I usually set aside time on Wednesday evening to write my weekly column. It has already become a routine, though for such tasks I typically rely on my mood to determine when and what to write and not a schedule. Tonight, I am in no mood to talk t...
This article is the first in a series that will illustrate what a player needs to do and how he needs to think when facing a losing position or one that appears to be going from bad to worse. The first step is to realise that we all throw in a fe...
How does one plan a sacrifice? Sometimes the position requires for one side to sacrifice a piece or the exchange. It is often apparent when the position is bad and some active measures need to be taken. What about the positions that are better, bu...
The weak dark square complex is a group of squares that are undefended by nearby pawns on white squares. For examples in this article, Black has pawns on f7, g6, and h7, and the squares f6, g7,and h6 are undefended by Black pawns. They form a we...
Chess Exam: Matches against Chess Legends, You vs. Bobby Fischer IM Igor Khmelnitsky 2009 IamCoach Press 190 pages http://www.chessexam.com Hello chess enthusiasts and readers! I have just finished working through my copy of C...
In my younger years I was a big fan of Dvoretsky’s books. I read them all, even though I did not fully understand them. I still like to go back to the chess shelf to flip through pages from his books to see the many marks and under...
Imbalances Tom asked: If I’m doing a tactical puzzle, should I be looking at the imbalances before I start calculating? Or does this not apply when you know there’s a tactical shot in the position? Dear Tom, Imbalances (space, material, pawn...
There are different theories of how one should choose a move. Some of the theories are systematically developed and are presented as practical methods. Deciding on a chess move, unless you are a computer, is a very complex process. The decision-ma...
The Art and Science of the Isolated d-Pawn Madhacker asked: I’d like to ask about the correct handling of positions where White has an isolated queen’s pawn. The question was raised in my head by the following game I played in a lo...
Once again, it is great to see many readers coming up with creative ideas to solve the positions. Please, keep posting your ideas and comments, I read them all, even if I do not address all the continuations suggested. In Position 3 my natural in...
If any of us were asked "What makes some chess players better than others?", we might come up with a number of different responses. Some replies might be: They are better at seeing tactics, They have a better memory for openings, They can calculat...
I am very happy to see a large number of comments to the first article in the series about planning. I read through all the comments and was impressed with the numerous creative ideas that the readers came up with. With strategic positions there i...
It's nice to win games by playing amazing moves, surprising tactics, and slashing attacks, but we all know that those are rare and that we can't expect a steady diet of brilliant wins. It's like the lottery. It would be nice to win once in a whi...
Today will mark the start of a series of new articles that will span the next couple of months. The topic of the articles will be "Planning in Chess." One has to differentiate between the ideas of strategical play in general and a ...
One of the characteristics about modern chess is the fluidity of material values. When Morphy and Andersson were ruling the roost, sacrifices were common, but they were often with a clear tactical goal in mind - get the opponent's king stuck in th...
One of the goals we aspire to in each game is to make every move count. That is, we want to make moves that threaten something or at least contribute to some objective. We try to avoid pointless moves that put our opponents under no pressure. ...
The USCL (http://www.uschessleague.com/) is the American version of a national chess team league. In the fall, 14 teams in 2 conferences battle it out in matches with 4 boards apiece. I've played in the USCL for the San Francisco Mechanics since t...
Going into the last round of the SPICE Cup in Texas, I was tied for 2nd place with GM Eugene Perelshteyn and IM Ray Robson with 5.0/8. IM Ben Finegold was leading with 6.0/8, and was playing Eugene in the last round. Ray had black against FM Danie...
While I'm all in favor of playing aggressively, I try to do by playing an aggressive opening as White. And when I'm playing Black, I try to play aggressively after I have equalized and gotten a few pieces developed. However, choosing an opening ...
In my last tournament, the SPICE Cup in Texas, I had 4 blacks out of 9 games. The first 3 blacks I had all saw my opponents open with 1.e4 (I wrote about the first game last week, at http://www.chess.com/article/view/pawn-power). While I've normal...
In part 1 of this article (http://www.chess.com/article/view/opposite-side-castling-the-basics), I showed a game where the kingside attack was conducted using pieces to open up the pawn cover on Black's kingside. In part 2, I show a game with the...
In games where the players castle on opposite sides, an attack against the opposing king is almost always in order. The rational for this is "If you don't do it to him, he's going to do it to you" or, if you like, the more pithy "Kill or be kille...
After playing in Montreal, which I wrapped up with a loss to Naiditsch in the 11th round (covered at: http://www.chess.com/article/view/developing-an-opening-repertoire), I had a week off before playing another strong round-robin. This one was in ...
2009 US Women’s Chess Championship Report By GM-elect Ben Finegold I will be taking over WIM Iryna Zenyuk’s column this week. After reading this, the readers may wonder, “Where is the real Iryna?” Since Zenyuk is busy preparing and trying t...
