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Chess Articles


  • The Wildest Game

    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

  • Computers in chess... Good or Evil?

    Computers are an essential part of the modern world and it is impossible even to imagine our everyday life without them. As a matter of fact, you wouldn't be able to read this article if there were no computers and the miracle called "Internet". B... | Read More

  • A rare Continuation in French Opening

    Some time ago I showed a game where I got the initiative in the early middle game: http://www.chess.com/forum/view/game-showcase/better-piece-play-and-a-pawn-storm-worked-well-together Very nice! you may think, but why mentioning it again? Well,... | Read More

  • Pawn Forks: the David vs. Goliath of Chess

    The pawn fork: fun, often game changing, sadistic. In fact the David vs. Goliath feel of a lowly pawn simultaneously hitting two far more valuable enemy pieces is one of the game’s great pleasures.  But, is the pawn fork really some rare nucle... | Read More

  • The Best Moves Never Played: Key Positions 4

    Today we will look at few examples from world champions' practice where one side sacrificed a pawn for positional reasons. In some cases this sacrifice was absolutely necessary, while in the other cases it was optional, even questionable. We will ... | Read More

  • SOS - Secrets of Opening Surprises - February 2013

    No time to study opening theory? Shock your opponent with an SOS! With an SOS you deviate early (usually before move 6!) from regular lines in mainstream openings. So you will reach positions you have actually studied without having memorized tons... | Read More

  • The Misunderstood Knight Fork (Part 3) – Various

    One might think that going after material (Part One) or using the fork as an attacking device (Part Two) would be the main themes regarding Knight forks. And that’s true. But there are other uses for this tactical weapon that you might not b... | Read More

  • "The Test of Time" by Garry Kasparov

    This week I will be reviewing a book that was pretty influential for me when I was growing up. This is Garry Kasparov's game collection The Test of Time. The book includes his annotations of games starting from his first steps in international che... | Read More

  • What is a proper moment to resign a game?

    The subject of today's discussion might sound bizarre for most of you.  Indeed, all the chess coaches as well as books, magazines and Web sites teach you how to win your games and here we talk about when to resign? And yet, I think any e... | Read More

  • Should your "better half" play chess?

    In my column "Pros and Cons" I discuss the subjects that have no clear answer. Are doubled pawns good or bad, is an isolated pawn an asset or a liability, what's better a Bishop or a Knight?  The answer is the same to all these questions: "It... | Read More

  • Chess.com Player Profiles: WGM CamillaB

    Woman Grandmaster Camilla Baginskaite from Sioux Falls in the United States has won the World Girls Under 20 championship, the US Women's championship, made top 16 in World Women's Championship and played in seven Chess Olympiads. She is also a... | Read More

  • The Best Moves Never Played: Key Positions - Part 3

    Generally speaking there are two types of chess players: optimists and pessimists. The first tend to stay positive and evaluate positions in their favor, while those in the latter category often give the opponent too much credit and underestimate ... | Read More

  • Q&A with Coach Heisman Feb 1, 2013

    When I get asked generic questions on the show about improvement, there's about an 80% chance that I already have at least one Novice Nook containing a much more comprehensive answer than I could easily cover on the air. This, of course, makes me ... | Read More

  • "Chinese School of Chess" by Liu Wenzhe

    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

  • Imitating Boris Gulko, Part V (English/Español)

    Today I am going to continue with examples on what to do when you have a time advantage. Continúo hoy con más ejemplos sobre qué hacer cuando tienes una ventaja de tiempo. Here’s the video of the middlegame stage from Gulko-Radjabov. I made... | Read More

  • The Misunderstood Knight Fork - Part 2: Attack

    In Part One of the Misunderstood Knight Fork, I compared the Knight fork’s raison d’être as “leaping into an unapologetic orgy of material gain.” In Part Two we take the chains off those well fed horses (after all, ... | Read More

  • Positional or Tactical Chess?

    Probably all chess players ask themselves at some point of their chess career: "Am I a positional chess player or a tactician?" Based on the answer to this question they choose openings and the general strategy of their games.  But if you say... | Read More

  • The Best Moves Never Played - Key Positions 2

    This article will build on the topic of seeing and correctly assessing key positions which we started studying in the previous article. In last week's article we looked at this concept by analyzing a recent endgame. Today we will see several openi... | Read More

  • 2012 Pan American Team Championship

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  • Blunders?!

    Regardless of strength, some players make serious blunders more often than others. While obviously most mistakes in chess are due to either a miscalculation or misevaluation of the position, when a 2500-rated player simply puts a piece en prise, y... | Read More

  • The Misunderstood Knight Fork - Part 1: Greed

    Forks are one of the most useful tactical tools in chess (not to be confused with cutlery). Most people view forks as a way to attack more than one enemy piece at a time and, by doing so, winning a decisive amount of material. While that’s t... | Read More

  • Imitating Boris Gulko, Part IV (English/Español)

    You'll have to excuse me for not putting this article up sooner. My friend, Gomi, invited me to go on vacation with him and his family. And you just don't reject Islands and Fun. Back to Chess  I am going to use English and Spanish in this artic... | Read More

  • The Tale of g2-g4? & g2-g4!

    One of the major strategic rules of chess is "Keep your King safe!". It is precisely due to this rule that a very common pin from many openings which start with 1. e4 e5 is especially dangerous. For example this one: We've all had a similar ex... | Read More

  • The Best Moves Never Played - Key Positions 1

    A strong chess player calculates variations well but also knows when to stop and evaluate the resulting position, resorting to experience and knowledge of typical positions. An experienced player will know that certain positions are better for him... | Read More

  • Q&A with Coach Heisman Jan 18, 2013

    Tonight's show was a lively one and I think one of the best. It's always fun when I get to do a little story-telling to enhance an answer. Moreover, the good questions from the audience led to an interesting show - when it was over I was quite sat... | Read More

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