Norway Chess: Carlsen retakes the lead

10/14/2020 – With two rounds to go after the rest day, two players still have realistic chances to win the tournament — Magnus Carlsen and Alireza Firouzja. Firouzja was leading the tournament before round 7, but lost in Armageddon against Fabiano Caruana on Tuesday, while the world champion collected 3 points by beating Aryan Tari in classical chess. Carlsen now has a one-point lead over his 17-year-old colleague. Firouzja and Carlsen will face each other on Thursday. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

New: Chris Ward - Sicilian Dragon: The Real Deal!

10/14/2020 – English Grandmaster Chris Ward is an expert in the Sicilian Dragon, and wants to share his knowledge, debuting as a Fritztrainer. The British Championship Master's fun, entertaining spirit, and his soothing voice, keeps us hooked to his first part on how to play the Sicilian Dragon with plenty of current variations. The popular opening was recently played by Hikaru Nakamura, but also Veselin Topalov has used the powerful system in his best times with his very own variation. GM Ward doesn't want to dissect the variations too much, but rather give interesting new ideas for strong attacking play, creative moves and solid defending.

Boris Gelfand discusses with stand-up comedians

10/14/2020 – "Grandmaster Chess" is a series by ChessBase India in which a top GM shows his best game and asks four chess loving stand-up comedians to guess the moves in critical positions. The playing level of the comedians is between 1200-1600, and hence they always come up with moves that amateurs and viewers can relate to. The explanation of the grandmaster helps them to understand the game better. You can watch the show live on Wednesday, 10:30 a.m. European time, or later in full on YouTube | Photo: Maya Gelfand

The Weekly Show: Aryan Tari vs Alireza Firouzja

10/13/2020 – In his weekly show IM Lawrence Trent takes a closer look at the Norway Chess Tournament, and especially at the game Aryan Tari vs Alireza Firouzja, in which Firouzja evoked memories of a great attacking player of the past. | Lawrence’s show is available at 17:00 UTC (19:00 CEST, 13:00 EDT) on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here. | Photo: Official site | Photo: Lennart Ootes

King to king

10/13/2020 – It is helpful to know a couple of theoretical endgame positions - they might come up in a practical game or knowing them might help you to win an important or less important blitz game. Centurini's draw is the most important theoretical position in the endgame bishop and pawn against bishop.

Norway Chess: Firouzja still ahead

10/13/2020 – Alireza Firouzja continues to impress at the Norway Chess Tournament as he beat Levon Aronian in Armageddon to keep the sole lead in the standings. Meanwhile, the main event of the day, Magnus Carlsen versus Fabiano Caruana, saw the world champion defending a tough position in classical chess and winning the Armageddon decider. Jan-Krzysztof Duda defeated Aryan Tari in their classical encounter. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Simon Says: The King's Indian Attack - The Bobby Fischer Way

10/12/2020 – In this "Simon Says" the Ginger GM shows you how Bobby Fischer used to mate his opponents with the King's Indian Attack. | Watch "Simon Says" for free and on-demand (for a limited time, or forever with a ChessBase Premium account). (Normally 18:00 UTC (20:00 CEST / 14:00). | Photo: Bobby Fischer

Carissa Yip wins 2020 U.S. Girls' Junior Championship

10/12/2020 – From October 8 to October 29, the St. Louis Chess Club organizes the U.S. Championships, but this year all Championship tournaments are played online and in rapid format. The series began with the U.S. Girls' Junior Championship, and with a smooth and convincing performance Carissa Yip won the tournament and her third title in a row.

Short leads in Prague against Dai Van Nguyen

10/12/2020 – Currently, chess legend Nigel Short and the young Czech Grandmaster Thai Dai Van Nguyen, play a friendly 10-game rapid match in Prague. It began October 10, and after six games Short leads 3½:2½. Today, the last four games will be played.

Altibox Norway Chess: Firouzja grabs the lead

10/12/2020 – In the sixth round, Fabiano Caruana took down former leader Levon Aronian. The beneficiary of the defeat was Alireza Firouzja, who won against Aryan Tari and thus took the lead. Magnus Carlsen bounced back from his loss on Saturday and defeated Jan-Krzysztof Duda — the world champion is in third place. | Photos: Lennart Ootes

A video chat with Judit Polgar

10/12/2020 – On Saturday, October 10, the Global Chess Festival was celebrated! The woman behind this vibrant annual gala hardly needs any introduction. The strongest female chess player of all time is the only woman to have ever challenged male hegemony in the sport. Though everyone is familiar with Judit Polgar, the chess player, we thought the world would also do good to know Judit the wife and mother. At the end of last month, ChessBase India's Amruta Mokal conducted an exclusive interview with this remarkable lady. In this article we bring you the full transcript of this candid tête-à-tête. | Photo credit: globalchessfestival.com

Grandmaster Chef: Fabiano Caruana

10/11/2020 – Grandmaster Fabiano Caruana is the top-ranked chess player in the United States and is second in the world. He was the challenger for the World Chess Championship in 2018. To show appreciation for Caruana, National Master Mike Walder presents a recipe for a dish Caruana might like and annotates one of Caruana’s wins. WIM Alexey Root tells why Caruana is a Grandmaster Chef honoree. | Pictured: Caruana at the 2018 London Chess Classic | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Finding harmony in the endgame

10/11/2020 – Endgame expert Karsten Müller keeps finding interesting endgames at the Altibox Norway Chess Tournament. This time around, he looks at the rook and knight versus bishop and knight ending from the Levon Aronian v Fabiano Caruana game from round 5. Hidden tricks abound in these unbalanced positions! | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Norway Chess: Duda ends Carlsen’s streak, Aronian leads

10/11/2020 – Round 5 of the Norway Chess tournament saw tail-ender Jan-Krzysztof Duda defeating former sole leader Magnus Carlsen, thus ending a 125-game undefeated streak in classical chess that lasted over two years. In the meantime, Levon Aronian and Alireza Firouzja also collected 3 points each by winning their classical games — Aronian inflicted Caruana’s second straight loss while Firouzja defeated Tari with the white pieces. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Connected pawns on the move

10/10/2020 – Round 4 of the Altibox Norway Chess tournament in Stavanger saw Levon Aronian and Alireza Firouzja playing an Armageddon tiebreaker after drawing their classical game. Karsten Müller assessed the final phase of the encounter as a “fascinating knight endgame”. The endgame specialist examined the sequence in detail and now shares it with all ChessBase readers. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Russian Higher League kicks off in Sochi

10/10/2020 – The Russian city of Sochi will host the “Higher League” until October 17. Thanks to the large number of strong grandmasters in the country, this qualifying tournament to the Superfinal is heavily contested, so much so that it equals the level of the national championship in almost any other country in the world. Rating favourite Vladislav Artemiev (2716) already gave up a half point in the first two rounds. In the women’s tournament, Valentina Gunina is the rating favourite. | Photos: Eteri Kublashvili

"Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual": an interview with Karsten Müller

10/9/2020 – Many players believe that Mark Dvoretsky's "Endgame Manual" is one of the best chess books of all time. Recently, Russell Enterprises released the 5th edition of this legendary work. In an interview with Johannes Fischer, Karsten Müller, who edited and revised the 5th edition of the "Manual", talks about his passion for the endgame, why studying Dovretsky's manual is fun and worth the effort, and what makes this book so special.

Norway Chess: Carlsen beats Caruana to take the lead

10/9/2020 – Magnus Carlsen climbed to the top of the standings in the Norway Chess Tournament by beating former co-leader Fabiano Caruana with white in their classical encounter. Meanwhile, Alireza Firouzja and Aryan Tari won in Armageddon, defeating Levon Aronian and Jan-Krzysztof Duda respectively. A misunderstanding with the arbiter meant Firouzja arrived a couple of minutes late to his sudden-death game. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

AlphaZero/Kramnik: Torpedo pawns

10/9/2020 – Modifying the existing rules for chess to make it more dynamic or decisive, needs years of experience and a large numbers of games if we are to assess the quality and appeal of any new variant. The company DeepMind has used their AI technology to evaluate nine variants proposed by former World Champion Vladimir Kramnik in a much shorter period of time. Here are their findings for "Torpedo Chess", where pawns can move two squares forward from anywhere.

Norway Chess: Another instructive endgame

10/9/2020 – The first four rounds of the Altibox Norway Chess Tournament saw a number of instructive and interesting endgames. Karsten Müller is happy and took a close look at the textbook-endgame between Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Levon Aronian in round 3, which shows why it is sometimes better to have less.

King in the middle (3)

10/9/2020 – Grabbing the opponent's b-pawn in the opening by sending your queen on a killing spree is not always bad, as the Poisoned Pawn Variation in the Najdorf (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 e6 7.f4 Qb6!?) shows. But in the diagram position, Black's greedy 9...Qxb2? is indeed bad. However, to refute the move, White needs to use many a piece. Have fun!

Judit Polgar's Global Chess Festival goes online - on October 10!

10/9/2020 – The Global Chess Festival, initiated and organised by Judit Polgar, is a treat for chess players all over the world. Traditionally, the festival takes place on the second Saturday of October, which this year falls on October 10, and this year the festival goes online - with a fantastic program and an amazing choice of events, all for free! "Chess Connects Us" is the slogan of the Global Chess Festival, and chess fans all over the world are invited to join the fun!

Robert Ris' Fast and Furious: Attacking with Black against the Slow Slav

10/8/2020 – In this week's show, well-known Dutch trainer Robert Ris shows how Black can mix things up against the Slow Slav. | "Fast and Furious" is available from 17:00 UTC (19:00 CEST / 15:00 EDT) on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

The Penrose Family: Scientists and Chess Players

10/8/2020 – The Penrose family's passion for chess can be traced back to Lionel Penrose, a famous professor of genetics, whose legacy also includes a number of chess problems and studies. Of his four children, Jonathan Penrose showed the greatest talent for chess: he was ten-time British Champion, an International Master, a Grandmaster of Correspondence Chess, and in 1993 the FIDE made him an Honorary Grandmaster. On October 6, his brother Roger Penrose won the Nobel Prize in Physics. | Image: Pioneer Works (Screenshot)