In the recent Hive Online Chess Tournament, I came heartbreakingly close to victory, finishing second with 30 points—tied with the winner. During the tournament, I secured an impressive 11 wins and suffered only 2 losses, a record I was proud of.

As the tournament progressed, I fought relentlessly to increase the gap, but in the end, @maestroask grabbed an ending victory to win the tournament on 30 points.

• Some Position Highlights

@stayoutoftherz against @kintokris

The position comes from the classical Benoni structure. As Black and in positions like this, I usually decide to go for piece activity and tactical opportunities on White's Kingside to gain an advantage no matter how little it may be and as early as possible. At this point, the position is still balanced for both sides but after the Kg8 move blunder, the position took a turn for the worse for white.

_{From this point, it was all over. The rook is hanging and the mating attack is hard to defend against.}

• The Classical Sac

@kintokris against @stranger27

Always keep an eye open for sacrifices like this on the kingside, especially after castling and when your white pawn is controlling the f6 square. It tends to lead to gaining material advantage to stop the mating attack or checkmate like it did for me in this game.

_{The checkmate it led to.}

• Simple Moves can be Blunders

@dhilan04 against @kintokris

In this position, I felt the simple Rd7 was a good move since it holds my pawn that's under attack but little did I know it was a blunder. It was a blunder because after Ne5 hitting on the c4 pawn and my rook, defending my position against the passed pawn becomes hard. Although my opponent didn't see the idea immediately, he didn't deviate far from the concept towards the end.

_{The passed pawn haunted me till the end.}

For more games
https://lichess.org/tournament/ZH38RebM

Thanks for stopping by.