Well, after a long wait, next week I’ll be playing in my first long time control tournament at the Virginia Closed. Last month in the State Championships, I finished 7th with a score of 4/6, with only one loss to Grandmaster Sergey Erenburg in what was one of my best performances of the past year.

Next week, I’ll only have four rounds to try to keep up the solid play at the Kingtowne Chess Festival. Last year I scored 1.5/4, but was a significant underdog in all my matches, so this year I aim to double that with a score of 3/4 or better. Its a bit ambitious, but I’ve done the work, and hopefully pulling my Tactics Trainer rating on chess.com to 2100+ will pay off.