Interview With D LeMoir

The monochrome image above is a press photo from a Simultaneous exhibition given by former British Champion and chess author Harry Golombek in 1966. He had finished all of his other games and so sat down to finish me off. What happened was that I finished him off instead.

WK: Evening David, may I start by asking how you first got the bug for playing chess?

DLM: To start with, playing chess was not a pleasure but a necessity. My brother Nick was five years older than me, and one summer school holiday, when I was eight years old, he was bored so he decided to teach me a whole lot of games, including card games, in order that he had someone to beat. You didn't say No to Nick! I played all sorts of games against him that summer, and from then on. Chess was just one of them, and of course I lost time after time.

We began to play chess more and more because by now Nick had got the bug. I think he was champion of his year at school and he started borrowing a few chess books from our small local library. That library was on my way home from school, so I would stop and peruse the few chess books that they had in store, and occasionally I would borrow one. The one that I borrowed most was Reti's Modern Ideas In Chess. It was such a beautifully written book that it was probably then that the bug started to burrow its way into my head.

By the time I was twelve I had still hardly scored a win against him. I was slightly more successful at draughts. At the beginning of my second year at secondary school - which is year eight nowadays, I guess - they started a chess club at my school which met a couple of lunchtimes a week, I think. By then, Nick had left home. He would visit home once a week, and we would play mainly chess then. Meanwhile, I was distinctly an also-ran at school chess club - although I loved the game by then. I found a bookshop in Bristol that carried a fairly decent range of chess books. I could only go there when my family went into town - we lived in a suburb five miles away - and I would spend most of my time reading - but not buying! - chess books from their shelves. I did the same at the main Bristol library which was nearby.

Wherever my family went I would seek out second-hand bookshops and occasionally I could afford to buy a book. I picked up old hardback copies of Capablanca's Chess Fundamentals and Nimzowitsch's My System amongst a few others. As the school year progressed, I gradually worked my way up the rankings and finally I won the championship of the school second year in the summer term.

By then the bug was more of a rampant virus, but it finally took complete control when I "got good".

This happened at the beginning of the next school year. I got more practice against my brother and some schoolmates during the summer holidays and I visited that bookshop a bit more. When I appeared in the school chess club at the beginning of my third year it was clear that there were few better players in the whole school. Here is where little accidental things make a big difference. It happened that the teacher in charge of the school chess club was also a leading light in the adult chess club in Patchway, the next suburb along from ours. He had already introduced two of the stronger sixth formers to the club and now he invited me to join.

I've written about this in En Passant. I'm not going on too much am I? Just tell me when you want to ask me another question!

WK: No, carry on! There are still a few visitors to our website who don't read En Passant. Maybe this will tempt them...

DLM: I hope so.

Anyway, I joined Patchway Chess Club on the night before my fourteenth birthday and beat the geriatric opponent that they put in front of me. I soon learned that he was one of their very weakest players and he rarely got into any of their three six-man teams. I struggled to beat him. But they saw something in me, and about three weeks later I made my debut on board six (bottom board) in division six (bottom division) of the Bristol League. I lost.

From there the only way was up. By now I had persuaded my parents to get me, for birthday and Christmas, subscriptions to both CHESS magazine and British Chess Magazine and the three volumes of Alekhine's best games. That really did it. By the end of the season I was on top board for the third team, got promoted to the first team for the following season and was soon on top board there.

It's not really relevant to your question, but would you like to hear the story of how that came about?

WK: Yes please. I've got all night.

DLM: I started on about board four in the first team, which played in the second division of the Bristol League. I won most of my early games, but the wins were not convincing. Then came the day when we were due to play Lysaghts, the side which had Max Poolake playing for them. Max was graded 189 and was one of the top players in Bristol. Certainly he was by far the strongest player in division two.

Those accidents again... That day was a school chess club day. Henry, the teacher in charge happened to mention that evening's match. "No one wants to play Max Poolake" he said, almost as an aside. "I will" I said, and Henry laughed and walked away.

I thought no more about it. Before matches the away captain would read out his board one, and the opposing captain would read out his, and so on. That evening it went "Max Poolake..." "plays David LeMoir". You could have knocked me down with a feather. It was only much later that I realised that Henry had wanted to put me up against Max and he had been sounding me out. He was right not to tell me in advance as I would have been unable to concentrate on my lessons that afternoon and after all that's what Henry was there for!

The opening of the game was sticky. Max played a slow system against my Caro Kann that I had not seen before, and I had to waste a development tempo to avoid worse. I recovered well and suddenly I had the opportunity for a knight sacrifice that would force a draw by repetition. I played it of course, but then realised that by grabbing some material back instead of forcing the draw I might give myself winning chances. I got up from the table to see whether I could attract Henry's intention. I meant to ask him whether I should take the draw!

Stupid question, but my heart was pounding as you can imagine. Accidents again... Henry was deep in thought. I went back to the board and grabbed the material. I now know that the resulting position was only slightly better for me, but my opponent's nerve was shot and he soon blundered a piece. I had beaten one of Bristol's top players less than a year after my first unsuccessful outing for the club.

I stayed on top board for the remainder of my time in Bristol, until I went to University.

WK: Who did you look up to then and who do you look up to now?

DLM: I didn't look up to anybody then and I probably don't now. I had heroes, but they were distant ones. This was the mid-60s and as soon as I saw his games I fell for Mikhail Tal. I wanted to play like him, and in a way I succeeded. I would like to play as well as he did too, but you can't have everything!

Reading magazines like CHESS and British Chess Magazine made me feel part of the chess world and I would warmly recommend it to anyone wishing to improve. Magazines are easy to read and encourage you to get your chess set out. Anyway, advertisement over - the point is that heroes emerged from their pages, and one of my early heroes was Owen Hindle. I was delighted when I found that he was a resident of Norfolk when I arrived here in 1998. He has become a personal friend and I wrote series of articles about him in both En Passant and CHESS magazine.

Nowadays I have no real heroes - although I dearly want Anand to retain his world crown when he plays Gelfand later this year. The best players in Norfolk - the ones who beat me - are also my friends, so in a way it's hard to look up to them.

Of them all I would pick out Mike Harris. Mike is a truly talented player. He was British Under-18 Champion around 1990 and might have gone a lot further in chess had he not taken up his career. I would not recommend chess as a career. In a way I was lucky that chess was not a career except for players in the communist bloc and the very best in the West when I was young. From the mid-to-late seventies - after Fischer-Spassky - it became an option for more players and I'm sure that most of them regretted it. Tournament winnings are uncertain and have to be supplemented by writing books and articles and by coaching. It's a very precarious existence and you have to love the game with a passion to pass up your creature comforts for it. Most strong chess players have the ability to make a very good living outside of chess if they choose the right career.

WK: What victory and/or tournament win has given you the most satisfaction?

DLM: Oh Boy! There is a difference in being satisfied at the time and being satisfied now.

During my second season for Patchway, when I was fifteen, I sent in an entry for the West Of England Junior Championship, which was for under-eighteens. I received a reply saying that I had been moved into the Minor Championship, which was for under-sixteens, in view of my age. I rang the organiser and pointed out my recent league win against Max Poolake. He shifted me back to the Junior Championship and I finished equal first!

Was I satisfied? No! You might think that I was big-headed enough to think that nothing but lone first place was enough, but that was not it, or not quite. You see, after five of the six rounds I was a point ahead of the field and due to play one of my two chasers in the final round, who was from Somerset. On the evening before the last round two things happened. Firstly two Somerset players who were playing alongside us in the West of England adult Championship took me on one side. They reminded me that the winner of the Junior Championship qualifies to play in the following year's adult championship and asked me whether I thought I was good enough. I can't remember my reply, but one of them played an offhand game against me and slaughtered me.

Then my opponent-to-be decided he was my bosom buddy and kept me away from my bed for longer than was sensible. One sleepless night later and I lost like a child (which I was). Although I shared the Championship title, my sum-of-opponents-scores was not sufficient for me to gain the place in the following year's adult championship and I had a great feeling of let-down.

Now, I'm proud of that achievement, but at the time....

My subsequent score against the combined might of those two Somerset adults was 3 ½ out of 4, so I guess I gained some measure of revenge, but that won't bring back the greater success that was so nearly mine.

I had to wait an extra year to get through to the West Of England Championship proper. I achieved that by coming second in the following year's Challengers tournament, but my first three years in the Championship were distinctly unsuccessful. However, in 1971, at the age of twenty, I managed to win the Championship, the youngest to have done so up to that time. That was probably my most satisfying tournament win, especially as the person who now holds the record as the youngest winner is none other than Michael Adams. On his way to him achieving that title in the 1980s I lost once to him and drew twice. Not many British players can say that.

WK: I guess he was pretty young then.

Yes, fifteen the last time I drew against him - but he became an International Master very soon after that and within a few years was the world's youngest grandmaster. Since then, my most satisfying tournament victory was my first Norfolk Championship win in 2000, beating Owen Hindle convincingly in the second game of a two-game playoff, which more-or-less kicked off our friendship.

WK: If you had the chance to play Kasparov, what opening would you go for?

DLM: The nearest door out of there!

[WK laughed when he eventually got the joke.]

Actually, I'd probably play 1.e4 and hope he played a Sicilian Scheveningen. My one-in-a-million chance of getting some kind of result would be to catch him with a sacrifice like some of those in my Essential Chess Sacrifices, many of which are against the Sicilian. But the main point would be to enjoy the experience of playing him.

WK: You clearly love the game of chess, what keeps you so excited about it?

I like to win and hate losing, but the main thing that keeps me playing is the chance of creating something beautiful. I probably have more successful sacrifices and combinations than most players at my level, and every now and again I produce another one. I also have lots of chess friends and I wouldn't want to be without them. I once tried. For three years, from 1989 to 1992, I gave the game up.

WK: Really. Why did you do that?

I decided that I wasn't enjoying it. Since the late 1970s I was never in a position to practice the game. If there was a local chess club, my London job meant that I could never get to club nights and none of my local friends played chess. Even my competitive chess was restricted to the London League. Again, I couldn't guarantee to get to local matches because of the long commute to Hertfordshire and the likelihood of having to stay behind at work. In any of those seasons I played a handful of London League games, seven games in the West Of England Championship at Easter and that was normally it. After a London League game I would get home after midnight and rise again early for the following day's commute into London. I heard in the corridor at work a conversation between two of my colleagues about the previous night's inaugural meeting of our firm's Bridge Club. They talked enthusiastically about how much they enjoyed it. "I wish I could say the same about chess" I said to myself and it was a small step to giving the game up.

BIG MISTAKE!!

WK: I know I would miss it, but why was it that big a mistake for you?

DLM: At the time, I wasn't conscious of any ill effects, except that I did have an important one-on-one meeting where a chess board started analysing itself in my mind's eye - to such an extent that I felt that the guy I was talking to had moved several yards away from me and the chessboard had moved in between us. That was the only time I had such a weird experience, but it was truly memorable!

The main effects could only be diagnosed afterwards. I have described them in a series of articles for CHESS magazine entitled What Has Chess Ever Done For Us? I can't remember them all offhand, but the main ones were a lack of intellectual stimulation and challenge that led to my brain being dulled. My decisions, particularly about my private life, became stilted and strange - that's the only way I can put it. It's hard to find the right words. Work went downhill to the extent that I was eventually made redundant. That had a knock-on effect on my health and my family life.

The only good news was the effect on my cricket. That was my other passion. The summer cricket season neatly gelled with the winter chess season. Now I waited eagerly for the summer - that's probably a serious understatement! I badly needed success and I got it. I had two of my best seasons ever. After the second one, I was approached to play in a special chess competition for my home town. It was about time to stop this nonsense, especially as my enforced change of job meant that I could now get to local chess matches, so I agreed and came out of retirement.

WK: Had the layoff affected your playing strength?

DLM: Yes - and how! It took me more than five years to get back to near my former level. When I came to Norfolk in 1998, I had more time for chess (but still no between-match practice) and the rest, as they say, is history.

WK: Who do you think, in local chess, has the best chance of being a truly good/great player? I use "great" sparingly.

DLM:To succeed in chess nowadays takes a combination of talent and very hard work. School and college work and a career don't necessarily mix with that. If you enjoy chess as a distraction, you are unlikely to want to work very hard at the game. I have been closely involved with William Boulton over recent years and more loosely with a few much younger juniors. One thing they have in common is that they don't want to do too much reading or other study. They want to play. Play is good, but not good enough.

Of all the juniors that I have come reasonably close to, the one who seems to be most willing to work on his chess is Gordon Scott. But the one with the most natural talent is probably William. Now if we could combine the two of them...

WK: How about our Lowestoft youngsters?

DLM: It's too early to say, but what I would say to them is: if you want to win at chess, then play, practice and read. If you can get some coaching, then probably all the better, but work at your game, don't just play it.

WK: You haven't mentioned a coach or a mentor. You never had one, did you? Do you regret that?

DLM: I did have an "official" BCF coach and that was Ray Keene. The strongest West Of England juniors attended a weekend training session with him in 1967 when I had just turned seventeen. That was helpful, but that was all we got.

A really good regular coach would have been very helpful. After all, I was willing to work very hard indeed. But a mediocre coach could have done more harm than good.

In the summer of 1967 - this was when I was sixteen and after my first season on top board in the top division of the Bristol League - I had been dissatisfied with the games that I had played in the previous season. I looked closely at my games and realised that I played best when the emotional temperature of the game was turned up. This was normally when I had lost some material. I would fight like mad and my opponents often wilted under the strain.

I took the decision to create a high emotional temperature deliberately. I would sacrifice whenever I thought there was a reasonable excuse - even if the sacrifice wasn't particularly good. What happened was that my results rocketed upwards, and I played some really nice games. A double-whammy.

I think that a good coach would have encouraged more of the same, and maybe helped me with openings that could lead to the right kinds of position. But a mediocre coach might have driven me down the path of soundness. I am perfectly capable of sound play, and the results might have been quite good. But I'm sure that I have achieved better results by being coachless and taking risks. My games collection is the bounty that I have collected over the years, and it's a lasting treasure to me.

WK: Thanks for that David, much appreciated and thanks for your time.

DLM: It's always a pleasure to talk about my favourite subject.

WK: Chess?

DLM: No, me!

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