I was on my way back to Perak for the Chinese New Year Holidays when I received
received an SMS from Ching Kim Lye from Kedah informing me of the death of Pn Hjh Khatijah Na. For those who don’t know she is the mother of the strongest women chess player in Malaysia, WFM Siti Zulaikha(picture). [...]

Finished 26th position in the PCMM.
Things just didn’t go well for me this week.
My PDA was on the blink. The screen just showed some rubbish characters. I don’t know whether it can be fixed or not. So I didn’t get any practice done on the PDA. That’s no excuse though. I played some really horrible [...]

pcmm-3rd round
Originally uploaded by gilachess.
3 pointers
Anas
Nur Shazwani
Zarul Shafiq
Abdullah Che Hassan
Fariz
Balendran… Continue reading

Round 1
Originally uploaded by gilachess.
That’s the Tosai I had.Got a look at the player’s list: Anas, Nur Shazwani, Zarul Shafiq, Adbdullah Che Hassan, Zarul Shazwan, Balendran, Alia, Abd Rahman, Abd Shukor, Afiq, Aishah, Alijendar Ober, Izz are the top seeds.I’m seeded 19.Got into a back rank mate and [...]

pcmm-ready to start round 1
Originally uploaded by gilachess.
Top seed is anas. Izz and abdullah che hassan in picture. Blogging this live from my 3 year old nokia 7650. Wonders of technology !… Continue reading

Pcmm allegro
Originally uploaded by gilachess.
Sitting at the restoran nasi kandar just across wilayah complex.Having teh tarik and tosai waiting for round 1 to start.Since this is the 2nd day of Chinese New Year it looks like I’m one of only 2 chinese here. The Foudzi family (Siti, Johan, [...]

In case you are wondering why my Google advertisement has a dog in it, it’s because today is Chinese New Year and it’s the Year of the Dog. Good to see that the American based company recognize this Chinese celebration too.
Here is the logo from Google China http://www.google.cn.

On a chess related note, Google advertisement (Google [...]

My preparation for the weekend tournament last Sunday was a mess. Slept late, arrived late, and suffered terribly from lousy time management. Surprisingly I didn’t do worse than the last allegro held at the same place.
I finished a lucky 13th place - up one position from my last allegro. There were 3 games where [...]

Read this article on Karpov School of Chess in Kansas. It seemed that the school spent a whole bunch of money bringing in former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev to Kansas and went broke as a result. Now they are selling their building in which they are housed to stay alive. And I thougt chess people [...]

Ok. It’s time to evaluate the success of my One Week Chess Preparation Plan:
1. Tactics:
Moderate success as I only spent 5-10 minutes a day.
I did see a marked improvements in games where I won with tactics.
2. Online Conditioning:
Failure. Only played games on Friday online using 2 minute time controls.
My game against Kamaluddin was drawn where [...]

The local chess scene is very popular seeing now that parents are actually encouraging their children to participate in this mind sport.
I remember a time when my dad just didn’t approve of the time I spent on chess during my school days.
Things are so different today. As an example, the CAS tournament pre-registration for this [...]

Just an update on point no 1 of my one week plan for the coming CAS tournament.
1. Tactics:
Many advice from the net and some strong players say that tactics training is a sure way to boost chess performance.
Now the problem is what tools to use.
Will use Renko chess tactics puzzle for this on a daily [...]

I was surprised to find this chess blog is now ranked no. 3 in Technorati in terms of most “authority” in the Chess category.
Of course this latest ranking has to be taken with a grain of salt but it’s a nice feeling to be top 3 in something

Link to the above page Continue reading

I’m testing out posting viewable games on this blog.
The first game I’ve selected is from the Closet Grandmaster blog. Apparently he is not only an active chess blogger but a pretty good chess player himself.
Here is his game played in the current Queensland International Chess, New Zealand.
For a full game comment go here Continue reading

Last month it was sad to see Malaysia being humbled by our Singaporean neighbours for the 5th time in a row (probably more than that but I can’t get the results before year 2000).
It’s also sad to see our local chess websites not doing too well these days.
I still maintain my ‘hobbyist’ Malaysian Chess [...]

Here’s my plan in getting ready for the coming CAS tournament. I have only one week to prepare!
1. Tactics:
Many advice from the net and some strong players say that tactics training is a sure way to boost chess performance.
Now the problem is what tools to use.
Will use Renko chess tactics puzzle for this on a [...]

CAS will organise her first event of the year on 22nd Jan (Sunday) at
“2nd Floor, Wilayah Complex, KL”.
This 1-day event will commence from 10 am (Rd 1). 2 categories i.e.
Category 1 for those who have NationalRating of at least 1400 points
and unrated Adult; while Category 2 is created exclusively for
unrated Under-18 players and those with [...]

Didn’t have much time to post but I just feel great that my chess website GilaChess.com can pay for it’s own webhosting for the 2nd year in a row. The money comes from ads served by Google on the website. Also thanks to the other GilaChess webmasters like Ching Kim Lye and Vickneswaran who have [...]

Singapore vs Malaysia 2005
This event is held annually and last year, Malaysia lost by a margin of 10 points.
You can find the official report on MCF website.
This year, armed with the knowledge that the Singapore team is not as strong as last year as Singapore had an extra estimated ELO 1500 more [...]

off to singapore
Originally uploaded by gilachess.
Will be travelling with the malaysian team via train to singapore this christmas eve. Wish us luck !!… Continue reading