There is no accusation that is more guaranteed to get under a chess player’s skin than dismissing his beloved game as a ‘waste of time’. There is no better way to antagonize a chess player than to say that. But many famous thinkers and writers have done so. In chapter two of his book “Chessays”, […]
Monthly Archives: February 2023
The British band Depeche Mode is preparing a new album and has just released the title track in which the remaining founding members David Gahan and Martin Gore say goodbye to their friend and colleague Andy Fletcher, who died last year. The chessboard images in the music video quote Ingmar Bergman’s famous film “The Seventh […]
In round 10 of the Women’s Grand Prix tournament in Munich, Koneru Humpy was close to winning against Alexandra Kosteniuk, but eventually had to settle for a draw and missed the chance to catch Kosteniuk at the top of the table. Now, Kosteniuk only needs a draw against Zhu Jiner in the 11th and last […]
Although it should be well-known for everyone, as these situations appear over and over again during all kinds of events, most players – and unfortunately, many inexperienced arbiters – don’t know how to handle three or fivefold repetitions and 50/75 moves draw properly. The primary aim of this article by International Arbiter Tamas Gyomber is […]
In round 9 of the FIDE Women’s Grand Prix in Munich, Alexandra Kosteniuk drew with Black against Nana Dzagnidze and now leads the tournament with 7.0/9. One point behind follows Humpy Koneru who won against Elisabeth Pähtz. In round 10 on Sunday Kosteniuk and Koneru will play against each other. The symbolic first move in […]
The Slav has a reputation for being a (very) solid opening. But there are ways to play it for a win and give your opponent difficult problems to solve. Dutch Grandmaster Sipke Ernst shows how in his course “The Super Solid Slav Defence”. Hedinn Steingrimsson took a look at the course and liked what he […]
Rapid interviews are fun: interviewer and guest face each other in an epic rapid chess battle. The chess guest not only has to face the interviewer’s questions, but also concentrate on the chess game at the same time. This leads to surprising answers and sometimes to curious chess positions. Leon Mendonca is now playing for […]
In the 8th round of the Munich Grand Prix on Friday, Alexandra Kosteniuk won against Anna Muzychuk to increase her score to 6.5/8. Nana Dzagnidze, who was second to Kosteniuk before the round, lost to Elisabeth Pähtz and dropped to third place, where she is now level on points with Pähtz. The new runner-up is […]
Magnus Carlsen won the Airthings Masters, the first event of this year’s Champions Chess Tour, after beating Hikaru Nakamura 2½-1½ in the 4-game Grand Final match. Carlsen won game 1 with white and drew the three remaining encounters to secure tournament victory. This was the second time Carlsen beat Nakamura in the 5-day event.
After a long time, Svitlana was finally able to play some chess again in the Canadian University Chess Championship 2023. With 4 out of 5, she had a great tournament. We take a look at two of her games, where we specifically analyse her two opening choices. Especially the move 3. .. h6 in the […]