World Mindset Championship 2012

Apparently Tiit cursed me by mentioning David Kotin, but anyway, I hadn't even managed to step through the door of the University of London Union when David Kotin walked towards me. As always, Pardubice invited me to the festival, but miraculously this time he didn't even mention tukuz kumalaki. When I got to the tournament hall, I was in for a real shock - the 2010 world champion Paco Garcia was sitting at the backgammon table, who was practically 100% certain to miss the tournament. What a bluff! In fact, it wasn't a ruse, it was just that about two weeks before the competition he received a call from an institution that is something like the Ministry of Sports and offered to pay for his plane tickets and entry fee. Anyway, Paco is here and has secured at least 2nd place in the backgammon tournament that is still ongoing, which guarantees 91 points, or a great start to the tournament (if the main competitor loses in the last round, he will even rise to share first place, or 95.5 points). My start to the tournament was generally poor. I got 4 out of 7 points in kamisado, which gives me only 57 points, or essentially a failed event. David Pearce came second with 89 points. Let's hope for better than the hare and the tortoise. All the old friends are here again: in addition to Pearce and Garcia, also de Toffoli, Hebbes, Hamer, Dekker, Khandelwal, Hatthrell, Dixon, Jameson and others. Like last year, the media is also there (this time with photo coverage, not cameras) and I've already been given my first interview time. I won't have time to talk about it any longer now, so I'll talk about the third session, or Hare&Tortoise, later in the evening.

The last competition of the first day started well for me - I managed to win the first five-player table and scored the first 4 points (points were distributed 4-2-1-0-0 for five-player tables and exactly the same for four-player tables as for 5). Unfortunately, I was brought back to earth in the second round - I had to settle for 4th place and 0 points, with no chance of a higher place. In the third round, I was demoted to a 4-player table and if I couldn't get above 3rd place, the train had already left before the decisive round. In the fifth round, I received 2nd place and 2 more points, which in total raised me to 7 points and probably somewhere in the middle of the table (I don't know the exact place, I came away when one table was still playing). Michael Dixon took the win with 12 points out of 16 possible. Dixon had a very good day overall and also took the lead in the overall standings with 185 points. He seems to be one of those crazy people who usually does a full program without a single break, which is neither more nor less than 104 hours of brain work. As you can see, compared to the predictions set yesterday, I was completely destroyed today, the predicted 82 points were out of the question (kamisado 57 and H&T probably also around 60 points). Considering the overall score, of course, Paco's 91 points in backgammon were also bad, keeping up with him seems to be relatively unlikely, to be honest. Paco's three trump cards - go, entropy and creative thinking - are all still to come, plus he has achieved results over 90 points in oware, blocus, mastermind and poker in the last two years. To be honest, he just seems better than me. Of course, losing to Paco wouldn't be the end of the world, today didn't bring anything bad in terms of winning a medal and I would be rather surprised if I missed out on it, but to be honest, that's not what I came for. As usual, there's no bad thing without worse, and I got a bad surprise when I got home. Yesterday, to be sure, I asked Harri if the water here was still drinkable (more on that later, I didn't really doubt it) and when he said there was nothing wrong with it, I quenched my thirst quite well. But by tonight, a letter had arrived stating that even taking a shower could be dangerous and drinking it was practically a surefire suicide. Well, that's a great story. Fortunately, I haven't seen or felt any signs of illness yet, except for terrible fatigue, which is more likely due to something else. I also miss Kertu, it's still pretty boring and sad to walk home alone at midnight, especially if the competitions haven't gone as planned. So, Kertu, if you're reading this, put on your headphones and head this way. In short, my mood is pretty bad at the moment, I feel a bit unhappy and a lot tired. But we shouldn't forget that last year I was a beaten man after the third day of competition and then everything turned upside down in one day (and in 2010 everything worked out at the beginning, but Paco still beat me to it in the final sprint). So nothing is really lost and tomorrow is a very important chess tournament. I really hope that Triinu will have time to come and support me, then it would be completely realistic to turn things around for the better (it may seem unbelievable that someone's support can have a significant impact, but look at the statistics of home and away games in football or basketball, for example; in previous years it was easier to squeeze 100% out of yourself with Tiidu or Kertu, today I just didn't have the energy). Last night I had a dream about hares and tortoises running around, today I will probably see kings dressed in white and black in carriages behind horses

We here at Liiva-Putla are keeping our fingers crossed for you. If your nose is starting to sink, remember that we are sending you good cheer and endurance! Pihel

I've just returned from my conference and I'm going to keep my fingers crossed and support you with all my heart. Hang in there!

Half of the chess tournament is behind us and I'm really angry right now. It's a damned stupid system, where 3-4 areas are taking place at the same time and there's no point in joining in on the competitors' strong areas. Interestingly, nothing really bad has happened because of this until this year, and now it's not like it's going to get out of hand. Yesterday morning's hexdame tournament was cancelled altogether, because in the end there were only four participants left and now we're down to six in a chess tournament, which is of course completely unheard of. The organizers really stepped up their game by scheduling chess at the same time as monopoly (why the hell does this game have to be on the schedule at all) and of course everyone who didn't see a chance in their chess chose (whether it was just a coincidence or collusion) monopoly, because anyone can win there. When there were fewer than 10 participants in chess, things got heated even at the top of the chess game (maximum points are not awarded even in chess if there are fewer than 10 players) and in the end we started playing six. In short, the chances of all strong chess players have been dealt a painful blow, even winning the tournament gives only 85.7 points and everything else is already completely useless. Despite all this, my game has been going completely normally so far and the results are even better than normal. I have collected 2.5 points from three games and share first place with Martyn Hamer. All the games have been extremely tense and ended in a flash of the last seconds. At the same time, I had to beat Hamery in the head-to-head game, but in the previous game I had to lose to the US champion Etan Ilfeld. The afternoon session will start soon, now only wins are satisfactory.

After the tournament, you will have to join forces with other former world champions and make your suggestions on how to change the rules and organization so that the event does not lose its level and seriousness. It is nonsense if chess is essentially excluded from the tournament. However, I hope that you will at least manage to make the most of what is left. Good luck for the next few days! It will come when it has to come. Aliis

The afternoon session unfortunately did not bring anything positive. Already in the first game I played the opening terribly and had to defend a very unpleasant position for the whole game, which in the end was not successful due to lack of time. I did win in the last round, but it only meant sharing 2nd-3rd place, which gives only 60 points due to the small number of participants. So everything was fine so far, but at least the competitors did not manage to collect very good results today (including Paco Garcia in Cribbage). In the evening I will participate in 7 card stud poker, but the review of that will be tomorrow, Estonian time.

The last area of the second day of competition, 7 card stud poker, ended quite early for me. The card did not run from the beginning and even the first pair had to wait for almost an hour (and that from three cards, not two like in Texas Holdem). If we add a few unsuccessful decisions, then after about an hour and a half of play I was all-in (by that time I had only 9/14 of the starting stack). This time I had nevertheless received a pair - queens, one of them face up (in this poker variant, everyone is initially dealt 3 cards, two of them face down) and one face up and I immediately started with the maximum bet, although the two back hands had a king and an ace face up. A woman with an ace, Madeleine Heppell, came along and perhaps this should have made me cautious, but since she had managed to give the impression of being more of a calling station, I went all-in on the next card - I had a jack, she had a 7 - immediately. Unfortunately, my opponent had grabbed the ace and although I had also made a second pair, he also managed to do the same and the journey home could begin. The reward was no better than 20th place. All of my overall rivals were still in contention when I left (except Alain Dekker) and Paco Garcia, who was playing at the same table with me, had already more than doubled his initial stack. With the 5 areas so far, I have no better result than 60 points to show. If this continues and 5x60 (which I don't have at the moment) becomes the final result, we can expect a place somewhere around thirtieth. In addition to Michael Dixon, David Jameson has also made a great start to the tournament, adding to yesterday's silver medal in Hare&Tortoise (92 points) today's first place in Monopoly (89 points). At least none of the main favorites earned super results with their first sessions today. The best was Alain Dekker with 87 points for third place in Cribbage, Tim Hebbes' second place in Monopoly was worth only 76 points, Paco Garcia earned 60 points in Stratego and even less in Cribbage. It was obvious how much Paco scores in poker. Tomorrow will be the most decisive day of the entire tournament for me, with lines of action on the agenda. Let's hope that tomorrow night's gold medal hunt won't be considered a failure.

Half of the Lines of Action tournament is behind us and unfortunately it is quite appropriate to use the phrase used in the movie: it's alla over. I already lost the first two games, which destroyed my chances of achieving a good result in the field and also essentially my hopes of winning gold and maybe a medal in the overall standings. To make things even worse, the first two places in yesterday's poker were taken by Tim Hebbes and Paco Garcia (100 and 96 points respectively) and Paco is on his way to about the same score as I had last year (489). Hebbes seems to be on his way to silver and the maximum I can still aim for is bronze (of course, the tournament is still long, but based on the results of previous years, you can already make quite accurate predictions).

A really ugly team was organized against you in chess. But as a world champion, you have to take into account that others see you as a threat and make your life difficult. Bringing home a medal will be an even bigger challenge for you. Any medal would be a tough result from this point on, so keep trying until the end. And next time we'll organize a bridge partner for you.