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Photo credit: James Bartosik |
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Both Higginson and Gillies were on the lower rungs of the competitive chess ladder. This was fantastic for the general public, who could easily understand what was going on by simply counting the pieces.
As usual the fight started with the chess; Gillies was White and played an unorthodox opening attack with his queen. If 2.Qh5 were to lead to a quick checkmate, it would go down in history as The Boston Dome Attack! Higginson, however, thwarted those ambitions by chasing the queen away. After further adventures over all corners of the board, the excitement peaked in round three when Higginson carelessly lost his queen but recaptured it a few moves later with a cunning trick – he had disguised his queen’s bishop as a big pawn! From covering Westminster’s political machinations, he has clearly learnt how to get himself out of a scrape!
In round five, Higginson gained a decisive advantage on the board with a knight fork and was destined to queen a passed pawn. Gillies knew he needed a KO in round six and came close to doing so when an exhausted Higginson ran out of steam. But the parliamentary journalist survived and mopped up chess victory in round seven. |
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L | W |
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Higginson wins via chess - submission (Round 7) |
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[Event "LCB - International Chessboxing 2010 Super Dome"]
[Site "The Dome, London, England"]
[Date "2010.03.13"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Rob 'The Gentleman' Gillies"]
[Black "Johnny Higginson"]
[Result "*"] 1.e4 e6 2.Qh5 g6 3.Qf3 d5 4.d3 Nf6 5.Bf4 Bd6 6.Bxd6 Qxd6 7.d4 O-O 8.Bb5 c6
9.Ba4 b5 10.Bb3 Na6 11.Ne2 Nb4 12.O-O Ba6 13.Nf4 dxe4 14.Qe3 Ng4 15.Qxe4
Rae8 16.c3 Nd5 17.Nd2 Nxf4 18.h3 Nf6 19.Qf3 b4 20.Nc4 bxc3 21.Nxd6 Ne2+
22.Qxe2 Bxe2 23.Nxe8 Bxf1 24.bxc3 Nxe8 25.Kxf1 Nf6 26.Ba4 Rc8 27.Rb1 Ne4
28.c4 Nd2+ 29.Ke2 Nxb1 30.Bc2 Na3 31.Bd3 a5 32.f4 f6 33.d5 cxd5 34.cxd5
exd5 35.Ba6 Rc2+ 36.Kd3 Rc5 37.Bb7 g5 38.fxg5 fxg5 39.Kd4 Rc4+ 40.Kxd5 h5
41.Kd6 Rc2 42.Bd5+ Kg7 43.g4 Rc3 44.gxh5 Kh6 45.h4 gxh4 46.Bf7 h3 47.Bd5
h2 48.Ke7 Rc1 49.Kf8 h1=Q 50.Ke7 Qxd5 51.Ke8 Re1+ |
