7/17/2018 – The United States have become a chess epicentre thanks to the Sinquefield family and the club they created in Saint Louis. It seems like, if they continue to support the younger generations, American chess players have a bright future ahead. This year's U.S. Junior and U.S. Girls Junior Championships are taking place in Missouri's cultural centre, and have clear leaders after five rounds: Advait Patel in the open section and Carissa Yip in the girls section. | Photos: Austin Fuller / Saint Louis Chess Club

7/16/2018 – An interview with a living legend! IM SAGAR SHAH spoke with GM Eugenio Torre who reminisces about the years of his prime, talks about his struggles and reasons his failures. He also talks about the advents of Vishy Anand and Wesley So, his love for Chess960 and suggests an interesting scoring system to reduce the rampant draws in top level chess. | Photo: David Llada

7/16/2018 – Live games and commentary by WGM Tatev Abrahamyan and GM Robert Hess at the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of St. Louis. After four rounds, Advait Patel leads the Open with 3½ / 4, a full point ahead of four players. Carissa Yip has a half point edge in the Girls also with 3½ / 4.

7/16/2018 – 35.855 games played between April and June 2018. Using his own game against Andrei Volokitin (Lvov 2016) Adrian Mikhalchishin explains a few ideas behind the English Variation with 6.a3 Bc5. It is only with best play that Black can equalise.

7/16/2018 – The United States is experiencing a new chess renaissance. There are top tournaments every weekend, with big prizes. Chess centres are also flourishing, and more top players are moving to USA for teaching and playing opportunities. Here, DAVIDE NASTASIO reports on one great tournament already in its third edition, the Carolinas Classic, and interviews one of the organizers, FM Peter Giannatos.

7/16/2018 – Seven out of eight games finished drawn in the first two rounds of the Sparkassen Chess Meeting in Dortmund. The only player who managed to win was Jan-Krzysztof Duda, who beat Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu in Sunday's round and now is the sole leader of the tournament. Despite the big number of draws, we saw a lot of fighting spirit and some very long battles. | Photo: Macauley Peterson

7/15/2018 – On his 90th birthday, which we celebrated with a major biographical article earlier today, we add to the congratulations: Happy 90th, Pal, please stay with us as long as you can, and remain as incredibly creative as you still are. It is also appropriate to present our readers with the solutions to Benko's record-breaking twin problems, which turned out to be harder than expected.

7/15/2018 – At the Sparkassen Chess-Meeting in Dortmund the four games of the first round ended drawn. However, if you think about symmetrical structures and a lot of early exchanges, you are completely wrong, because all boards were struggling hard for the full point. The only player with significant chances to win probably was the birthday boy Ian Nepomniachtchi (against Giri), but the position was pretty tricky. There was also a draw between Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Vladislav Kovalev that went almost the full seven hours possible. The ceremonial first move was made by the mayor of Dortmund, Birgit Jörder. | Photo: sparkassen-chess-meeting.de

7/15/2018 – Today, July 15th, Pal Benko turns 90. As the progenitor of the Benko Gambit, chess theory will always remember him, but he also had an interesting life. He was a ladies man, spent a year and a half in a Soviet prison camp, fled from Hungary to the US, played in two Candidates tournaments, and is a renowned composer of endgame studies and problems. FRANK ZELLER offers more details. | Photo: (left) F.N. Broers / Anefo [Public Domain], via Wikimedia Commons | (right) Diana Mihajlova

7/14/2018 – Mikhail Botvinnik is the patriarch of the Soviet School of Chess. Knowing Botvinnik's games is fundamental for the development of every player, argues reviewer DAVIDE NASTASIO, who takes you on a tour of the lasted addition to the Fritztrainer Master Class series. Try your skills at some study positions as you learn about Botvinnik and his games in this review. Whether or not one likes Botvinnik's style or personality, he is clearly a piece of chess history worth knowing and studying.

7/14/2018 – Small local rivalries are a big part of club-level chess. In Spakenburg, a small Dutch village, two strong amateur teams are located next to each other and have frequent confrontations. The squads are known as "the red" and "the blue", much like Arsenal and Chelsea in England, or Inter and Milan in Italy. YOCHANAN AFEK sent a report describing the rapid tournament they organized: it took place in a football stadium and was won by a computer. | Pictured: Kevin van Brummelen | Photos: Frans Peeters

7/13/2018 – Starting Saturday, Vladimir Kramnik and Anish Giri top the field of players providing a nice mix of old and new this year. Since 1984, the tournament has been made possible by the commitment of the Dortmund Sparkasse regional bank. | Pictured (L to R): Gerd Kolbe, Klaus Steenweg, Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Vladislav Kovalev, Georg Meier, Andreas Jagodzinsky, Radoslaw Wojtaszek, Stefan Koth, Vladimir Kramnik, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu, Anish Giri, | Photos: Macauley Peterson