Martinovsky Memorial and parting with the lady.
Dear ICB Editor,
I received this great material from NM Glenn Gratz this morning. Glenn won the " Parting with the Lady " Queen sacrifice prize at the US Masters. Colley, this should find a prominent spot in your next issue of the Illinois Chess Bulletin! I ' m especially pleased that an Illinois player won this prize and thanks again to Jerry Hanken for his generosity! Best,
Helen
Martinovsky Memorial and parting with the lady.
By Glen Gratz
As I sat down to play round 1 in the Martinovsky memorial, I overheard the organizers say that a prize was being offered for the best game submitted with a queen sacrifice combination. They mentioned that in a previous tournament that the same prize had been offered before and no one had submitted a game with a queen sacrifice. Obviously, on the master level queen sacrifices are seldom seen. I decided that if a queen sacrifice was a good possibility without too many risks that was what I would try.
I remembered my first game against Dr. Martinovsky in the 1989 US Open in Chicago, not for a queen sacrifice but for a queen sacrifice that I could have tried. Unfortunately at the time I did not see the queen sacrifice nor did Dr. Martinovsky. Here are the moves of that game up to that point.
1. c4 e5, 2. Nc3 c5, 3. g3 Nc6, 4. Bg2 d6, 5. e3 Be7, 6. Nge2 Bg4, 7. f3 Be6, 8. b3 Nf6, 9. 0-0 Qd7, 10. e4 Bh3, 11. d3 B: g2, 12. K: g2 h5, 13. h4 0-0- 0,14. a3 Nh7, 15. Rh1 g5, 16. hg N: g5, 17. Nd5 Rdg8, 18. Ne3 h4, 19. g4 h3 +, 20. Kf2 h2, 21. Nf5 Rh3, 22. Kg2 Rdh8, 23. B: g5 B: g5, 24. b4 Nd4, 25. Ne: d4 cd4, 26. c5 d5, 27. Nd6 + Kb8, 28. ed Bf4, 29. Nf5 Q: d5, 30. Qe2 f6, 31. a4. 1 / 2-1 / 2
At this point Dr. Martinovsky had only 15 minutes left on his clock to play to move 50 and I had just under an hour. He offered me a draw in this unclear position because of the complications and
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Illinois Chess Bulletin
Letters
his limited time. I accepted the draw more out of respect for his rating and playing strength. In that US Open I had to catch the last train to Harvard and leave by midnight to do so, therefore that may have weighed on my decision to accept the draw.
Dr. Martinovsky graciously analyzed the game afterwards with me. My local hometown area master Kevin Gensler, who had the same childhood training as me with expert Dr. Vern Willert, was there analyzing the game with us. He pointed out that in the final position where Dr. Martinovsky offered me a draw I could have moved my queen to win pawns. If the doctor moves a rook to guard the pawns I could sacrifice my queen for a rook and he would be in a mating net. Kevin pointed out that if I play 31... Qb3 I can harass his pawns. If he plays 32. b5 then 32... Qc3 harasses the c pawn and it threatens 33... Qc3: a1 then after 34. R: a1, I play h2-h1( Q +), 35. R: h1 R: h1 my other rook threatens to go to h2 checkmate. If he plays32. Rb1 after 31... Qb3 I simply capture the rook so therefore I can win pawns on the queen side because of the queen sacrifice concept.
After that first game with Dr. Martinovsky, I played him 5 more times. I have probably played him more rated games than any other USCF player in my career. My next 3 games were losses and my last 2 wins. I always enjoyed playing him win or lose. My style of play and his style of play made the games very interesting with only 1 draw.
Then in this tournament as a memorial to a wonderful chess player and person I had the opportunity to sacrifice my queen in 2 different games. In the first game the queen sacrifice was more a defensive necessity than a decisive combination.
I won the game and submitted it in case there were no other entries. But the second game involved a much sounder queen sacrifice.
White Gratz Black IM Justin Sarkar. 1. e4 c5. 2. Nf3 Nc6, 3. Bb5 d6, 4. 0-0 Bg4, 5. h3 Bh5, 6. Re1 e5, 7. c3 Nge7, 8. g4 Bg6, 9. d4 Qb6 10. Na3 0-0-0.( I am not sure about opening theory here but I believe black has gone wrong. Castling queenside looks very dangerous and his pieces are not very well coordinated.) 11 d5 Nb8,