as I imagined earlier).

I may well post the game here as it was almost interesting. When I met Malcolm some years later he was able to recall the game verbatim.

[Nick Ivell]

Strong players nearly always have an excellent memory of their own games. Partly this is a function of their excellent memory; also it often bespeaks a profound study of their games (rather than writing the game down and throwing the scoresheet away, which I am not remotely suggesting John did!)

[John Saunders]

Strong players nearly always have an excellent memory of their own games. Partly this is a function of their excellent memory; also it often bespeaks a profound study of their games (rather than writing the game down and throwing the scoresheet away, which I am not remotely suggesting John did!)

Yes, I agree. However, as someone who spends a ludicrous amount of time trying to establish the exact scores of historical games, I am naturally concerned about the word 'nearly'! About which you are correct, by the way. Having read Alekhine's (wonderful) game collections from cover to cover and checking them against various reputable sources, I came to the conclusion that he recalled the moves from memory rather than consulting a written record and, while his memory was generally very good indeed, it was by no means faultless.

But Alekhine is not alone in that respect. As a magazine editor I occasionally received annotations of their own games from titled players where the score didn't tally with other sources and it was by no means always their versions that were correct. In the course of this work it surprised me to find that titled players were no different from the rest of us in that they range from those who keep a punctilious record of every move played in every game, however insignificant, to those who barely keep records at all and routinely jettison scoresheets. And the latter category couldn't necessarily reconstruct their games from memory, unless the game was of some significance. That said, I've written before about a game I played against Julian Hodgson in 1977 in a weekender, and, in a conversation in the early 2000s, he was able to summon it up from memory and identify a key move. When I later checked my record of the game, I found that the move wasn't actually played but was the winning one he had missed towards the end of a quickplay finish.

[John Upham]

Strong players nearly always have an excellent memory of their own games. Partly this is a function of their excellent memory; also it often bespeaks a profound study of their games (rather than writing the game down and throwing the scoresheet away, which I am not remotely suggesting John did!)

I can recall many of my OTB games (especially from the 1970s and prior to 1983) because I recorded them, kept the scoresheets and analysed them by hand and with friends. I then entered them into CB and analysed them with an engine.

For all of my students I have stressed how important it is analyse their games by hand carefully on a physical board before shunting them into an engine. This includes their online games.

Many players miss the benefits of this approach and either don't analyse them or use an engine only.

[Nick Ivell]

I always analysed my games 'by hand'. My weakness was that I tended to spend more time on my wins (and the consequent ego boost) than my losses!

My guess is that Malcolm spent a lot of time analysing his losses.

It's perfectly possible that Alekhine wrote his wonderful books from memory only. An extraordinary player is likely to have an extraordinary memory.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Though isn't one claim that Alekhine sometimes created more "flashy" finishes for certain of his games than actually occurred?

[Nick Ivell]

Even the greatest sometimes want to improve upon reality!