In this variation of the Queen's Gambit Accepted I play white and try to regain my gambit pawn and suffer because of it. Black wins the opening with a queen and knight tag-team, even though his king has been checked out of position. This game is...
James West is a Life Master from New Jersey (where I used to live also). Although he has for most of his carrer played the Sicilian Defense as black in response to 1. e4, he later switched to the Philidor Counter Gambit (PCG) (1.e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3....
Doomclaw asks:I am fairly new to tournament chess, but in the few OTB tournaments I have played I can’t seem to avoid getting very nervous before and during my games, which sometimes causes me to blunder. Can you make suggestions on how to stay ca...
Many amatuers (like me) realize the large amount of theory that can come after both 1.e4 and 1.d4, yet we don't want to play sidelines and give up trying for an advantage. For a good portion of those people (including me) we turn to flank openings...
Bobby Fischer’s real name is Robert James Fischer and he was a famous chess player. He represented the United States and Iceland in all of his chess matches. Fischer was born on March 4, 1943 in Chicago, Illinois and he died on January 17, 2008 ...
As I was buzzing around the forums, spreading useless and, in some very rare cases, useful information, I noticed several members of the community expressing their belief that a King + Rook vs. King Endgame is a difficult checkmate. That really sh...
William Morrison is one of the top players in Maryland. He is nicknamed "The Exterminator" for his "ability to process lower-rated opponents" (I read that somewhere). I presume that means he grinds them up like a food processor and points come o...
Before I present a new typical tactical pattern, I want to thank my readers for their comments, ideas and suggestions. Particularly I have to thank one of my readers who suggested that in the beginning of my articles I should mention a very usefu...
The M-Tel Masters is held every year since 2005 in Sofia, Bulgaria with six to grandmasters playing a double round robin. Veselin Topalov won the first three in 2005, 2006, and 2007. In 2008, the winner was Vassily Ivanchuk. Topalov came in second...
Some chess books about tactics have puzzles for you to figure out. Most of them are neat, but you never see them in your games, so you wonder if studying them is even worth the effort. IT IS! But they don't just appear. You have to:1) Know the ...
When and when not to trade into the endgame? We ask this question many times during our chess games. Usually trading into the endgame means exchanging one’s major piece- Queen. The following characteristics are common causes for one side to trade ...
Which piece is better; the bishop or the knight? Walk into any room with amateur chess players and everyone will know. Or so they think. The evidence they present for their case is neither concrete, nor valid, but it's enough to make them belie...
Just when you think you've created something original, it turns out it's been done before. This happened to me in 2007 at the United States Amateur Team East tournament in Parsippany, NJ. In Round 4, I played the Black side of a King's Indian Defe...
You may have seen opening analyses that cite statistical evidence regarding how well an opening fares. Those statistics are based overwhelming on games by players with ratings over 2200. What would we discover if we looked only at amateur games? H...
I've noticed there are fewer resources available to those who want to learn about the Colle-Zukertort, a solid, positional chess opening system for White. Thus, I thought I’d make a quick-start guide for anyone who wants to try it out sometime. Th...
In this article I want to show an incredible game, Emanuel Lasker-William Napier, Cambridge Spring 1904. This is one of the most known Lasker games. It was such a tremendous game, that Napier considered it his best game ever! Napier wrote: “This i...
If you're like me, you don't read much opening theory. You play Chess, enjoy it, but don't know many of the nuanced trap lines that have been developed over the years. You probably, like me up until this evening, have never even heard of the Magnu...
Of my last few tournaments, my best result was definitely at San Sebastian, Spain in April. I tied for first there with an undefeated 7.0/9. I included one of my earlier games (against FM Angel Arribas Lopez) in an article titled "Spicing up the E...
It's been a long time since I posted my first power of h4 article, but I've finally summoned up the courage to post another one. Anyway, here it is. Polugaevsky initiates the greek gift against tal-but in an somewhat unorthodox setting. It takes...
Srikanth Narahari asked:The following variation of the Smith-Morra Gambit is one of my favorite opening lines with White: 1.e4 c5 2.d4 cxd4 3.c3 dxc3 4.Nxc3 Nc6 5.Bc4 e6 6.Nf3 d6 7.O-O a6 8.Qe2 Be7 9.Rd1 b5 10.Bb3 Ra7 11.Be3 Rd7 12.Rac1 Bb7 13.Nx...
In 1988 and 1989 there was a series of six World Cup tournaments organized by the Grandmasters Association. The overall winner was Gary Kasparov, who won two of the tournaments outright and tied for first in two others. The following game between ...
This is the final game on the Open Ruy Lopez I plan to investigate, and along with the other two examples this should provide the reader with a good introduction into the typical themes and plans in this slightly unorthodox opening. For instructio...
I would like to thank all my readers for their comments. This feedback helps me to determine what would be the most interesting subject for my coming articles. Today I would like to answer some of your questions and requests. Due to the space limi...
Some time ago one of my students told me that it is hard to find rook moves that do not capture the opponent's rook but rather put it in close proximity to the enemy rook. The examples of white playing Ra7 when black’s rook is on a8 came to my min...
