As we move along in our exploration of the endgames that defined the battles for the world championship, we come to the 1894 match between Emanuel Lasker and Wilhelm Steinitz, which took place in New York, Philadelphia, and Montreal. In the year...
So I was logged on ICC when a friend of mine said "JMB, I have a game to show you!" When he showed me I was blown away. I could only dream of playing such a game! To be honest, if someone had played this game against m...
Serious opening preparation is a must for all chess professionals. At times, the preparation is mundane: NORMAL OPENING PREPARATION 1) You decide to play a new opening that had attracted you for years, or you saw something new and exc...
Chess has had some difficulty throughout the years in presenting itself as a form of public entertainment. There has been some isolated cases where chess made good TV and even a few instances where chess was limelighted and managed to captiv...
When you play chess online, it doesn't really matter what you do with your hands. But when you play chess at a tournament, sitting across the board from a real human opponent for up to seven hours each game, you MUST master the 17 key hand positio...
Last week, we left our amicable chess terminator at a position where his opponent set a devilish trap for him. Many of you, my dear readers, correctly found the refutation of the trap. In his book, Tal wrote that White's move (25.Rd2) made him ver...
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Would you like to play in a weekend tournament (over the next two weekends) with a time control of 90 30 (That's 90 minutes plus a 30 second increment each move) without having to travel? You can do it on chess.com in this historic event. This is ...
Whether you like it or not, Paul Morphy is almost invariably remembered for his brilliant victory over the Duke of Brunswick and Count Isouard in 1858 (refresh your memory here). And for good reason! However, while Morphy indeed conducted a bril...
Professor: Happy Independence Day, Class! Lucian: You mean happy July Fourth, don’t you? Zephyr: They’re the same day. Thomas: That’s the way the Founding Fathers planned it. Zephyr: Maybe the Founding Mothers had the sam...
We miss a player with around 2250-2300 ELO from the world. Who does want to come now to play for the IM-norm? The list of the players: SZEBERENYI, Adam IM 2316 HUN FARAGO, Sandor IM 2249 HUN SZALANCZY, Emil IM 2280 HUN KISLIK, Erik Andrew IM 2...
Dear readers! Over the next couple months I will be doing a series of articles covering the endgames played in world championship matches over the years. Through this series, we will be seeing how endgame play evolved as well as learning about som...
In our first look at this pawn structure in Part 3a we explored the piece setups, dynamics, and general plans of the Burn Variation of the French Defense. Though doubling one’s kingside pawns early in the game may look idiotic, the resulting struc...
The 2014 FIFA World Cup has reached a fever "pitch"! The knockout rounds have begun, six teams have been eliminated, and two more will fall today. The U.S. team faces Belgium in the round of 16 this afternoon, and many Americans are discovering th...
Many Chess.com University students have had trouble creating, viewing, and editing PGN files. Students have also struggled at installing and using chess engines in Fritz and/or Chessbase. These days, it is very useful to know how to use programs...
This year we celebrate the 30th anniversary of one of the most influential movies of all time: The Terminator! Is there any person on Earth who hasn't said "I'll be back," imitating the great Arnold? Even though The Terminator is just a sc...
As can be seen in the introduction, this article from Schach-Jahrbuch in 1891 endeavored to amass data on the interplay among 32 leading players from the second half of the 19th century. It apparently includes only what the author deemed as...
"I did action X and gained Y rating points so I suggest everyone should do that." This claim came up during the show, raising the question: How helpful it would be for others to follow the suggestion? In order to address this issue, we should sta...
Last week, we broached the fascinating subject of endgame attacks, which is rarely addressed in chess literature as an individual concept. Today, I would like to zero in on a particular type of endgame: queen and bishop vs. queen and knight (QBQN)...
Professor: Class, how wondrous to see you! Here, the burble of garbled voices seemed to say pleasant prattling things back to the professor. Professor: They say all good things must come to an end, and that’s the case today. Thomas: Are you lea...
Two minor pieces against a rook - a very tricky material balance. In one situation, a rook and pawn defeats the two minor pieces. In another, two minor pieces run circles around a rook and two - or even three, as we see in today's game - pawns. An...
Yet not reading latest Chess Informant 120 Maracana? Seriously? THE PERIODICAL THE PROS USE Book: Paperback, 340 pages, English language. CD: in ChessBase format (with PGN). Our four times-a-year publication aspires to be an arena that gat...
ACO World Amateur Chess Championship Rhodes (Greece) 2014 The ACO World Amateur Chess Championship took place on the Greek island of Rhodes from 7-16 June, 2014. 237 players with ages between 8 to 86 fought for the title of ACO World Champion in ...
Shock Value or the Real Thing? ejSalsac asked: “I wished to ask for your evaluation of a line of the English Attack which to my knowledge has rarely been played: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be3 Ng4 7.Bg5 h6 8.Bh4 g5 9.Nf5!? ...
