Classical KID Recap | KID March

I started posting what I learned and knew about the King's Indian Defense in September of 2021. Over the past half year we've studied and looked at the Classical KID in ten posts. It's time to look back on those posts and see what we learned from each.

My first ever post on the KID was Openings Crash Course: Introduction to the KID. At that time I had no idea about how the series would turn out, and actually fully expected not to be able to complete posts on much of the listed variations! 

• The Orthodox System, leading to the Classical ✔
• The Saemisch Variation
• The Standard Development, which will usually transpose to the Orthodox and Classical
• The Four Pawns Attack
• Some uncommonly played variations, like the Makogonov or Kramer Variations
• Delayed e4 variations (in these white can choose whether or not to play e4 later on if black allows it):
• 3. g3 Variation (different move orders can reach the Fianchetto Variation)
• Tarkatower Attack (can also transpose to the Fianchetto Variation)
• Fianchetto Variations
• Smyslov Variation
• Early h4 pushes

And we've checked off the most important and complicated variation on the list now! We've finished our overview of the Classical. I'm going to summarize it a bit and pull some excerpts that I found especially useful from each post. 

"However, I must say that there is a reason that it is not played much anymore at the top level. That is because black must play every single move very accurately to avoid being completely lost. Of course, that is assuming that white plays some of the best moves too. It is harder for the black side of the KID to keep up with all of the theoretical evidence, therefore the lack of popularity at the highest level."

It's true - the KID is fading from top level play because white's optimal play gives them a pretty clear advantage, but it's definitely a interesting and great option for everyone still.

And if you forgot (somehow??): 

"If you look at the Opening Explorer statistics after 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7, you can see that in the top few variations, white has decently better winning percentages, but the database's games are master games, at a higher level. And if you scroll down and look at the less played variations, you can see that black dominates the winning percentages:

Respectable statistics! That first post was generally just a heads-up to what would be in the next posts. My next post was The KID: Breaking it Down to the Basics. 

"The KID is a hypermodern defense, meaning that black lets white immediately take full control of the center, only to challenge it later on in the game. In many hypermodern defenses, including this one, the main breaks are ...e7-e5 and ...c7(or c6 depending)-c5.

The most important lines of the KID sprout from white playing to grab the center immediately, and that is when the most tooth-and-nail play comes from, with black either breaking with ...b7-b5 and playing on the queenside or ...f7-f5 and playing on the queenside, and white playing on the opposite side."

Always helpful to remember the rudimentary concepts!

"Black absolutely must play for e5 or c5, or he will slowly be ground down until there is no more room to breathe. These two pawn breaks are why this opening exists. Hypermodern openings do not work if you do not strike back at the center before it is too late."

MUST KEEP IN MIND. If you play the KID and never play e5 or c5, you'll be ground down into a fine powder.

Time to introduce our first line!

"The first line that we will look at in the next post is known as the Main Line, the Mar del Plata Attack, or, more officially, the Orthodox, Aronin-Taimanov Defense, which leads to the Classical. This is how it is usually reached, but there are a few other move orders:

The Mar del Plata Attack Part 1: Main Ideas of the Classical

"Mar del Plata is a city on the Atlantic coast of Argentina, one of the country's largest fishing ports. It's a large and popular city. Seemingly unrelated to chess, until you learn that there have been many strong tournaments located there. And in one of those tournaments, there was a fateful game between GMs Miguel Najdorf and Svetozar Gligoric which brought attention to this line of the King's Indian Defense. Now known as the Mar del Plata Attack, it's one of the most dynamic and sharp lines there are. White has an established advantage, but play is very interesting."

It's always nice to know the meaning of names. Why are you named what you are? Names give meaning to people and things.

"The Mar del Plata Attack is not actually a specific line but has many variations, and I don't believe that there is a line that is officially called the "Mar del Plata Attack." But the variations sprouting from the moves below are all considered to be part of the Mar del Plata Attack and have some similar themes and ideas.

"Now we need to understand the ideas in play after the position after the last move. You've probably heard that you should attack on the side that your pawn chain is facing, in other words where you have more space, and this is the rule of law in almost all Mar del Plata lines. White wants to attack on the queenside where he has more space, and black wants to attack on the kingside where he has more space. White's pieces will naturally gravitate to the queenside, black's to the kingside. The central situation is closed, so play on the flanks is not only justified but necessary."

White attacks on the queenside, black on the kingside.

After that I go on to explain how the position of the pawns affects everything, visualize it with some diagrams, and more.

"This time, the pawn break is ...f7-f5. A move with many intentions. In some cases, if white makes an inaccuracy, black can take on e4, opening the f-file and removing a part of the center. But white will almost always play f3 before that's possible. The main idea of ...f7-f5 is actually to advance further and take more space with ...f5-f4. This usually comes with a tempo, as white's dark-squared bishop is almost always placed on e3, forcing it to retreat to f2. The pawn structure after that will be this (...f5-f4 usually comes before c5xd6, so the c7 and c4 pawns are still on the board):

Next is the general plan for black and the introduction to the Rf8-Rf7 maneuver.

"Black has gained more space on the kingside. After this, all of black's kingside pawns will come running down the board in the frenzy to topple the white king. ...h7-h4, ...g6-g5-g4 and the possibility to go to g3, etc. Black isn't exposing his own king as much as it looks like it because the center is locked and no white pieces are going to be able to make it to the kingside to punish black. The pawns will break up white's pawn cover, and behind them will come the knights, queen, light-squared bishop (and occasionally the dark-squared one too, which may come to e3 via h6 before it is blocked by ...f5-f4), and possibly a rook. Lots of firepower gunning for the white king, but black also has to worry about white massacring the queenside.
This brings us to a common kingside piece formation. In many cases black will play Rf8-Rf7. This move actually has three reasons:
1. To guard the second (or seventh) rank from invaders, useful to challenge a rook that could try to enter on c7.
2. To have the possibility of playing Rg7 bringing the rook to the same file that the white king is on, supporting the g-pawn and looking through it.
2. And finally, clearing the f8 square for the bishop which will usually move there to guard one of the weaknesses, d6."

After that I go on to explain the two main ninth moves in the Classical, 9...Nd7 and 9...Ne8 and their similarities, differences, and purposes. We've chosen 9...Nd7 as our move to play, and you can read more about it if you wish.

The Mar del Plata Attack: The Neo-Classical with 9... Nd7 10. Be3

The two main moves after 9...Nd7 are 10. Be3 and 10. Nd3. This post was about 10. Be3 and how to play against it. As you probably know by now, without checking the post out or looking at a board, the move is 10...f5, our thematic pawn push. The next moves are obvious, 11. f3 f4 12. Bf2 g5, starting the kingside pushes. That was just about it for that post, just a starter for the rest.

The Mar del Plata Attack: The Neo-Classical Line, 13. a4

"13. a4 doesn't seem to be doing much, but in many cases the a7 pawn will be targeted by the bishop on f2 and the c3 knight jumping to b5. The a-pawn will advance further if black allows, take space, and extend the a-file for the queenside rook, which can go to the c-file or lift if it wants. In many lines black will give up the a-pawn for an attack on the kingside, but it does not usually work out well for black, so here I would suggest the move 13...a5. The most commonly played, by a very small margin, is 13...Ng6, but 13...a5 appeals more to me, seems to make more sense and be better.

This gets the pawn off the vulnerable a7 square, and delays white's play with b2-b4 for a tiny little bit of time. The drawback is that it takes some time away from black's kingside attack. One main idea in this line is to play ...b6, which attempts to secure control over the very important c5 square. It does weaken c6, however. Here are the next few moves, which are almost always played and most obvious."

A common continuation:

...and of course went on to talk about what to do in those positions. After that came a demonstrative game that I chose to illustrate the ideas.

"You can see that at this level, a single inaccurate mistake can cost the game. Black's g5-g4 saved the day, and under pressure white faltered."

Pressure is everything. We're humans, and especially in KID positions where white may be objectively better, black has to worm his way into white's mind to create doubts and exploit them.

The Mar del Plata Attack: The Kožul Gambit

"The reasoning behind the pawn sacrifice is to open the c-file and create targets for white faster than usual when white prepares c4-c5 with b2-b4."

And how I suggested to play:

"The gambit, the brainchild of Croatian International Grandmaster and 2006 European Champion Zdenko Kožul, is one of the reasons why some players switched from 9...Nd7 to 9...Ne8. I myself prefer 9...Ne8, but there is an easy way to avoid getting worn down positionally on the queenside and getting play on the kingside, as all KID players want. How? Simply decline the gambit. Don't take on c5. Let white capture on d6, and the pawn structure will be what we are familiar with, with our pawn chain from d6 to f4 still intact. Then play will be almost identical to other lines of the Mar del Plata, where black pushes for the white king while white hacks away at the black queenside. Taking on c5 has all the downsides, so don't! This way of playing is objectively not as sound as accepting the pawn, but for players around my level and below, it is a much better choice.

After 13. Rc1, the move to be played is 13...Ng6. You could also play 13...Nf6 or 13...Rf7 and it would most likely transpose to our line, but we'll go with 13. Ng6 for now since it is the most commonly played move. This gets the knight over to where it wants to be - the kingside. That particular knight has the potential to jump to h4, where it will be a key attacker, putting pressure on g2."

The demonstrative game shown with the main line:

And the 14...Rf7 game: