6/16/2021 – In round 2 of the Masters at the Prague Chess Festival David Navara played against Radoslaw Wojtaszek and suffered his second loss in a row. Sam Shankland won against Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Nihat Abasov defeated Nils Grandelius. After two rounds Sam Shankland, Radoslav Wojtaszek and Nijat Abasov share the lead with 1.5/2 each. | Picture: The hotel Don Giovanni, the host of the event

6/15/2021 – Unlike other sports, chess allows for players to agree to a draw, be it explicitly or implicitly — for example, by entering a forced line that leads to a threefold repetition. Many workarounds have been proposed to prevent this from happening too often, but at the end of the day, it mostly has to do with how ‘fighting’ a player is. But how to measure the players’ combativeness? GM David Smerdon has developed a method to answer this question.

6/15/2021 – In his "Weekly Show" IM Lawrence Trent will take a look at Shakhriyar Mamedyarov’s win at the Superbet Classic in Bucharest. The featured game will be Caruana-Mamedyarov where Mamedyarov scored a brilliant victory with Black against the world's number two. | Lawrence's show is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

6/15/2021 – Yesterday, 14 June, the Prague Chess Festival 2021 began at the Don Giovanni Hotel in Prague, with a Masters tournament, an Open and a few other tournaments. In the Masters Jan-Krzysztof Duda started with a win over David Navara. | Photo: Tournament page

6/15/2021 – On Sunday, 13 June, Carol Jarecki died at the age of 86. She came to chess through her son, promoted and organised chess tournaments and was the arbiter in many top level tournaments and matches, including the world championship match Kasparov vs. Anand in 1995 and the match Kasparov vs. Deep Blue in 1997. She was a passionate pilot, and together with her husband Richard Jarecki she also won millions in casinos by exploiting mechanical imperfections of roulette wheels.

6/15/2021 – The diagram position is complicated and extremely sharp. Both sides have dangerous passed pawns which the knights might or might not stop. However, it was Black to move and he had a way to win. But in the game Black failed to find the winning move - can you do better?

6/15/2021 – In the last round of the Superbet Chess Classic, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov safely drew Maxime Vachier-Lagrave with the black to secure tournament victory. Wesley So, Levon Aronian and Alexander Grischuk shared second place a full point behind the Azerbaijani. The second event of the tour, the Paris Rapid & Blitz Tournament, kicks off on Friday. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

6/14/2021 – In the winter of 1921/22, Ernst Grünfeld developed a revolutionary chess opening. Almost a hundred years later, the Viennese, who became a professional player out of necessity and joined the NSDAP because of his Jewish-sounding name, is the unlikely star of an exhibition in his hometown. Stefan Löffler visited it. | Photos, if not otherwise indicated: Collection Michael Ehn

6/14/2021 – On Sunday, the last four of the 19 rounds of the "Gelfand Challenge" were played. After 15 rounds Vincent Keymer from Germany had led the tournament but he only scored 1.5/4 on the final day. This was the chance for the 15-year old Indian Gukesh D., who had started the day two points behind Keymer, to catch up. After a 4.0/4 run Gukesh finished on 14.0/19 and tied first with his compatriot Praggnanandhaa but Gukesh won the tournament on tiebreak because he had won the direct encounter against "Pragg". Half a point behind the two Indians, Vincent Keymer came third. | Picture: Julius Baer Challengers Chess Tour

6/13/2021 – Shakhriyar Mamedyarov kept his 1-point lead going into the last round of the Superbet Chess Classic, as in the only decisive game of Sunday’s round Levon Aronian got the better of Bogdan-Daniel Deac. Mamedyarov signed a quick draw in his game against Anish Giri, while Alexander Grischuk vs Fabiano Caruana was an exciting encounter in which both players missed chances. | Games and results | Photo: Bryan Adams

6/13/2021 – Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books about chess training and chess strategy. In the 31st instalment of his ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving", Herman continues to talk about the right exchange. | Photo: Tommy Grooten

6/13/2021 – Shakhriyar Mamedyarov is the sole leader at the Superbet Chess Classic after an eventful seventh round in Bucharest. The Azerbaijani beat Fabiano Caruana with black while former co-leader Alexander Grischuk was defeated by Levon Aronian. The third decisive game of the day saw Anish Giri getting a full point in his encounter against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. | Photo: Lennart Ootes