Ciarán O’Hare used to play over-the-board chess in Ireland in the late 1970’s: for example he played in the 1979 and 1980 Irish championships. He moved to the US at some point, a long time ago I think, and is now a surgeon in Oklahoma. For time reasons he switched to correspondence chess, where he has had great success, winning the US Absolute Championship in 2008, and just recently adding to this the correspondence chess Senior International Master title. (In correspondence chess, there are IM and GM titles as in the over-the-board game, but there’s an extra Senior International Master title that ranks between the two.) He becomes Ireland’s 7th CC SIM. Congratulations!
The November 2011 issue of the column The Check is in the Mail, from the online edition of Chess Life, features an annotation by Ciarán of the game that gave him the draw he needed to clinch the title, in which he was defending a pawn down.
Vasil Hlinka – Ciarán O’Hare
Chessfriends Rochade (corr) 2009 [B84]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be3 e6 7.Be2 Qc7 8.a4 b6 9.f4 Bb7 10.Bf3 Nbd7 11.Qe2 Be7 12.g4 Nc5 13.Qg2 d5 14.exd5 exd5 15.Nxd5 Nxd5 16.Bxd5 Bxd5 17.Qxd5 Bh4+ 18.Ke2 O-O 19.Qc6 Qa7 20.Rhd1 Rfe8 21.Nf5 Rac8 22.Qf3 Be7 23.Kf1 Bf8 24.Kg2 Qc7 25.Bxc5 Qxc5 26.c3 g6 27.Nd4 Qc7 28.Rd3 Re7 29.Rf1 Rce8 30.Rf2 Re4 31.b3 Bc5 32.Re2 Rxe2+ 33.Nxe2 Qe7 34.Ng3 Qe6 35.c4 Qe7 36.g5 a5 37.h4 h6 38.Qg4 hxg5 39.Qxg5 Kf8 40.Qh6+ Kg8 41.Qg5 Kf8 42.Kf3 Qe1 43.f5 Qb1 (diagram) 44.Qh6+ Kg8 45.Qd2 Qg1 46.fxg6 fxg6 47.Kg4 Re3 48.Rxe3 Bxe3 49.Qd5+ Kg7 50.Qb7+ Kf6 51.Qf3+ Kg7 52.Kh3 Bf2 53.Ne2 Qe1 54.Qc3+ Qxc3+ 55.Nxc3 Kf7 56.Kg4 Ke6 57.Ne4 Bc5
½-½
(Click to replay the unannotated game.)
Thanks for remembering me!!
My uncle Eugene has been referrenced in your blog. I have always rated his OTB achievements greater than my postal. However, few of his scoresheets have survived.