Upgrade to Chess.com Premium!

Instructive & Beautiful positions

Hi! I would like to share with you two instructive and beautiful "fresh" positions that occured during my games,and one bonus chess nugget that i found while studying,which might challange international players.

The following is an extract from the active time control game Yoni-Gergacz Attila(IM),which was played at 20-Jun-2012.

I played white,and my last move was Bxe6. I thought i was completely winning,but my opponent found a way to fight! Can you do the same?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a multiple choice question: What is white's best move,

Rae1 or Ng3?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here is a true chess nugget for whoever reads my first blog post.

Yusupov (who was number 3 in the world for a long time) in his excellent book "Build up your chess-the fundamentals" chapter 3 exercise 11 said about the following position:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Na5? is bad due to Qa4+....".

Well,if i did not doubt anything and everything that the author says,i would never improve my play,but this time is special because the author's mistake is so subtle!  

As opposed to Mr Yusupov I think that the text move (1..e4!) and 1..Na5! (planning b6 and Ba6 pressuring the c-pawn Nimzo-indian style) are both good.

Even though i believe that chess improvement can be achieved only through solving exercises,and being actively involved in the material that you are studying,I could not post the following as a puzzle,since there are too many places with different good options.

Having said that,I do recommend that before you play out the position below,take your time and see,what am i talking about? Doesn't Na5 Qa4+ just drops a pawn?! (After an eventual e4 by black etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I hope that you enjoyed my first blog post :)

Comments


  • 7 months ago

    YoniKer

    Yes,you are right about Yusupov-finding mistakes in his books is very rare (In fact so far that was the only one,and the computer gets it wrong too until 2 or 3 moves into the variation,meaning that he takes writing his books very seriously,and also that he checks it with a computer!).

     

    Having said that,some books (by GMs/IMs) do contain errors that are not even subtle :)  

    I will give a few examples soon if you want,when i will have enough interesting positions to show!

  • 7 months ago

    Elubas

    I'm surprised GM Yusupov missed that -- though the idea is subtle, it's not like it is completely alien to me, so you'd think it would be downright obvious to him that you have to look at what happens in the position after the queen moves to a5 to make sure there are no last second ideas. I suppose he either A) figured that the queen being trapped was too unrealistic, so unrealistic it wasn't even worth mentioning in his notes; or B), he was simply a little lazy there.

    Or maybe a third possibility: He computer checked it and perhaps the computer also thought it was just good for white :) Anyway, nice find, if it works -- must be fun to "outsmart" a grandmaster for a millisecond ;) Actually, now that I think of it, I guess he assumed that if ...Bc8 didn't work, due to giving up a4, then the trap wouldn't work. Still, even though ...Bc8 doesn't work, the queen is still trapped and out of play with the bishop on d7, even though it will be a while before it finally gets attacked.

    I remember once where I was reading a book and GM Igor Stohl said "and black has dangerous attacking chances for the piece," but I thought he was being too presumptuous (A weak king and active pieces doesn't automatically equal mate), so I looked into it more with the help of a computer, played it out quite a bit, and I came the conclusion that black's attack was basically BS, and that he was in trouble.

    Of course, finding such mistakes is like seeing a top player make a huge blunder -- it's psychologically encouraging because it shows you they are human, but at the same time we know that such mistakes are extremely rare, and we make them way more than they do.

Back to Top

Post your reply: