Bailey vs McGaugh; French Defence

Although Mark Bailey possesses a USCF rating of 1418, don't let that fool you. He plays much better than that. I observed in some of his recent games where he has a good position only to blunder near or in the endgame. I think he played pretty good in this game considering his rating.

I don't agree with his opening choice which was an unusual second move order for White, although it can be played. Instead, as Quint suggested, he probably should have entered the Exchange Variation with 2. exd5 instead of 2. f4 and 3. exd5.

The resulting position was still difficult for me to play and I missed or misplayed a few tactical shots along the way. In the middle of the game I got a really bad stomach pain probably from the food I had earlier. Is not an excuse for playing poorly, but I would be lying if I said it did not affect my concentration over the board. The only reason it did not affect my play is I can play pretty decent fast moves. But I need to play more long games, because fast play does not develop the thinking process like long games do. A rapid player playing against these guys will soon realize that he will lose the strategic and sometimes even the tactical skirmishes along the way.

On the other hand, Mark just has to control his blunders and maybe brush up on his tactial and positional knowledge. After that he'll be ready to move up to the next class.