Hans Olav Lahlum: organiser, novelist (2/2)

9/14/2015 – Hans Olav Lahlum is one of Norway's most prominent chess personalities. As TV commentator he helps to make the game popular and as organizer he helped Magnus Carlsen at the start of his career. In the second part of a detailed interview Lahlum talks about organizing chess tournaments, Magnus Carlsen and his career and how he managed to enter the Guinness Book of Records.

Eight interesting match-ups from round two

9/14/2015 – The first round of the World Cup 2015 is over. The field has been narrowed down from 128 players to 64. But there are still 32 games to follow, which is quite a bit. We bring to you the eight most interesting match-up of round two. And while you are waiting for the games to progress out of the openings maybe you would like to solve tactical puzzles from round one.

Erwin l'Ami: The modern Two Knights

9/14/2015 – When she started playing chess, back in 1988, Nisha Mohota faced a big problem: lack of information. Twenty-seven years later, with the advant of computers and the Internet, she faces the opposite problem: too much information. But there is a very nice solution: ChessBase DVDs, in which very strong players present in information in easy-to-learn summaries! Review.

Baku 1.TB - One Armageddon, One big Surprise

9/13/2015 – The big news of the day is definitely of the 18-year old Chilean prodigy, Cristobal Henrique Villagra, knocking out former World Cup winner Boris Gelfand in the tiebreakers. Another previous World Cup winner that will say good bye to Baku is Kasimdzhanov, who lost to Kovalyov. Only one match went to Armaggedon, as Sargissian barely edged out Bartel.

Dhopade wins India’s 2015 National Challengers

9/13/2015 – The tournament has always been a meeting point for the most talented of the Indian players, with spots for the National Premier Championship up for grabs. IM Swapnil Dhopade won the 53rd edition of India’s National Challengers Championship with 10.0/13, half a point ahead of the remaining field. We bring you a richly illustrated report and a choice of tactics for you to solve.

Baku 1.2: Many tiebreaks

9/12/2015 – 24 of the 64 matches in Baku will go to a tiebreaker tomorrow, starting with the rapid format. Only one 2700 has been eliminated so far (Ni Hua) and several have not secured their spot in the next round just yet. Classical chess eliminations saw few surprises, with two of the highest rated players knocked out being from America: Ray Robson and former World Cup winner Gata Kamsky.

Baku 1.1: Upsets here and there

9/11/2015 – Things went mostly as predicted in Baku, as the majority of the top seeds cruised through their games while the middle seeds had many draws as they played players of similar calibre. Some of the major upsets were certainly by two Argentinians: Perez Ponsa beating Dominguez and Sandro Mareco over Ni Hua. Several top GMs were also held to a draw, including Giri, Gelfand, Grischuk and Adams.

WJCC 2015: Duda and Abdumalik lead

9/11/2015 – World Junior Championships for Open section and girls is taking place from the 31st of August to 16th of September 2015 in the city of Khanty Mansiysk, Russia. After eight rounds of play Jan-Krzysztof Duda and fifteen-year-old Zhansaya Abdumalik are in the sole lead half a point ahead of the field. The latter started with 7.0/7 and a rating performance of 3016!! Big illustrated report.

Attacking quartett

9/11/2015 – Tactics can seem deceptively simple, particularly when seeing an engine analysing grandmaster games. Strange, however, how difficult it is to find the right move and to calculate variations properly when playing yourself. It is easier if you solve tactical puzzles regularly. In the ChessBase Magazine and his tactics column Oliver Reeh helps you to do so.

World Cup starts today

9/11/2015 – The 2015 World Cup is upon us. Being hosted in the North Flame Tower (Fairmont Hotel) in Baku, the massive 128 player Knock Out event brings some of the best in the world, as well as qualifiers from every region of the globe. The top seeds will have relatively easy games, but the middle matches will be extremely close. We bring you the regulations, pairings, and some opening impressions.

Warakomski wins 2015 Rubinstein Memorial

9/10/2015 – The 51st edition of Akiba Rubinstein International Chess Festival will go down in history as an incredibly emotional event in which players struggled for the trophy till the very end. In the main section a slightly lucky but deserving IM Tomasz Warakomski triumphed after a poor start, after which he spread his wings and took gold. Illustrated report.

Final Impressions from the Abu Dhabi Masters

9/9/2015 – Do you know who the strongest siblings in the world are? Who is the ten-year-old kid who has already reached 2300? Which GM has beaten an ex-world champion in a match, has played over 600 people in a simul and is soon to finish a PhD? (Hint: he is not from a western nation, India or China). All this and more in form of pictures and stories in our final report from the capital city of the UAE.

Simon Williams: Most Amazing Moves

9/9/2015 – Recently IM Nisha Mohota was suffering a crisis, after returning unsuccessful from her Asian Women Chess Championship. "I was not getting the inspiration to work on the game," she writes. Then she chanced upon this ChessBase DVD by Simon Williams. "After I went through it I fell in love with chess all over again!" Nisha submits one of her own games for Vol. 2 of Most Amazing Moves.

Knight on the rim is not always dim

9/9/2015 – Every week ChessBase magazine author and renowned endgame expert Karsten Müller presents a remarkable or particularly instructive endgame in his blog. A click on the diagram opens a larger board. Test your endgame skills, improve and have fun!

Huffington on Aronian's Chess Comeback

9/8/2015 – Levon Aronian won the third Sinquefield Cup, the second leg of the recently established Grand Chess Tour. The top Armenian grandmaster finished a full point ahead of a group led by the world champion Magnus Carlsen and the U.S. Champion Hikaru Nakamura. Huffington Post columnist Lubomir Kavalek provides an evaluation and analysis of Aronian's and Nakamura's games.

Al Ain Classic in December 2015

9/8/2015 – If you wish to end the year playing in a very strong tournament, with many grandmasters, IMs – or simply chess lovers, then from 22nd to 30th December, Al Ain is the place to be. The 3rd edition of the Chess Classic promises to be bigger and better and just like the previous two editions. Al Ain, known as the ‘Garden City’ for its oases, parks and trees, invites you to enjoy its famous hospitality.

Ilyumzhinov for President – of FIFA?

9/8/2015 – He is the reigning president of FIDE, the Fédération Internationale des Échecs. Now the president of the Russian Chess Federation, Andrey Filatov, wants Kirsan Ilyumzhinov to run for the office of FIFA – the Fédération Internationale de Football Association. From world chess to world soccer. He is, as Filatov says, "an experienced sports manager with expertise in football." Press release.

Sinquefield Cup Recap

9/7/2015 – The 2015 Sinquefield Cup will probably be the strongest tournament of the year, and it was an exciting venture. In a very close race until the last couple of rounds, Levon Aronian took the title and impressed even his most die-hard fans as he recuperated from a tough year. We bring you the recap of what happened at the tournament, some interesting facts and Grand Chess Tour standings.

Chesthetica Composes Longer Mates!

9/7/2015 – This program, written by Prof. Azlan Iqbal, is an ever-improving attempt to create an artificial intelligence that composes chess constructs, a type of chess problem, from scratch, using a new AI technology and a model of human aesthetic perception. As expected, there has been some criticism that the results are not up to the standard of top problem composition. Is this justified?

ChessBase: larger text and bigger board

9/6/2015 – Whether you are using Fritz or ChessBase on a small laptop, or a large desktop screen, some parts such as the notation or computer analysis can have even healthy eyes squinting a bit to read the information. Also, perhaps you'd like a larger board to play through the moves. In the following guide, you will learn how to configure it for the most pleasant experience possible.
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Ultimate Moves ends with jokes and jibes

9/6/2015 – With the final round over and the trophies and checks handed out, one would understandably presume that was the end of the Sinquefield Cup, but not quite yet. There was one last encore for the players and spectators, and not some simul or other, it was the Ultimate Moves. This very fun event brought teams with the stars in blitz games, rotating the players every few moves!

Prize winners at the Abu Dhabi Masters 2015

9/5/2015 – In our previous report we brought to you annotations and an interview with the winner of the Abu Dhabi Masters 2015, Nils Grandelius. But four other players had the same number of points and took places second to fifth on tiebreaks. Martyn Kravtsiv was the runner-up, with Baadur Jobava, Alexander Areshchenko and Richard Rapport following behind. Pictures and games annotations.

Chess in the land of dried apricots (2/2)

9/5/2015 – In spite of the many interesting things to see and enjoy, the Golden Apricot tournament was still about chess, and the event saw a number of surprises, notably two players rated just over 2000, both young and old, who finished with wins over master and grandmaster in a moment of inspiration. Here is second part of Alina L'Ami's report, chock full of portraits, profiles and moments.

Check the ideas

9/4/2015 – Tactics can seem deceptively simple, particularly when seeing an engine analysing grandmaster games. Strange, however, how difficult it is to find the right move and to calculate variations properly when playing yourself. It is easier if you solve tactical puzzles regularly. In the ChessBase Magazine and his tactics column Oliver Reeh helps you to do so.