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 when Not castling wins
For instance, in Anatoly Karpov v Kiril Georgiev (Valjevo 2007), Karpov's
18 Kd2! instead of castling clears the first rank for the rooks,
defends the c3 pawn, and
keeps his King in the center in anticipation of piece exchanges.
And that is why Karpov, choosing not to castle, eventually won the game:
www.chessgames.com
Generally, following an exchange of Queens, if you have not already castled, you may want to keep your king in the center as both a fighting piece and a supporter of central pawn advances, or to be flexibly ready and mobile to defend pawns on either the Kingside or the Queenside.
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Yes, we did discuss about castling, but I looked at jstevens annotated game and made a comment about the castle. It's not always about when, but it is usually where. In other words, I recently learned, less then a month ago, that it is generally safe to castle on the king's side. However, it is not safe to castle on the queen's side because it exposes the king.
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Commented Annotation
In fact, the game I am referring to about castling, was my first commented annotation.
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In addition, I made a statement about castling on the queen side V. the king side, in my second. This annotation was about my game against paulr1212. gameknot.com
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Moot Points
Regarding my post, "I have never found castling harmful", and regarding your post, "Castling is no protective Panacea", it is interesting that we have different points of view, shamash. I just realized that some issues of castling are not right or wrong. Instead, they are merely matter of opinions, so the point of views about castling are actually moot points.
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every position is different
In the game provided by Shamash had Karpov castled he might not have won. Sometimes
doubled pawns are a great asset. Even tripled pawns can act like a great tower of deterrence.
Sometimes 'isolated pawns' can act like 'offensive pivots' and win games.
Consider the Berlin defense to the Lopez. Black does not care if his ability to castle is lost for the
reasons Shamash mentioned..the King becomes a powerful piece. Most often then not we will
castle but sometimes........
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Castling as an aggressive move
Castling queenside can centralize your Queen's Rook and bring it into active play.
So on occasion, queenside castling can be an aggressive move.
And here the question of <when to castle?> would be answered
by determining how castling as an attacking move
would help build your initiative or
even help your initiative culminate in a successful attack.
Considered as a dynamic move,
then the primary focus of castling would not be the safety of your king,
but the continued momentum of a winning attack on your opponent's position.
Because if you have a winning attack,
as long as you keep the initiative while you press on to victory,
it does not matter if the position of your king is weak. (A weakness is not a weakness unless it can be attacked.)
Or as Croatian Grandmaster Dražen Marović expresses the idea more fully:
“It is the property of attacks to impose imperatives,
which govern the board at that particular moment.
While in progress, an attack, which in general implies forceful events, suspends
all the static qualities in the positions. As long as the attack lasts,
any potential static weaknesses become irrelevant.”
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I recently found out that a moot point is not worth discussing. I meant that our points of view were open to discussion, so I am sorry for the confusion.
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jkarp
14-Dec-11, 13:16
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Deleted by jkarp on 16-Dec-11, 15:07.
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Where I had good luck by not castling
I now agree with your assessment about castling. After one horrible game with delta5ply10, as mentioned in the annotation, here is another short, but great game against him. If I had castled on my ninth move, I would not have played as well. Instead, I sacrificed my bishop on my eighth move instead of castling and played a 3 way fork against a move later with my knight. This is the annotation of a well played game against delta5ply10. gameknot.com
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Earlier in the thread, shamash said, "". . . Castling. It is supposed to put your king into safety."
No.
Castling is no protective panacea.
You don't just tuck the monarch away and leave him on his own."
Natalia Pogonina agrees with this assessment. I just read an article, about a few minutes ago, and it mentions that it is ok to castle, once in a while. However, it is not a good idea just to decide on castling because it is your favorite. I have also learned that the article, "Castle early and often", is sometimes inaccurate. She points out that is not always safe to castle, when you are getting your king out of danger. In some cases, it is just better to move your king out of the, "danger zone", then to castle.
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In the past, I have castled ASAP. However, Natalia Pogonina said, "Many people castle automatically without giving it any real thought. Not a good idea.", in her article. I now believe that you must be very careful, before deciding to castle. After all, it is important to, "think before you do things", as it is said. In addition, "what you do in the beginning will affect you in the middle game; what you do in the middle game will affect you in the end game; what you do in the end game will affect the final results", as chesskindom64 would say. Therefore, it is important to balance the advantages and disadvantages of castling, before you make that final decision.
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Natalia points out that you want to castle in most cases. However, there are exceptions where you want to leave the king out, without castling, because it can be a very strong weapon. This happens when no other pieces or pawns are threatening the king.
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Where to Castle
According to the article, the best place to castle, is what gets your king out of danger. In other words, if you are going to castle, it is a good place to do this on the side that is not threatened. For example, if you queens side is threatened by your opponents pieces, it is better to castle Kingside. If, however, your Kingside is threatened, it is better to castle Queenside.
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When Castling becomes Costly
Earlier in the thread, shamash showed how Karpov won, by not castling. In this particular game, castling caused theancientbeast to loose. That is shown in the annotation below gameknot.com.
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For Those that are Wondering
I recently lost a game by castling. That game was annotated, and the annotation is based on this thread and jstevens1 annotation, of her game against Master easy19.
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The annotation is shown in the link below. gameknot.com
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