I followed my good performance in the Major Open with a dismal performance at the e2e4 Sunningdale International.  The only positive thing which can be said about it is that a loss was not my most common result; I had four losses and five draws.  It’s hard to say what exactly caused such a collapse, but I can honestly say that my standard of play was not as bad as the results suggest.  In one of the drawn games I was completely winning but fell for a thinly-veiled stalemate trap, and in three of my losses I had the draw in hand but overpressed trying to win.  Had I not played in this event my first FIDE rating would have been close to 2100; as it is it may drop below the 2000 mark.  A more extensive report including games will follow at some point after I get home.

I’ll do a proper report with some analysis of my games when I have time, but for now this is just a quick update on how I did in the end.  The second week didn’t go as smoothly as the first, and I ended up with a +1 score of 6/11.  This isn’t as good as I’d hoped for at the end of the first week, but is still a decent result when you consider that I was one of the lower seeds.  My final rating performance was encouraging: 2124 FIDE and 186 ECF.  A more detailed report, as well as the weekly progress reports which I’m getting behind with, will have to wait until after my next tournament, which starts on Wednesday and finishes on Sunday.