Non-Random Chess960 Trial Game 4: SP959

The PGN database for these trials is here.

Mark and I have finished up our non-random trial of the 'barbecue' BBQ SP's with SP959. Depending on how you number the first position in Chess960, the very first position in all of the 960 starts is a BBQ or 'barbecue SP', but is also the very last! Now in retrospect having studied them in detail, I think they have their wonderful place in the Chess960 repertoire for sure! I first assumed that there would be no way that black would have time to castle at all, that his king would be stuck in the corner, but I was wrong. I also thought that the game would have too few options, but essentially I was wrong about that as well, if you take out the first few moves as almost "inevitable". Note that I have played the 'barbecue' gambit 2.b4 with a reasonable game in our previous trials.

In the sample opening we played through below, the feature is that not only do we have a broadside bishop attack on the king, but the king is on the c-side and thus castling long could leave the kings safety even more exposed than in SP000 (SP960). That said, Mark made the classic mistake that all Chess960 players of this age including myself make, and this is to confuse in one's mind, the c-side from the g-side. Mark based all his early thinking on the plan to castle short, but that just so happens to be on the extreme opposite side of the board! Amazingly, it turned out fine in any case.

SP959 Nf3 variation: What are white's castling intentions?

Here are my thoughts on SP959:
These 'barbecue' SP's are actually surprisingly stealthy start positions because it turns out that all three castling options are possible, castling c-side, g-side and not castling at all, stealthy because neither side want's to reveal what their castling intentions will be until the last minute, for obvious strategic reasons. We also noticed that with some solid principled play, black maintains strong fighting chances. That said, the pressure is definitely on black to play solidly! This confirms an educated "guess" about Chess960, that there are roughly 50 start positions that have to be studied in detail and memorized so that black specifically knows how to play them.

Here are Mark's comments playing as black:
"..The pieces from the d- to h-files develop naturally. The big question is what to do with the RKR.....Good observation that many chess960 SPs offer three castling options for both sides. SP518 (the traditional start), with the King starting in the center, offers only two, with a few exceptional variations where a King doesn't castle. If I wanted to play it safe, I would move 10.Bf4, but I'm ready for a fight...Move 10.Qf2 prepares O-O and defends against 10...Re8 with a tactical trick. That's ten moves for me, but the game is just getting started. White can't claim any advantage and it will be a tough battle ahead."

I will leave it to someone else to work out what Mark meant by "10.Qf2 defends against 10...Re8 with a tactical trick". In our trial, Mark and I accidentally had been playing by book up to move 6 from the CCRL 40/4 FRC database where Mark deviates from Baron170 by exchanging knights. The game that we were accidentally following includes a stunning but curious migration of white's king and a double rook lift to the second rank! What was the computer thinking?

SP959: Baron170 migrates the king from g1 to b1 starting move 22

Finally, here is a further sample of a hypothetical line in this opening. In some Chess960 start positions, the game proceeds almost as if it is playing itself (where the moves are so natural as to be inevitable). Normally, once this inevitable position is reached, then things get interesting. To complement the above opening system where in the resulting game the king manually migrates laterally across the board, here is a hypothetical variation where white castles kingside?!

SP959: White castles kingside?!