Speelman's Agony #83

9/2/2018 – From Bradford, England comes a pair of games by Kevin Winter (pictured with Nigel Short). Jon can always use more material from readers. If your games are selected for the Agony column, not only will you get free detailed commentary of your games by one of chess’s great authors and instructors, and former world no. 4 player, but you also win a free three-month ChessBase Premium Account! | Photos: Kevin Winter

Paehtz wins Pia Cramling's Ladies Open

9/2/2018 – One of the most respected grandmasters in Europe, 55-year-old Pia Cramling, hosted two parallel events during the first weekend of September at the Scandic Foresta Hotel in Lidingö, Sweden. A four-player double round robin and a 7-round Swiss Open are taking place concurrently. After two days of play, Elizabeth Paehtz emerged the clear victor in the Invitational, while Inna Agrest had a near perfect run in the Open. | Photo: Lars OA Hedlund

A lesson in chess mastery

9/1/2018 – Master level games are not engine like, they are human, with their mistakes, slightly imperfect moves, and mind battles. The game we see on the board, tell us only part of the story. NM Shanmukha Meruga shows us five of his tournament games, with the drama, ideas, and errors typical of human play.

September 2018 FIDE Ratings

9/1/2018 – September is here, and as the month kicks off we check in with the FIDE rating lists to see how a busy (northern) summer season has shaken thinks up Elo-wise. Magnus Carlsen's top spot in both classical and blitz was briefly threatened, but he remains the king of all formats. | Photo: Grand Chess Tour / Lennart Ootes

Asian Nations Cup 2018: Iran and China on top

9/1/2018 – The 2018 Asian Nations Cup took place from July 26th until August 4th in the Iranian historical city of Hamadan. Teams from twelve different countries participated in the Open and Women sections. They faced each other in 7-round Swiss Opens in Classical, Rapid and Blitz chess. Iran won all three Open tournaments, while China took first in the Classical and Rapid sections amongst the women — India won the blitz. | Photos: Iranian Chess Federation

Time per move in the notation

9/1/2018 – In over-the-board games, some people like to note down how much time they spent on each move to be able to analyse their games better and to improve their thinking processes. If you play online the computer does this for you: it automatically records the time you spent on your moves. You can use this information — or you can delete it. | Graphics: ChessBase
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Six players lead the Russian Championship

8/31/2018 – Halftime and a rest day at the Russian Championships, after six of eleven rounds. In the open tournament, six players are in the lead each with 3½ out of 6 points, but the Elo favourites are not among them. Even in the women's tournament, the nominal favorites have had a hard time. Olga Girya and Alina Kashlinskaya lead with 4 out of 6, while Alexandra Kosteniuk (pictured) has scored just 3 out of 6 or fifty percent. JULIAN WNUK breaks down the action so far. | Photo: Russian Chess Federation

McShane's second wave

8/31/2018 – Black's attackers are working perfectly together. Four precise moves from the diagram position and White can resign. Can you find them all?

Endgame Magic with guest IM Sagar Shah

8/31/2018 – Joining Karsten for a look some recent endgames from tournament practice today is IM Sagar Shah, a regular ChessBase contributor and founder of ChessBase India. This week's show is FREE to watch on-demand (for a limited time)!

Sinquefield Cup video highlights, part 1

8/30/2018 – One of the chief draws of any Grand Chess Tour event is the extensive and high-quality coverage on the Saint Louis Chess Club YouTube Channel. The Sinquefield Cup was no exception. Here we've pulled out a number of the interviews and bonus material you may have missed over the past 10 days. Break out the popcorn and kick back!

The Beliavsky plan against the Dutch Stonewall

8/30/2018 – This quick review of a recent interesting product is geared toward the player who would like an easy plan to face the Stonewall Dutch. The review itself, thanks to the new ChessBase "live diagrams", lets a player tests some positions and ideas against an engine. Then, of course, Mikhalchishin's explanations and choice of example games can be quite enlightening. DAVIDE NASTASIO explains.

Five problems new chess players face

8/29/2018 – Practice makes perfect, but beginners often need a little extra guidance for their early chess development. BILL GORDON offers five things newcomers to the game should keep in mind to improve their play, avoid mistakes and stay focused at the chess board. To the seasoned amateur or tournament warrior, these tips will be nothing earthshattering, but why not share them with your newbie friends and family?

The Power Play Show

8/29/2018 – Wednesday at 19:00 CEST (17:00 UT) Daniel King will go on air on playchess.com. You can watch the episode live for free. All the usual puzzles, games and instruction will be on offer. Puzzle and the live video...

Saint Louis: Caruana bests So in GCT playoff

8/29/2018 – Following the Sinquefield Cup 2018 in Saint Louis, Wesley So and Fabiano Caruana were working overtime: they played a tiebreak to determine who would participate in the London Chess Classic, the Grand Chess Tour final KO event for the top four finishers. Caruana won the match by taking the second rapid game to score 1½-½. V. SARAVANAN files one more report. | Photo: Saint Louis Chess Club, Lennart Ootes

Russia wins the IBCA World Team Championship

8/29/2018 – The VIII IBCA World Team Chess Championship for the blind and visually impaired took place in Sofia, Bulgaria from July 20th to 31st, 2018. The event was played in a novel format and witnessed some really exciting games all the way through. At the conclusion of an intensely fought final round, Russia emerged on top of the field by beating Poland by a razor-thin margin. | Photo: Sagar Shah

The Weekly Show with Lawrence Trent

8/28/2018 – Tuesdays at 18:00 CEST (5:00 pm UK time, Noon EDT) Lawrence Trent goes on air on Playchess.com. In his show, Lawrence will be dealing with the latest trends, games and combinations from elite chess tournaments. This week Lawrence takes a look at the Russian, French and Spanish Championships!

Sinquefield Cup: Three winners (one playoff)!

8/28/2018 – The sixth edition of the Sinquefield Cup had an unprecedented finish. Levon Aronian defeated Alexander Grischuk in a memorable game, while Magnus Carlsen got a 97-move victory over Hikaru Nakamura. Therefore, Aronian, Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana tied for first — in points and in all tiebreak criteria! The rules stipulated that a drawing of lots would decide which two players would go to the playoff — Carlsen objected, as he thought it to be 'ridiculous'. Finally, the players and organisers decided all three would be declared co-winners! V. SARAVANAN reports. | Photo: Saint Louis Chess Club / Lennart Ootes

Gharamian and Guichard win French Championship

8/28/2018 – The victory of Tigran Gharamian (photo) at the French Championships 2018 in Nimes turned into a marathon affair as the Armenian-born French grandmaster claimed the title only after two sets of tiebreaks culminating in an Armageddon game. The Women's Championship was clearer: Pauline Guichard won the title with 7½ out of 9. Second place went to Sophie Milliet, who scored 6½ points. | Photo: Amruta Mokal (archive)

A fateful square

8/28/2018 – Normally the rook against knight without pawns is a draw when the knight is near his king. But there are two important exceptions. Do you know them?

The Sinquefield Cup - Final results / standings

8/27/2018 – Live games and commentary from Saint Louis! Fabiano Caruana, Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian tied for first place, while Caruana also tied for fourth place in the Grand Chess Tour standings with Wesley So, forcing a playoff match to be held on Tuesday. | Graphic: Saint Louis Chess Club

Sinquefield Cup: Nothing yet decided

8/27/2018 – Everything looked set for a day full of fireworks when the eighth round of the Sinquefield Cup had just begun — Grischuk opened with 1.f4, Karjakin and Nakamura went into what seemed to be a sharp Catalan and Carlsen surely was in the mood to avenge his Biel loss against Mamedyarov. The players did try to fight, but the final result was, once again, five drawn games. Curiously, with one round to go, all the GCT "regular" players still have chances to qualify to the final stage in London. V. SARAVANAN reports. | Photo: Saint Louis Chess Club / Lennart Ootes

Garry Kasparov will play Chess960 event in Saint Louis

8/27/2018 – The Sinquefield Cup 2018 is not over yet but that does not stop the Saint Louis Chess Club from announcing its next big event: in about two weeks, from September 11-14, ten top players will battle it out in Chess960. Garry Kasparov is one of them! | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Activity versus Structure

8/27/2018 – We often hear the advice to replay classical games played by World Champions in order to improve our chess understanding. What if we could unite the fun of learning a new opening with improving our chess? Yes, the Tarrasch Defence answers both these conditions. Many World Champions played it throughout their careers in very crucial moments, when a win would define their own existence as chess players. Now we can learn it from a top GM, who adds his own wisdom to the theoretical knowledge we can find in books.

Sinquefield Cup: Magnus lets Fabi escape

8/26/2018 – The much-awaited encounter between Magnus Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana took place on Saturday in Saint Louis. The World Champion faced Caruana's Petroff and obtained a decisive kingside attack, but was not able to round off the game to a win. The rest of the games also finished with draws, so the World Championship challenger remains the sole leader with two rounds to go. V. SARAVANAN tells us all about the big clash. | Photo: Saint Louis Chess Club / Lennart Ootes