Durarbayli.com

You have bread. You have butter… and you want JAM?!’

https://images.app.goo.gl/x7bjWpS9dow5MGUB6

What’s the greediest chess move you’ve ever played?

For me, it was this position from a 2018 game. My knight was on d5, his pawn on f4. I just needed 5 minutes to calculate the crushing Ne7 … 

https://www.chess.com/emboard?id=13494630

But I grabbed on f4 because I wanted JAM too!
Technically, White was still winning, but after 1…g5!!, it got much harder to convert. I overpushed… and even lost the game.

I first came across this quote in the brilliant book The Seven Deadly Chess Sins by GM Jonathan Rowson. At first, I thought it might be a British proverb, but no. It was GM Julian Hodgson who said it.

Rowson uses the quote to illustrate the problem of perfectionism—a situation where a player is not satisfied with a good position and keeps pushing for more. But in my case, the issue was a little different.

I already had a great (winning) position…

But I also wanted to win without calculating. I wanted it to be easy.

That want… was the jam.

Vasif

Vasif Durarbayli is a highly accomplished Azerbaijani chess Grandmaster. He was born on February 24, 1992, in Sumgait, Azerbaijan, and began playing chess at the age of six. Durarbayli quickly showed a talent for the game, winning several national and international chess competitions as a young player. He holds the record for being the youngest player ever to represent the Azerbaijani Olympic chess team, achieving this feat at just 14 years old. To this day, his record has yet to be broken or renewed. He also won the World Youth Chess Championship U14 and the European Youth Chess Championship U18. He was awarded the title of International Master in 2007 at the age of 15 and became a Grandmaster in 2010, at the age of 18. Throughout his career, Durarbayli has competed in and won numerous prestigious chess tournaments, including the Azerbaijani Chess Championship twice (in 2021 and 2023). He was also ranked among the top 16 players in the World Cup in 2021. Durarbayli has represented Azerbaijan in several Chess Olympiads. Currently, he resides in St. Louis, MO.

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