When I hear the word gambit, the first thing that pops up in my mind is the King's Gambit. Yes, I am well aware that a gambit means a sacrifice to achieve certain benefits like initiative or an outright attack, and there is more to it than just ...
In his famous comedy routine, Richard Pryor tells a story about being caught cheating with another woman by his wife. Since the wife entered the room at the worst possible moment, it was pointless to deny the fact of cheating and yet, he tried his...
As you know from my previous article, in 1992 Vladimir Kramnik transformed from a FIDE master into one of the world's leading players. The year 1993 made it official: Kramnik became a candidate for the world title. Again we played in the ...
I have been lucky to play in tournaments with chess players who later became super grandmasters or even world champions. The transformation of talented juniors into the best players in the world was usually a gradual process. With Vladimir&...
Vladimir Kramnik's decision to quit professional chess shook the chess world. Many people even sense deja vu. Indeed, there is an uncanny resemblance to 14 years ago when Garry Kasparov quit chess. Oddly enough, both great players lost thei...
The recently concluded Tata Steel chess tournament was very memorable for the U.S. grandmaster Sam Shankland. From now on he will be forever remembered as a chess player who the beat the former world champion Vladimir Kramnik in his last profess...
A couple of months ago, I wrote an article about Puzzle Rush. Even though I could see its educational value right away, to me at that time it was mostly a new and very addictive toy. These days it is a must-have training tool for all my stude...
Last year, I wrote an article intended for players rated below 1000 on Chess.com. Judging by your response, the article was helpful for people just starting at chess. Of course there were many comments that can be summarized like this: "I am rat...
The end of 1970s and the beginning of 1980s were definitely the peak of Anatoly Karpov's chess career. He was larger than life in the Soviet Union! His wedding with Irina Kuimova (you see, 40 years later I still remember the name of Karpov...
Prearranged draws are the reality of chess. You might hate it, you might fight it, but if two players want to make a draw, they will find the way to do it. Sometimes such players just agree to a draw before the game and when the game starts they...
In one of my recent articles I shared a story of how I became a lucky owner of an amazing book that really helped my chess development. This is how that article ends: "It might be a pure coincidence, but the next year after I bought The Test ...
In last year's article about chess insults, I mentioned a funny episode that happened in the game between two chess legends, Tarrasch and Nimzowitsch. The game barely started when GM Tarrasch loudly announced: "Never in my life have I ha...
Unlike professional soccer or tennis players, chess players cannot brag about their money. Yes, the world champion Magnus Carlsen is very rich and most of the players who've played world championship matches are millionaires, but can they be compa...
Last week's article about Puzzle Rush provided great feedback, so I would like to thank you for your comments. When I see that people from different countries, different political views and different playing strength share passion for chess, I fee...
Chess.com's new game called "Puzzle Rush" is taking the chess community by storm! If you haven't tried it yet, you should. But be warned, the game is very addictive. While I doubt we will ever see "Puzzle Rush Anonymous," nevertheless, once y...
The world championship match is over and now it is a part of chess history. Just like any big chess event, it has provided a lot of food for thought. For many chess fans the main takeaway from the match is that something should be changed so we ...
We all make mistakes playing chess, proving the old saying "to err is human."' However, it is one thing to miss a 30-move-deep variation like Fabiano Caruana did in game six of his world championship match. It's a totally different story wh...
In one of my first tournament games I fell into a well-known opening trap and lost very quickly. My very considerate opponent waited till the mandatory crying was over and came to me. "Don't be upset, Greg", he said. "The move I played in the op...
When I was a kid, I didn't watch much TV. You see, 40 years ago we had only two state-controlled TV channels in the Soviet Union, so most of the kids spent their time outdoors rather than watching boring news. Nevertheless, there was one weekly pr...
One of the leading Russian newspapers, "Izvestia," has published an interview with the president of the Russian Chess Federation and captain of the Russian Olympic team, Andrey Filatov. This interview got my attention when Filatov claimed tha...
The last European Chess Club Championship was a nightmare tournament for Peter Svidler. I don't recall another case of an elite grandmaster losing four games in a row against mostly lower-rated opponents! Only in the last round we could fin...
The year was 1985 and I was playing a tournament where I had an opportunity to get my first master norm. At that time, tournaments with master norms were very scarce in the Soviet Union. In fact, we had only one such tournament per year in my ho...
Petrov's Defense is not a common opening in club tournaments. It almost doesn't exist in scholastic tournaments, either. The reason is the opening is not very exciting, and in most lines leads to slow, positional play. Therefore, as Wikipedia pu...
I love reading member comments to my articles! It is a pleasure to see how smart and intelligent our chess community is. Unlike commenters in many internet forums, Chess.com members are polite and helpful. Take for example one of my most re...
The regular readers of my column know that I hate political correctness. In my old article I explained it is probably the biggest threat to Western civilization. Very soon people will stop expressing their true beliefs out of fear that the...