Mikail Tal, Pizza, and Circle Five

I had the weirdest dream Sunday night. I was staying at a hotel and I went out by the pool and guess who was there? None other than the great Mikhail Tal. "What luck!" I thought. A chance to sit down with the master of tactics himself and ask him about all those next-to-impossible combinations he found over the board that I've suffered through repeatedly in CT-Art. I wanted to go over and talk to him, but before I could I had to go order a couple of pizzas. I have no idea why, but I had to (it was one of those weird dream things). So I found the phone number of a pizza place, agonized over what to put on each of the two pizzas, and finally placed my order. I then started walking back to the pool area and saw the maestro was still there. I'm walking over, thinking maybe he might like some pizza, getting closer, thiking I hope I don't act like a moron in front of him, getting closer, getting closer, getting closer, and then...I woke up. Can you believe that? Five feet from Mikhail Tal and I woke up. What are the odds? I was hoping I would have the same dream last night (in which case I would skip the pizza), but alas there was no hotel, no pizza, and no Mikhail Tal. Rats.

Circle Four Report
Last week and this weekend were a blur. With two weddings to go to (one out of town), it was rough. My wife and I flew out Friday morning early (after four hours sleep) and it was non-stop wedding stuff until we left Sunday morning. Then we had a few hours of rest (which I used to do problems) before we had to go to a wedding reception in Austin. But with taxes, packing, etc. last week, I fell behind and couldn't make it up this weekend. The net of it is that I didn't get all the way through Circle 4. I was hoping to at least finish level 70, but I only made it through problem 1069. I will stick to my plan outlined in prior posts for just starting the next circle so as to avoid slipping the schedule. I really need to finish up so I can have a life again.

Anyway, here's the "final" stats for Circle 4:

Level  Circle 1 %  Circle 2 %  Circle 3%  Circle 4%
-----  ----------  ----------  ---------  ---------
10         96%         99%        100%       100%
20         91%         93%         95%        97%
30         74%         80%         87%        93%
40         69%         74%         82%        88%
50         67%         72%         81%        89%
60         55%         64%         75%        83%
70         60%         58%         68%        --
80         57%         --          64%        --
90+        55%         --          58%        --

Still seeing improvement. I hope to find time to go back and finish level 70 before I get to it in Circle 5, but that's probably just not going to happen given the schedule.

Speaking of Circle 5...

Circle Five Has Begun
Last night I started Circle 5. Here's the schedule:

Day  # Problems  Total
---  ----------  -----
1        488       488
2        340       828
3        234      1062
4        147      1209

"Yeah, right, this is going to happen" was my first thought. However, yesterday was day one and I actually finished all 488 problems in 3.6 hours after work. That's an average time of 24 seconds per problem. I had no idea I could do the problems that fast. It is sort of scary, moving pretty much without thinking or checking variations, but that's what it took. I even did several level 20s in 3 seconds. Miraculously, I only missed 15 problems out of the 488.

Here's the stats so far:

Level  1 %  2 %  3 %   4 %   5 %
-----  ---  ---  ----  ----  ----
10     96%  99%  100%  100%  100%
20     91%  93%   95%   97%   98%
30     74%  80%   87%   93%  (in progress)
40     69%  74%   82%   88%
50     67%  72%   81%   89%
60     55%  64%   75%   83%
70     60%  58%   68%   --
80     57%  --    64%   --
90+    55%  --    58%   --

The numbers are still looking good. To get over 98% on level 20 will be tough without missing any, but we'll see how things go on circles 6 and 7.

Tonight is my wife's birthday, so I'm taking the night off from problems (woohoo!). I will finish (or get as far as possible) on Circle 5 on Friday. I'll spend Saturday and Sunday doing Circle 6, and I'm taking Monday off work for Circle 7.

I guess I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Let's just hope the light isn't an oncoming train...