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

7/13/2018 – The 24th World Computer Chess Championship will start in Stockholm on Friday. Three titles are at stake: the software world champion, the open computer chess world champion and a blitz world champion. The two-time defending champion is Komodo. | Photo: Komodo operator Erdogan Guenes

7/13/2018 – A solid tactical understanding is sure to help any chess player in critical situations. Whether it is a simple exchange or a mating attack, tactics are ubiquitous. Take advantage of the opportunity to develop your tactical understanding in this series with IM Oliver Reeh and Pascal Simon! (Normally) Friday's at 15:30 CET (9:00 AM EDT) it's all about Tactics!

7/13/2018 – At the annual World Open in Philadelphia, 21-year-old, Webster University student Illya Nyzhnyk from Ukraine scored one of the biggest wins of his young career, by taking clear first and the USD $20,500 first prize with an impressive tally of 7½ from 9 games in a field of 32 GMs and 24 IMs. Among the GMs was RUIFENG LI, who filed this report with games and photos from the massive 1,223 player open (over nine sections).

7/13/2018 – No time to waste! 36.Rc7!! in the diagram position is the only move to give White an advantage, although Black's counterplay on the back rank might send a shiver down one's spine. However, after 36...Ng3+ 37.Kh2 Nf1+ 38.Kh3 Qg1 you are to checkmate in 7 - enjoy!

7/12/2018 – The United States sent a strong squad to the World Team Championship 50+. ALEX YERMOLINSKY is playing, spending time with good old friends and sending some pictures and stories for us to enjoy. The account until round six includes images of the team's trip to Dresden and, as Yermo calls it, the German Grand Canyon.

7/12/2018 – A few days ago Sergei Tiviakov became Dutch Champion 2018 and added another victory to his impressive list of successes. In an interview with ChessBase the former World Junior Champion and successful coach talks about his career, his style, about training, and his series of 110 games without defeat. | Photo: Harry Gielen

7/12/2018 – Grandmaster MIHAIL MARIN reflects on the attractive environs, inside and outside the playing hall, at the 10th Capo d'Orso International ACP Open. GM Karen Movsziszian took top honours with 7½ / 9. | Pictured: From left to right: International arbiter Laurent Freyd, Mihail Marin (2nd), Karen Movsziszian (1st), Vladislav Nevednichy (3rd) and organizer/the tournament's factotum Yuri Garrett | Photo: Caissa Italia