1975: Fischer beats Karpov 10-4?

1/16/2019 – What if Bobby Fischer had played Anatoly Karpov in 1975? It's a persistent question and thought experiment that fascinates our readers, but also contributor STEPHAN OLIVER PLATZ, who shares a computer simulated 1975 World Chess Championship match, to add his own fuel to the fires of speculation.

Game of the Week: The Challengers

1/16/2019 – Ideas and strategies in Grandmaster games can be quite instructive. IM Merijn van Delft presents games like these every Wednesday at 19:00 UTC (20:00 CET, 2 pm EST). On this week's show: The Tata Steel Chess Challengers. The live show is free to watch, and available on-demand for ChessBase Premium account holders (but FREE for a limited time!). To chat, please visit videos.chessbase.com/live or login via Playchess for Windows.

Tata Steel Chess - Round 5 Round-up

1/16/2019 – The 81st Tata Steel Chess Tournament takes place from January 12th to 27th in Wijk aan Zee, the Netherlands (and two "on tour" locations). The "Masters" has an average Elo of 2753. The "Challengers" weighs in at 2582. Both are 14-player round-robin tournaments. Round-up show live at 20:00 UTC (21:00 CET, 3:00 PM EST) | Photo: TataSteelChess.com

Toronto is king of the CUCC

1/16/2019 – We recently covered the larger Pan-American Intercollegiate Championship, now our Canadian contributor QIYU ZHOU reports on the Canadian University Chess Championship (CUCC) which was won by the University of Toronto last weekend. | Pictured: Toronto A team: Joseph Bellissimo, Qiyu Zhou, Mark Plotkin, James Fu (not pictured: Zehn Nasir) | Photo: Adrian Santhakumar

Tata Steel Chess: Magnus keeps on drawing

1/15/2019 – The drawing streak of Magnus Carlsen continues as the World Champion tied his fourth round match-up against Vladimir Kramnik at the Tata Steel Masters. Meanwhile, Anish Giri and Vidit won their games to join Vishy Anand and Ding Liren in the chasing pack half a point behind sole leader Ian Nepomniachtchi. In the Challengers, Vladislav Kovalev beat Lucas van Foreest to seize his spot in the leading group. The action of the day was analysed by GM DANNY KING. | Photos: Alina l'Ami / Official site

Gukesh becomes second youngest GM in history

1/15/2019 – 12 years, 7 months and 17 days — that's the age of the new second youngest ever, GM-elect D. Gukesh. He's also the 60th grandmaster from India! How did this youngster achieve it? On the surface, it looks like an extremely smooth journey where Gukesh achieved one milestone after another. "But when you delve deeper", writes SAGAR SHAH, "you see tremendous amount of sacrifices, grit, determination and much more from not just the youngster and his entire family". | Photo: David Llada

NIC: Sadler on books and AlphaZero

1/15/2019 – Courtesy our friends At New in Chess: GM MATTHEW SADLER on books looks at two of Simon Williams' recent video series. Plus, what would AlphaZero think about the World Championship match that was held at a stone’s throw from DeepMind’s headquarters in London? Sadler and NATASHA REGAN, authors of Game Changer: AlphaZero’s Groundbreaking Chess Strategies and the Promise of AI, provide a glimpse.

No-go squares

1/15/2019 – Pawn endings, more so than other endgames, lead to a decisive result. They require precise play and good theoretical knowledge.

Tata Steel Chess: Nepomniachtchi grabs the lead

1/14/2019 – Ian Nepomniachtchi is now the sole leader at the 81st edition of the Tata Steel Masters after knocking down Vladimir Kramnik's Berlin wall in the third round of the competition. Ding Liren beat Jorden van Foreest with the black pieces and now shares second place with Vishy Anand. In the Challengers, Andrey Esipenko and Parham Maghsoodloo won in round three to join the pack of co-leaders on 2/3. Expert analysis by DANIEL FERNANDEZ and DANNY KING. | Photos: Alina l'Ami / Official site

Inside an Italian prison — first FIDE-rated classical tournament

1/14/2019 – Two years ago we came across an interesting and heartwarming tale about a chess expert who accepted a very challenging job to teach the game of chess to prisoners in Italy. He shared at length about his experience at the maximum-security prison of Spoleto and how it changed his perspective about life. The best part of it was the testimonies of prisoners on how the game brought a change in their lives. In this follow-up article, MIRKO TRASCIATTI is back to share an update on the story. | Photo: Inmates playing chess from their prison cells at Attica Correctional Facility, NY, 1972 | Cornell Capa

Mega cool: The games update of Mega Database 2019!

1/14/2019 – What distinguishes the Mega Database from other databases? For one, it does not become obsolete and remains "up to date" with just a few clicks! Because the delivery of the Mega Database 2019 includes not only approximately 7.6 million games but also the weekly mega update service. Every week we provide you with a database of around 5,000 new games. (Plus, the included 72,000 annotated games alone corresponds to a set of over 1,000 chess books!) With a few clicks in ChessBase 15, your Mega Database will always be up to date. A "mega help" for every tournament player. Here's how...

Tata Steel Chess: Giri and Van Foreest bounce back

1/14/2019 – It was a good day for the locals in the Tata Steel Masters, as both Dutch participants recovered from their first round losses — Anish Giri got a third win in a row against Vladimir Kramnik and Jorden van Foreest defeated Jan-Krzysztof Duda with the black pieces after surviving a complicated time scramble. In the Challengers, young Vincent Keymer joined the leaders thanks to a win over Stefan Kuipers. GM DANIEL KING provides expert analyses of all the action. | Photos: Alina l'Ami / Official site

Tata Steel Chess: Anand and Nepo win, Kramnik escapes

1/12/2019 – The elite chess season of 2019 took off on Saturday with the first round of the Tata Steel Masters. Seven fighting games left Vishy Anand and Ian Nepomniachtchi as co-leaders, after the rest of the encounters finished drawn. The biggest escape of the day was achieved by Vladimir Kramnik, who could not be taken down by Teimour Radjabov. Meanwhile, in the Challengers, experience got the better of youth, as Anton Korobov and Evgeny Bareev defeated their much younger colleagues to join a four-player leading pack. Expert analysis by GM ADHIBAN BASKARAN and IM MERIJN VAN DELFT. | Photos: Alina l'Ami / Official site