Submitted by
FM FM_Eric_Schilleron Thu Jul 22, 2010 12:00am.
Most of the time both sides castle on the kingside in the Queen's Gambit Declined. Not always, however. In this game Garry Kasparov shows us the power of queenside castling for White.
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1428 reads | 11 comments | 2 votes:
Submitted by
FM FM_Eric_Schilleron Sun Jul 18, 2010 12:00am.
In today's article, I want to show you a strategy of using a sacrifice at g7 to set up a powerful pin that will allow your kingside attack to succeed.
Another WC example:
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1581 reads | 17 comments | 1 vote:
Submitted by
mauerblumeon Wed Jul 14, 2010 12:00am.
Please look at following position:
Black has given a knight for 3 pawns . This looks good if black can manage to bring the both ones on fifth row forward.
But there is a danger. White is threating Nc4+ Nxb6 + Rxf2. If he would succeed w... Read more »
2174 reads | 14 comments | 2 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Jul 9, 2010 12:00am.
This article wraps up the column that we had for half a year on planning. I believe that we covered some of the main ideas on how to plan and you can always go to the archive to review the relevant topics. My next column will be on endgames. I am ... Read more »
2993 reads | 8 comments | 2 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Jul 2, 2010 12:00am.
The set of the positions in the previous week was rather hard. I am sorry for giving you a tough test, but the benefit is seeing what type of positions the masters look at. Those were positions that my coach has given me to solve! This week the te... Read more »
3689 reads | 29 comments | 1 vote:
Submitted by
WGM Natalia_Pogoninaon Tue Jun 22, 2010 12:00am.
Two equally strong armies have gathered on opposite sides of the river. One commander evaluates the pluses and minuses of his and the enemy’s armies’ dispositions, comes up with a plan while taking into account possible counter-attacks, and ch... Read more »
5447 reads | 36 comments | 3 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Jun 11, 2010 12:00am.
As a column wrap-up I would like to present a series of positions to solve. I will move from easier examples this week that are aimed at 1200s to harder ones in the next two weeks. In this Final Exam for my column's readers, it is important to tre... Read more »
5849 reads | 20 comments | 0 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Jun 4, 2010 12:00am.
Planning needs to be done in a controlled environment. Creating a plan at a chess board is like carefully planning a scientific experiment. The similarities are that one has to account for all the possible things that can go wrong, sketch an outli... Read more »
2814 reads | 12 comments | 3 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri May 28, 2010 12:00am.
I was asked to write an article to help players of about 1200 strength with planning. I questioned myself: how do 1200s play? What is the difference between 1200 and 2200 rated players for example? Of course, masters see so many more hidden resour... Read more »
9152 reads | 53 comments | 3 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri May 21, 2010 12:00am.
Pawns do not go backwards – this is an expression which shows how committal pawn moves can be. Moving a pawn to one square does not seem to be the most important decision one makes in the course of a game. But sometimes one such move can be of c... Read more »
8718 reads | 26 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
IM Nezhmeton Wed May 19, 2010 12:00am.
This is a placeholder for the second video in the series "Thinking your Way to Chess Mastery."
We will study Gruenfeld Exchange theory and... understand it. :)
Two related games in this segment: Bhat-Kudrin US Championship 2010 and Cur... Read more »
1831 reads | 12 comments | 0 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Sat May 15, 2010 12:00am.
The past article generated many positive responses and seemed to be helpful for the readers to better understand the training process for achieving better results in chess. That is why I would like to continue upon the previous topic, despite the ... Read more »
2999 reads | 18 comments | 4 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri May 7, 2010 12:00am.
If you are a class player and want to improve you need to have some feedback on your play. There should be someone who can look at your game from a different angle and pinpoint weaknesses you need to work at. Usually, this should be a qualified tr... Read more »
6061 reads | 27 comments | 6 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Apr 30, 2010 12:00am.
The big match Anand- Topalov is underway. There is plenty of coverage of the games on chess.com as well as other chess websites. Naturally, talking about something else in chess, when everyone seems to talk about the match does not make much sen... Read more »
5415 reads | 15 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
IM Nezhmeton Sun Apr 25, 2010 12:00am.
This article is a companion for my Chess.Com video lecture.
We will use this game to understand the key steps to improvement:
Update: on May 22, 2010, I posted the solutions in this article (right next to the questions).
Inspect
Infer
Double... Read more »
2669 reads | 18 comments | 0 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Thu Apr 22, 2010 12:00am.
Recently, Ben Finegold an American who became a grandmaster at age forty said that he wants to win every chess game equally. When not quite getting what he was saying, Ben clarified to me by giving the example from the King's Island Open where th... Read more »
6493 reads | 32 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Apr 16, 2010 12:00am.
Mikhail Botvinnik, a World Champion for fifteen years between 1948-1963, with two brief interruptions had a tremendous impact on the development of the chess game. Dominating the chess world for such an unbelievably long time required character an... Read more »
4448 reads | 28 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Apr 9, 2010 12:00am.
To come up with a correct plan one needs to have a correct positional evaluation. We were taught that a bishop is better than a knight in open positions, that the two rooks are better than the queen, etc. This common sense knowledge guides us du... Read more »
5366 reads | 16 comments | 2 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Apr 2, 2010 12:00am.
Our life-preservation instincts generate fear and awareness of danger. At a chess board a player also experiences similar reactions. One can hear from time to time that this or that chess player has a "good sense of danger." Among super-grand... Read more »
3186 reads | 9 comments | 4 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Mar 26, 2010 12:00am.
Today we will look at examples where forming plans involved moving the pawns. Pawn moves can change the structure of the position and the associated plans. We open the game by sacrificing pawns and grab space by pushing them forward. Sometimes, ad... Read more »
5841 reads | 20 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Mar 19, 2010 12:00am.
Today’s article features two losses that happened because one of the sides (which happened to be me) did not have a plan in the game. To have a plan in any position is a very important step in choosing a move and a trend that the game will follo... Read more »
5592 reads | 16 comments | 3 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Mar 12, 2010 12:00am.
A chess player has to know how to use a variety of methods of chess strategy. Super grandmasters mastered numerous methods of leading chess battles. This is why it is good to go over their games and learn typical plans. Today’s two examples are ... Read more »
5049 reads | 10 comments | 1 vote:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Mar 5, 2010 12:00am.
Today, as promised I will look at the positions that the readers posted. Two positions were similar in that one side had a material advantage but had trouble finding a winning plan. It is very hard to win a winning position. It is hard from a psyc... Read more »
3994 reads | 12 comments | 6 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Feb 26, 2010 12:00am.
A chess player should follow strong GM-tournaments like a business person follows the Wall Street Journal. First of all, one can see modern opening trends and adjust his opening repertoire accordingly. Secondly, and more important in my opinio... Read more »
4187 reads | 21 comments | 5 votes:
Submitted by
WIM energiaon Fri Feb 19, 2010 12:00am.
Last article featured two positions from the Aeroflot Open, which was hosted in Moscow. Grandmaster Le Quang Liem won the event, scoring an impressive 7/9 with 5 wins and 4 draws, and 0 losses. Going into the last ro... Read more »
3782 reads | 18 comments | 5 votes: