Profile of a Champion
BIOGRAPHY: JOHN FUNDERBURG
The new club champion, John Funderburg, also known as "The Thunderbird", has been a factor in just about every club championship since 2007. In 2007, John scrapped his way to the top and nosed out on tie-breaks, Senior Master Marc Duesterwald, "Germany's Pride and Joy", to win the coveted club championship. In 2008, John finshed second to Master Ron Bruno bur what a memorable second place finish it was! We were all in awe of John's resolute will-power and his uncompromising competitive ferocity! In 2009, the tie-breaks seemed to go against John in the preliminary qualifying Markowski. With twelve berths, John finished in the unlucky thirteenth position! The only player with 5-2 to be left out. Then IM Felix Villarreal, one of the seeded finalists could not play due to work commitments and John was let in to the finals. The rest is history.
In spite of his storied and heroic exploits in the championship series, very little is known about this quiet and soft-spoken young man. To amend this deficiency, we requested our champion tell us a little bit about himeself and his approach to the Royal Game.
We are very grateful that John took the time to put together a brief autobiographical sketch of himself. Here it is:
I was born in Albuquerque, NM in 1971. I learned to play chess from my father around the age of 10 and played in my first scholastic tournament while in middle school. I lost every game that tournament save for one that I won on time. Not to be discouraged, I bought and studied my first chess book by I. A. Horowitz "The Complete Book of Chess".
One year later at the same tournament I scored very well, and then quicky rose to expert level. I went to college at the University of New Mexico and a got a degree in Computer Science. I've worked for various companies and moved to San Diego about 10 years ago. Currently I'm developing navigation software for portable devices.
Throughout the years I've been in and out of chess, including a six year hiatus. I've also been up and down in rating but have never been able to break 2200. The last few years has seen a change in my approach to developing as a chess player and it's paid off.
First I became very critical of my own games, I think it's very important to study one's games, not just looking for mistakes or missed combinations with a computer, but also looking for bad patterns of thought or analysis. I think a lot of players, including myself, hit a barrier because we keep making the same mistakes. Identifiying these bad patterns can help focus one's study and break through that brick wall.
Another thing that helped was subscribing to ChessLecture.com, a chess video website with hundreds of great chess lectures. ICC also has several video lectures. For me personally, a visual approach to learning resonates better than chess books. I suggest trying this approach.
I starting taking lessons from Cyrus leading up to the 2007 club championship. Cyrus helped me anaylze my games and prepare for the championship. He is a great mentor and a great person. I recommend seeking players above your strength and working with them to quickly improve.
In closing I want to mention how grateful I am to the San Diego Chess Club. When I was living in Albuquerque there was maybe 3 or 4 tournaments per year. But here there are tons of opportunities to play, and the players are the most friendly and fierciest over the board as I've ever met. See you at the club!
John
This page was last modified on Tuesday, April 21, 2009 04:57:17 PM