Category Archives: Losing on time

ICCF Rant 2: Procrastination

Over the board chess is strictly time-limited and you do have to get on with things. In blitz you have to move so fast there is hardly time to calculate – you have to rely on knowledge and intuition to get you through. Even in the longest time controls at standardplay, you need a sense of purpose. You can’t just sit there wool-gathering.

By contrast, in correspondence chess you have so much time. The standard is 10 moves in 50 days (sometimes 40 or 30 days but it makes no real difference). When you have played 10 moves, another 50 days are added to your clock. If you used all your time then a really long game of 100 moves would take an elapsed period of nearly 18 months out of your life. Who needs that much time to play a game of chess? How long do you need to find the best move and play it?

My own approach is to use up only as much time as it takes and no more. I have the best commercially-available computer with the fastest processor running the strongest chess engines. It takes anything from a few minutes to an hour or two; and then I’m satisfied that waiting any longer is not going to improve the quality of the move, so I make the move. As a result, I always have the maximum time available although I never need it.

Some of my opponents seem to have a similar approach. Our games are played at a fast tempo with several moves being exchanged each day. The record for my completed games is vs the Italian player Mario Palladino where we each made 34 moves in less than one day. In just under 10% of my completed games, each player made at least 10 moves a day. Sometimes I get a message from my opponent at the end of the game thanking me for playing at a fast pace (the unspoken point is that many players slow the game down).

I wouldn’t want people to conclude that I and my opponents in these games think too fast and don’t play the best moves. We take as much time as we need and often that isn’t long at all.

But this post is going to be a rant, so now I’m going to focus on players who take much more time than they need. These seem to fall into two main categories.

First, players who realise they are losing and play as slowly as possible. Either they want to delay their final hours as long as they can, or they simply lose interest and the game becomes their lowest priority in life.

Second, players who take the maximum time available even if they don’t need it. This approach is diametrically-opposed to mine and I am still trying to understand the reasoning. It may be psychological.

Let’s start with an extreme example of the first category. This is my game against Player C. He is from Latvia, he has been playing correspondence chess for over 30 years, and his rating is currently similar to mine, although it was over 2500 at one point. The game is so short that I’m simply going to give all the moves.

Player C v Rodney Barking
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Qc2 0-0 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.bxc3?!
Very unusual. 6.Qxc3 is almost always played, preserving the purity of the pawn structure. Otherwise why take a move putting the queen on c2 in the first place?
6…c5 7.e4 c5 8.e5 Ne4 9.Bd3 Nc6 10.Ne2 cxd4
All this has been played before. There are 11 games in my database. White normally recaptures with 11.cxd4. But in this game…
11.Kf1??
I do not understand this move. It leaves White a pawn down with misplaced pieces and no compensation. The evaluation goes from about 0.00 to –2.5. Maybe it was a mouse-slip and he meant to play 11.0-0 although even that loses a pawn and White doesn’t have enough for it.
11…dxc3 12.Bxe4 dxe4

Now White can’t take the pawn on e4 because it’s mate next move on d1. Taking the pawn on c3 with the queen leaves Black two pawns up: 13.Qxc3 Qd1+ 14.Qe1 Qxe1+ 15.Kxe1 Nxe5. So does taking on c3 with the knight: 13.Nxc3 Qd4 and the c4 pawn drops. Developing moves like 13.Be3 allow 13…Qd3 with an overwhelming position.

So far my opponent had taken 4 days for his 12 moves, not lighting-fast but still a reasonable pace. But now he stopped. I waited. And I waited. Maybe it was the horror show in front of him but he did not make any more moves at all. 41 calendar days later, the server automatically terminated the game with a loss on time for White. The relevant provision in the 2023 ICCF Rules is section 2.6.2:

If a player does not move or otherwise indicate the player’s intention to continue
during 40 full calendar days (plus 24 hours’ buffer time, not including any leave time) for the same move, the game will be scored as an ETL (exceed time limit) loss.

And there’s a further penalty beyond losing on time. Section 2.4.4 provides:

A player who has exceeded the time allowed shall forfeit the game. If the
player is not under any ICCF suspension when this occurs, the player will be restricted
from registering for any event on the server for a period of 30 days.

So Player C will not be able to sign up for any new events for a whole month. But it does not affect his participation in any existing events. As it happens, Player C is part of the lineup for an event which has already been organised but has not yet started, in which I am also playing. That’s going to be interesting.

I did wonder whether his failure to move in this game might reflect some traumatic event in his life which had taken him away from the chess board and for which he had not taken the period of leave which the server allows. But that is not the case. During the 45 days in which the event has been running, Player C has completed 7 of his allotted 16 games as well as losing this one on time. So it was just a one-off personal tragedy of a game.

That was a case of a player delaying the game through loss of interest. Here’s a more common case where a player realises he is losing but continues to play, although at a much slower rate. I was White against Player D, who is from Poland. At the start of the game he outrated me by about 130 points.

Earlier in the game (by move 18) I had won the exchange through a tactic which my opponent did not see. I guess he was playing without engine assistance at that point. This is the position after White’s move 37. My opponent had already started to slow the game down. His moves 1 to 28 took only 11 days. Moves 29 to 36 took a further 60 days. And now he is clearly losing. My immediate plan is to push the c-pawn to c7, then play Rc4 forcing him to move his knight, then capture his advanced pawn on a2. After this the game is trivial.

My opponent must have worked out this was going to happen because he slowed the game down even further. The game continued 37…Qc6 38.Qxc6 Nxc6 39.Rxa2 after which queens are off the board, I’ve rounded up the a2 pawn, and I have the exchange and two pawns with a completely won position. His moves 37 to 38 took a further 40 days.

The ICCF recognises that players may slow the game down considerably in an attempt to postpone the inevitable. This strategy is known as the “Dead Man’s Defence.” Section 2.15 of the 2023 ICCF Rules concerns the Code of Conduct for players and has this to say:

Extremely slow play in a clearly lost position is not proper behaviour in correspondence chess play, and is subject to a warning from the TD, and will result in disciplinary action if it continues or is repeated in other games. This type of extremely slow play has been nicknamed the dead man’s defense (DMD). The defining characteristics are (a) being in a position that appears clearly lost presuming reasonable play AND (b) dramatically slowing play in that specific game.

The provision is activated when the opponent of the slow player makes a claim. I waited a further 10 days after my move 39 and then contacted the tournament director. He then followed the notification procedure set out in this part of the Rules, requiring my opponent to speed up and start playing at a normal rate again. There are severe penalties for a breach of the Code of Conduct, mainly taking the form of a ban from ICCF events for a certain period. At this point my opponent decided he’d had enough and he promptly resigned the game.

The ICCF does try to hurry players up if they take a long time over their moves. When a player is considering his next move, Rule 2.4.2 provides that real time applies for the first 20 days but after that double time applies (this is known as “duplication”) so that every extra day taken counts as two days on the player’s clock. The rule gives the example of a player taking 23 days over a move, which uses up 26 days on his clock. In other words, 20 days of normal time and 3 days of double time counting as 6 days on the clock.

The penalty for losing on time is based on calendar days (real time) rather than clock days. In the first example I gave, the game against Player C, the penalty was applied after 41 calendar days, but he had actually used up 62 days on his clock. He still had 38 days of clock time left in the game, but his inactivity for 41 calendar days amounted to a loss on time under the rules.

My view – others may not share this view – is that the initial period of 20 days reflection time is too generous. I think the ICCF should reduce this to 15 days or even 10 days. This raises the prospect of players running out of clock time (the clock reaches zero) before the period of 41 calendar days is used up. It would certainly focus the mind. I don’t know whether the ICCF has considered this idea.

But I now realise that this provision is the wrong target and the real problem lies elsewhere in the Rules. This brings me to the case of Player E. I am not going to give any details of his identity or the particular games in question since these are still live. Player E behaves in an extraordinary way. Whatever the standard period of time allowed for a set of 10 moves, he does nothing until almost all the time is used up and then makes a move at the last minute. So for example he might have only one day left for his next 10 moves and then he would finally make a move. You might think he would have to make 10 moves in one day to avoid his clock running out of time. But no. This is what Rule 2.4.2 provides:

Time is counted in days, not in hours, minutes, or seconds. If the first 24 hours has not yet been fully consumed, the reflection time used is counted as zero days. For the next days, a similar method of accounting time consumed will apply. Playing time is accounted for in whole days (24-hour periods). A player will have 24 hours of reflection time to respond to a move before one day of time is charged against the player’s clock by the ICCF webserver.

This means that if you have only 10 minutes remaining on your clock, and you then move, the clock resets itself to 24 hours and that is the time you have remaining for your next move. In effect you can make one move a day indefinitely and you will never lose on time. It’s similar to the incremental time control in OTB chess. You may be down to increment time on the clock (“living on the increment”), but as long as you continue to move within the increment period of, say, 30 seconds, you will never lose on time. The game will continue until it reaches its natural end. This is what happened in the infamous game T.Foster–P.Lalic (Guildford 2023) which ran to 214 moves after 7 hours of play before the final blunder and resignation.

This is being remedied in OTB chess for the next Guildford congress with a stricter time control. Should something similar be done for online correspondence chess? The obvious solution would be to remove the increment so that the clock does not reset itself to 24 hours every time you make a move. This already happens in the alternative timing arrangement known as “Triple Block” used for some ICCF events. Rule 2.4.2 sets out the relevant provision:

Time is counted in days, hours, and minutes. All time while “on-move” used counts and is never given back by rounding to the last full day.

I do not know how long Triple Block has been in use. Maybe this kind of provision is the future. It still leaves me with the problem of how to understand players who deliberately use up almost all of their time rather than only taking the time they need. I don’t think such players are simply disorganised. You have to be organised in order to make one move a day every day until you reach the next time control. I do wonder if the reason is psychological. The player is indulging in mind games by creating an expectation in his opponent’s mind of an imminent win on time, only to dash that hope at the last moment, so as to provoke the opponent into moving too quickly (“blitzing”) and making an error. Who knows? Only Player E can tell us and he’s not saying anything.

I do have one further idea to encourage quicker play. This could be implemented without any changes to the time control arrangements. The server knows how much time has elapsed in every game played by each player in an event. If there is a tie between two or more players and none of the tie-breaks can separate them, for example they have exactly the same number of points, the same number of victories, no advantage in direct encounter, and the same sum of opponents’ scores, then an additional tie-break could be implemented to favour the player who has used the least amount of elapsed time.

Losing on time – part 2

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In this post we examine deliberate losing on time, and its lesser cousin deliberate timewasting, in the world of correspondence chess.

The rules of the International Correspondence Chess Federation provide for a range of time controls. The one that I have used most often requires you to make 10 moves in 50 days. After 10 moves, a further 50 days is added to your clock, and the same at later stages of the game. As with OTB chess, total time is what counts, so you do not have to make 10 moves in each period of 50 days counted separately. If you make 19 moves in the first 50 days, you only have to make 1 move in the next 50 days.

Players may take up to 45 days of leave in a calendar year. During a period leave, the clock is stopped and neither you nor your opponent can make a move.

There are penalties for slow play and running out of time. If you don’t make a move for 20 days, your remaining time is used up at double speed so that each additional day of consideration counts as two days off your clock. This process is known as duplication.

The system also sends reminders. First after 14 days of inactivity, just to prompt you. Second after 35 calendar days (i.e. ignoring duplication). At this point you must, within the next 5 calendar days, either make a move, or indicate your intention to carry on playing.

You lose the game if you run out of time, or you ignore the 35-day warning and do nothing by 40 days. Losing on time carries additional penalties in that you may be barred from competing in future events.

The allocation of 50 days for 10 moves is generous. No matter how busy you are, you don’t need that much time for so few moves. And in most of my correspondence games, my opponents have got on with the game more of less expeditiously.

Unfortunately, some players tend to slow the game down when they realise they are losing. Either they want to postpone the moment of defeat as long as possible. Or they simply lose interest in the game – in some cases letting the clock run down to zero. This makes the game seem interminable. One possible reform would be to introduce duplication at an earlier stage, after say 15 days or even 10 days, to speed the process of retribution for players who behave like this.

Now for some examples of completed games in 2022. I make no apology for naming and shaming.

Game 1
Start: 15 Apr 2022, End: 20 Oct 2022 (188 days)
White: Rodney Barking (ENG – 1800), Black: Johann Wiesinger (AUT – 1788).
A36: English, Symmetrical, Modern Botvinnik System
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 g6 3.g3 Bg7 4.Bg2 O-O 5.e4 d6 6.Nge2 c5 7.O-O Nc6 8.d3 a6 9.h3 Rb8 10.a4 Ne8 11.Be3 Nc7 12.d4 cxd4 13.Nxd4 Ne6 14.Nde2

All this is theory, and is the line recommended for White by Simon Williams and Richard Palliser in ‘The Iron English’ (Everyman, 2020). Black normally continues with …Nc5 and …Nb4, and queenside play. My opponent pursued an independent path. It’s now 25 April – we have reached move 14 after only 10 days’ play.
14…b6 15.Rb1 a5 16.b3 Nc5 17.Rb2 Re8 18.Rd2
Black’s structure is quite rigid, with no obvious pawn breaks. In contrast White is well-placed to start a kingside attack. The computer evaluation is about +1.2, indicating a clear advantage to White.
18…Rb7 19.Nb5 Bd7 20.Nec3 Qc8 21.Kh2 Nb4 22.f4 Rb8 23.g4 Bc6 24.h4 Ra8 25.g5 Rd8 26.h5 Rf8 27.h6 Bxc3 28.Nxc3

White’s kingside attack has reached a dangerous point. The computer thinks White is winning (+2.8). My opponent should bring his pieces back to the kingside to defend. Instead he blunders a piece. After this the game becomes trivial. It’s now 9 May – we have made 28 moves in 24 days. Still quite a brisk rate of play.
28…Nxe4?? 29.Nxe4
My opponent realises that he is losing and starts to take longer over his moves.
29…Qb7 30.Qa1 f6 31.Qd4 Rae8 32.f5 gxf5 33.gxf6 e5 34.Qxd6 fxe4 35.f7+ Rxf7 36.Bh3 Qe7 37.Rg2+
Now the computer says that White can force mate in at most 7 moves. I could have sent my opponent a message to announce this, but the practice is passé. It’s now 4 June. The last 9 moves have taken 26 days, almost all used by Black.
37…Kh8
28 June – that’s +24 days.
38.Qxe7 Rexe7
17 July – that’s +19 days.
39.Be6 Be8
17 August – that’s +31 days.
40.Rfg1 Rg7
29 September – notionally +43 days, although I think most of this was annual leave taken by my opponent.
41.Rxg7 1–0
And now it’s mate in 2 moves. At this point Black resigned. 20 October – that’s +22 days.

From the start to White’s 37th move took 50 days. The remaining 5 moves took 138 days, over 4 months, although this did include a period of leave. Very unsporting behaviour by Herr Wiesinger. Normally after the game one exchanges pleasantries, e.g. “Good game – well played – thanks for the game,” but after this game I had nothing to say to my opponent.

Game 2
Start: 20 June 2022, End: 23 October 2022 (125 days)
White: Rodney Barking (ENG – 1800), Black: Thomas Clarke (SCO – 1800)
B06: Pirc–Robatsch, 4.Be3 Nf6
This was one game in a double-header on board 42 of the “friendly” match between Edinburgh and London. As the ICCF blurb puts it:
“The Edinburgh Chess Club is the oldest chess club in Scotland, established in 1822 and one of the oldest chess clubs in the world. As part of the Club’s bicentenary celebrations this match against London is being played as a sequel to their original match with London which started in 1824.”
Sadly unrated, but could resist such a romantic playing opportunity?
1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Be3
The English Attack is White’s most popular continuation against the Pirc / Modern, even at GM level, giving the lie to its reputation as the hacker’s weapon of choice (“the 150 Attack,” beloved of players graded 150, or about 1825 these days). The idea is very simple: play Bh6, advance the h-pawn, deliver checkmate.
4…Nf6 5.Qd2 a6 6.Nf3 O-O 7.Bh6 c5 8.Bxg7 Kxg7 9.O-O-O Nc6 10.dxc5 dxc5 11.Qf4
Naturally White keeps the queens on the board, to strengthen the kingside attack.
11…Qa5 12.e5 Ng4 13.Bc4 Bf5 14.Rhe1 b5 15.Bd5 b4 16.Ne4 Rad8
Now both sides are attacking on opposite wings in an exciting middlegame position. However, White’s threats are stronger.
17.Ng3 Be6?!
Sacrificing a piece to break through on the queenside – but it’s not sound. White can take the material and defend successfully.
18.Bxe6 fxe6 19.Qxg4 Qxa2
Threatening mate in one, so White’s next few moves are forced.
20.Rxd8 Rxd8 21.Nd2 a5 22.Qe4 1-0

And that’s where the game stopped, with victory to White in an unclear position. What just happened?

Although the game started on 20 June, Black arrived late at the board and did not make his first move until 5 July. Play then progressed rapidly until after White’s 13th move on 8 July, just three days later. Black then slowed down and took 18 days over his next four moves.

After 17.Ng3, Black’s kingside pieces get into a tangle. He did not move again until 8 August, 13 days later, and followed up quickly with two more moves. I played 19.Nxg4 on 10 August. Inexplicably Black then took over a month to play 19…Qxa2, which is the only move in the position. He then played another two moves very quickly.

So to the final move in the game, 22.Qe4, which I played on 14 September. After that, nothing. I waited 39 calendar days, which with duplication amounted to 58 total days, and that point Black’s time ran out and he lost. I do not understand why he allowed this to happen. Maybe he thought there was no point continuing the game a piece down, even with compensation. As it happens the computer thinks Black can keep going with 22…Rd3, which keeps the white queen out of the queenside.

So this wasn’t unsporting, just very odd. I don’t see the point of starting a game of chess if you’re not going to see it through to the end. As Magnus Magnusson used to say on Mastermind: “I’ve started so I’ll finish,” his catchphrase whenever time ran out while he was reading a question on the show.

Losing on time – part 1

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This is the first of two posts on games where a player deliberately runs down his clock in a position which he knows is lost. This post is based on online research and I am indebted in particular to the chess historian Edward Winter.

Count Curt Carl Alfred von Bardeleben (1861–1924) was a German nobleman and one of the foremost German chess players of his day. He led an interesting life. He gave up his law studies to become a professional player and came first or equal first in a number of tournaments in the 1890s and 1900s. in 1908 he lost a match to Alekhine, who described him as a “charming old chap” who lacked the will to win. The chess player and author Edward Lasker commented on his shabby vintage suit and his propensity to escape his numerous debts by marrying and divorcing rich women who wanted to buy into his title. He died in 1924 when he fell out of a window – whether intentionally or not is unclear.

His most famous game was in the international tournament at Hastings in 1895. A very strong event, featuring all the top players of the day, it was won by the American Harry Nelson Pillsbury with 16.5/21. In round 10, von Bardeleben was Black against the former World Champion Wilhelm Steinitz. This is how the game proceeded (C54, Italian Game):
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4 6.cxd4 Bb4+ 7.Nc3

A typical 19th century Romantic opening. Now theory recommends 7…Nxe4 8.0-0 Bxc3 9.d5 Bf6 10.Re1 Ne7 11.Rxe4 d6 12.Bg5 Bxg5 13.Nxg5 h6 14.Qe2 hxg5 15.Re1 Be6 16.dxe6 f6 and White does not have enough for the pawn.
7…d5 8.exd5 Nxd5 9.O-O Be6 10.Bg5 Be7 11.Bxd5 Bxd5 12.Nxd5 Qxd5 13.Bxe7 Nxe7 14.Re1 f6 15.Qe2 Qd7 16.Rac1 c6

Black’s king is stuck in the centre. White sacrifices the d-pawn to bring his knight into the attack. Play now becomes concrete (modern GM-speak for forcing and tactical).
17.d5 cxd5 18.Nd4 Kf7 19.Ne6 Rhc8 20.Qg4 g6 21.Ng5+ Ke8 22.Rxe7+
Steinitz has initiated a beautiful forcing sequence. Black cannot take the rook.
22…Kf8 23.Rf7+ Kg8 24.Rg7+ Kh8 25.Rxh7+

At this point, von Bardeleben got up and silently left the room. Tournament officials were unable to persuade him to return. 50 minutes later, his flag fell, and Steinitz claimed a win on time. He then immediately demonstrated a beautiful mate in 10 moves, which Black can avoid only by giving up his queen:
25…Kg8 26.Rg7+ Kh8 27.Qh4+ Kxg7 28.Qh7+ Kf8 29.Qh8+ Ke7 30.Qg7+ Ke8 31.Qg8+ Ke7 32.Qf7+ Kd8 33.Qf8+ Qe8 34.Nf7+ Kd7 35.Qd6#
The crowd responded with loud and prolonged applause. Steinitz was awarded the brilliancy prize for the best game of the tournament.

Von Bardeleben was roundly criticised for his decision to lose on time in this way. In the Frankfurt General Anzeiger in November 1895, Dr Siegbert Tarrasch commented as follows (translated):
“To our regret, we have to say that Herr von Bardeleben provoked the indignation of all participants in the tourney by the singular way in which he used to surrender lost games. As soon as he became conscious of having a losing position, he followed the advice given in a well-known humouristic chess couplet –
‘Whenever your game is bad and sore, Then sneak out and return no more.’
He simply vanished and left it to the committee to declare the game lost by time-limit. Thereby Herr von Bardeleben has at least acquired the merit of adding one more to the many analogies between chess and war – the flight before the enemy.”

A commentator in the Yorks O. Budget noted:
“Bardeleben was almost as notorious a drawing master as Schlechter, and he introduced a method of resigning a lost game by the simple device of walking silently and without explanation from the board and allowing his time to run, which added a new verb “to bardeleben” to the vocabulary of his chess contemporaries.”

And from the British chess player and author Gerald Abrahams, in Teach Yourself Chess (1948), which introduced me to the Steinitz–von Bardeleben game, here is a quotation which has stayed with me down the many years since I read the book as a teenager:
“At this point Von Bardeleben is reported to have made no comment but to have put on his hat and quietly walked home, leaving his opponent to win by effluxion of time. That was a Teutonic way of showing that he knew what was coming.”

And yet, von Bardeleben has been pilloried unfairly. Edward Winter draws attention to the annotation of the final move of the game by a fellow-competitor, W H K Pollock, in La Strategie, from 15 October 1895:
“La partie a été terminée ici, M. de Bardeleben s’est retiré sans abandonner et la partie a été adjugée à M. Steinitz à l’expiration du temps limité. M. de Bardeleben a dit à son adversaire que sa conduite était pour protester contre les applaudissements souvent trop prolongés dont les visiteurs saluaient les victorieux et c’est à la suite de cet incident que le Comité du tournoi a défendu toute démonstration.”

As Winter points out, von Bardeleben made his silent exit “because of the disturbance caused by spectators applauding winners of games, and he informed Steinitz personally of this.” The tournament organisers responded promptly with a notice asking spectators to refrain from applause at the end of the game on the basis that foreign players would be unused to it and in any case the players found it annoying. However, von Bardeleben’s reputation seems not to have recovered (in so far as it matters to anyone apart from chess historians).