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My next few articles will be about the US Championship that took place from May 2-13th in St. Louis. I was a participant in the women's event, where ten players competed for a purse of $65,000 and the title of US Woman Champion. This event is gran... | Read More
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Any real fan of chess can tell you that, in many ways, chess is a lifelong addiction. Hundreds or even thousands (in some case, tens of thousands!) of chess books take over an apartment or house, chess sets can be found in bathrooms, bedrooms, kit... | Read More
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It’s been several decades since the last time Paris has been the site of a top-tier chess tournament. The French city of Lyon played host to Kasparov’s title defense match against Karpov in 1990, but other than that, nobody here can se... | Read More
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Continuing on the topic of Typical Positions in 1.d4 openings, one cannot not mention Nimzo-Indian Defense! This opening is one of the most complex and the resulting positions can be very hard to handle. In my preparation for the US Women's Champi... | Read More
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He didn´t like school but has a masters degree in computer science, his nickname is "Captain Mag-Pan" (according to IM Danny Rensch) and he happens to be a fan of Gandhi... Meet Grandmaster Magesh Chandran Panchanathan from Madurai in India, ... | Read More
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I opened the show by randomly selecting a position from one of my Chess.com friend's slow games:
I spent about the first 15 minutes of the show analyzing the position. My general considerations were that White was slightly better due to the act... | Read More
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When I introduced this column I mentioned that I probably wouldn't be covering many opening books. However, I decided to write a review of this fairly old book on the French by grandmaster Lev Psakhis from the "Complete..." series. Why?
Well, fi... | Read More
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Today I have the pleasure of reviewing Grandmaster Judit Polgar's new book, How I Beat Fischer's Record for our community here on Chess.com - and I must say I found Judit's work refreshingly honest, surprisingly inspiring, and undeniably as i... | Read More
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The Pin is a must-know tactic, and it’s particularly feared by amateurs who find themselves pinned in a myriad of different ways. As with all tactical devices, pins range from very basic to beautifully complex.
Our first example goes way, way b... | Read More
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In the last week's article I touched the subject of cheaters who use computer engines during their games. To my great surprise, judging by reader's messages, many of you are not aware of this problem. I was asked how can cheaters possibly us... | Read More
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Recently, a friend sent me a fantastically crazy game, and I have decided to share it in my column. It was a fairly obscure game, from the Beverwijk tournament of 1961. The position that arose was so incredibly lopsided that it is hard to believe.... | Read More
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This week I will be reviewing an interesting and unusual book about the development of chess in China. The author, Liu Wenzhe, is considered to be one of the first promoters of western chess in China. Originally a XiangQi (Chinese chess) player, W... | Read More
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At the beginning of this week's show almost every question involved openings. Don't get me wrong; I think openings are important - it's the only part of the game which you are guaranteed to reach each time you play. But this obsession with opening... | Read More
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Fight the King's Indian, Gruenfeld, and Dutch defenses with ZUKA by David Rude.Thinker's press, Inc. 2012, Davenport, IA.
44e0 pages, ISBN: space 101888710-63-2
$29.95 at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Gr%C3%BCnfeld-Defenses-stand-alone-cohesive-... | Read More
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Before I explain the strange title of today's article, let me show you what kind of position we are going to discuss:
This kind of position can happen in many different openings (we can assume that there ar... | Read More
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Although I am doing a new column - "My Bookshelf" - I will from time to time revisit "Attack and Defense" for some variety. And this is one of those times.
I recently played in the National Chess Congress in Philadelphia. This is a tournament wh... | Read More
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In the previous part of our discussion about doubled pawns we could see that in the majority of cases such pawns are a clear disadvantage in the endgame. But what about openings and middle games?
As we could see the major drawback of... | Read More
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Mongoose Press graciously offered free copies of The World's Most Instructive Amateur Game Book for the best question on each of the Dec 7 and Dec 21 shows. I scribbled down seven questions which were contenders for the prize. Here they are (I ap... | Read More
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In the second part of this article we continue the presentation of the new champions:
Without a clear rating favorite of the group (about whom you will read below), the girls under 14 championship was won by M. Mahalakshmi from In... | Read More
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Maribor, the second largest city in Slovenia was the proud owner of this name during 2012. Many interesting activities took, and continue to take place in this beautiful town where the Drava river flows, and which is also famous for its ski resort... | Read More