Jermuk: Chinese players Ju Wenjun and Ruan Lufei lead

7/20/2012 – After three rounds of the FIDE Women's Grand Prix in Armenia it is the only two WGMs in the tournament – all other players are IMs or full GMs – who have taken the lead. Both have 2.5/3 points and performances of 2797 and 2757 respectively. We bring you a big report of rounds two and three, with splendid photos supplied by the organisers, as well as annotated replayable games.

Marc Arnold is 2012 US Junior Champion

7/20/2012 – It is never easy being the top-seed, as the expectation is the highest, and one has the most to lose, but IM Marc Arnold lived up to his billing by winning the Group B qualifying section with ease and then beating FM Alec Getz, winner of Group A. With this, he became the 2012 US Junior Champion. That said, take note of one other name: 11-year-old Jeffrey Xiong who has won 227 Elo in one year!

Win a chess match, earn a $1,000,000 for your startup

7/20/2012 – A.J. Steigman is the chief executive of Soletron, a social e-commerce platform. Peter Thiel is a legendary venture capitalist and co-founder of PayPal. Both are internationally ranked “life master” of chess. In perhaps the oddest investment strategy ever seen, Steigman has challenged Thiel to a match. The loser invests a million dollars or provides equity in Soletron. Will it happen?

Rooks on diagonals

7/20/2012 – The white rooks are skewered. 27.Bd1-h5 (diagram) is designed to deflect the black queen from the protection of the knight, allowing after 27...Qxh5 28.Bxf6+ Bxf6 29.Qxf6+ Kg8 the rook lift 30.Rc5 with intentions on the kingside. This leads to what?

ChessBase Magazine, larger diagram and solution.

ACP Golden Classic – Adjournments rise from the ashes

7/19/2012 – The ACP Golden Classic, with its unusual time control, and above all, resurrection of adjournments has at the very least provided players and spectators with a fun exercise in analysis. In today’s game, two out of the three games ended adjourned, and are only to be resumed on July 21st. This means that spectators around the world can analyze and second-guess the players. What do you think?

Istanbul Besiktas continues to lead in Turkish Is Bank League

7/19/2012 – And Istanbul Teknik remains in second place. After nine rounds of play these two teams have 17 and 16 match points respectively and are followed at some distance by Ankara Gazi Üniversitesi Spor Kulübü at 13 points. With top GMs playing it is the lower boards with juniors and females that are decisively influencing the results. Big illustrated report by Anastasya Karlovich.

Dortmund Rd6 – The dark horses strike

7/19/2012 – None of the leaders were able to make a dent in their opponents, and in fact Ruslan Ponomariov allowed the last-place Mateusz Bartel to finally score a full point after a blunder under pressure. Jan Gustafsson was not so fortunate, and it was precisely a blunder on his end, also under duress, that gave Arkadij Naiditsch his second straight win and a share of first. Illustrated report.

ChessBase Online for Android – Creating a specific book

7/18/2012 – The latest major upgrade of the Android version of ChessBase Online is out, and it brings an important new function to allow improved research and opening preparation against an opponent: Create Book. Previously to prepare for an opponent, you would filter the games and position and then peruse the results. Now you can filter just the statistics of your opponent for every move. Learn how.

Anand on the World Championship in Moscow (Part two)

7/18/2012 – Immediately after his successful match defence against challenger Boris Gelfand, World Champion Viswanathan Anand spoke to his old friend Jaideep Unudurti. The Indian journalist conducted an interview that was too long and detailed for the newspaper Indian Express, which published only parts of it. Jaideep has given it to us in its entirety. Today we bring you part two.

The Power Play Show with GM Daniel King

7/17/2012 – Improvement of your own play is one of the main aims when you are engaged in chess training. GM Daniel King is an expert who can guide you in achieving this goal. In his Power Play show he will present a bunch of practical examples and show you how to handle different kinds of positions, which will help improve your practical results. An example and more information.

Can we still deceive computers in chess?

7/17/2012 – Today the best players in the world would balk at playing against a strong chess program. But are there any positions or ideas left that computers cannot figure out? Kiyoshi Takahashi has put together some elementary themes that traditionally posed problems for computers. To this we have added a study which for almost thirty years has genuinely stumped our electronic friends.

Istanbul Besiktas and Istanbul Teknik lead in Turkish Is Bank League

7/17/2012 – It is not always the big guns who dominate a league. The team like Istanbul ISEK, which has Adams, Polgar and Kazimdzhanov on the top boards, have scored just one win vs six losses. This is because each ten-board team has four reserved for juniors and females. Two Istanbul teams, with Mamedyarov and Bologan on top boards and strong juniors below, lead after seven rounds.

FIDE Grand Prix series 2012/13 – names and dates

7/17/2012 – It starts with London in Sept. 2012, and continues in Tashkent in November, Lisbon in April 2013, Madrid in May, Berlin in July and Paris in Sept. Clearly the absence of Carlsen, Aronian, Kramnik and Anand is a bitter disappointment to the organisers, but the four have schedule problems and are in the next World Championship cycle anyway. Announcement by FIDE.

Dortmund Rd5 – Karjakin joins Kramnik and Ponomariov for lead

7/17/2012 – The fourth round was such a lukewarm affair, there was nothing to remark on the five draws other than their exercise in symmetry at the end. Round five was another story altogether. While Kramnik and Ponomariov were unable to decide anything, Karjakin beat Daniel Fridman in a powerful game, Caruana outclassed Gustaffson in their encounter, and Bartel lost to Naiditsch. Illustrated report.

Fifth FIDE Women's Grand Prix starts in Jermuk

7/17/2012 – This event with zwelve elite female players is taking place in the Armenian hamlet of Jermuk, which is fast becoming a centre of chess, with it's third Grand Prix in four years. It started with a big opening ceremony on Monday, with the President of the country (and chess federation) present. In round one on Tuesday Humpy, Ju Wenjun and Kovalevskaya scored. Big illustrated report.

Nigel Short quiz: which game and how many countries?

7/16/2012 – At the start of the month British GM Nigel Short won the seventh edition of the Edmonton International Chess Festival. In our report we challenged readers to identify a game Nigel was commenting on during a lecture to Festival participants; and we asked our readers to guess in how many different countries he has won tournaments. The winner got a Fritz 13 program signed by Garry Kasparov.

ACP Golden Classic – Tournament for the nostalgic

7/16/2012 – The ACP is organizing the ACP Golden Classic in Amsterdam alongside the Dutch Championships and an assortment of opens. The event brings along several top-notch grandmasters, such as Ivanchuk and Kamsky, but what sets this event apart is the old 40 moves in 2.5 hour time control and above all: a return to the days of adjourned games! Illustrated report with pictures by Alina L'Ami.

Chess Problems: Obstruction and Paralysis – solutions

7/15/2012 – In his last column problem expert David Friedgood explained a special theme: paralysis. This occurs when the defending side is forced to not just one square is blocked, but all the squares available to a piece. The author explained the concept with two examples and gave us three interesting thematic problems to solve. Here are the solutions.

Dortmund Rd3 – A bad day for Germans

7/15/2012 – With four decisive games in five, the German front took the brunt of the attack, with only Arkadij Naiditsch able to hold Sergey Karjakin to a draw. There were few spectacular blunders, and it was mostly a case of the elite outplaying their lower-rated colleagues. The luckless Mateusz Bartel was unable to resist Vladimir Kramnik, who takes the lead with Ruslan Ponomariov. Illustrated report.

Anand on the World Championship in Moscow (Part 1)

7/14/2012 – Just six weeks ago Viswanathan Anand successfully defended his World Championship title in Moscow, against Israeli GM Boris Gelfand. Immediately after the final Anand spoke to an old friend, journalist Jaideep Unudurti. The interview was too long (and profound) for his newspaper, which carried only parts of it. Jaideep has given us the rest, which we bring you in three parts. Don't miss this!

Dortmund 2012 – Kramnik shocks Gustafsson with a KID... as black!

7/14/2012 – Vladimir Kramnik is famous for his merciless destruction of the King's Indian. He has been so efficient that even Garry Kasparov shied away from it, and it all but disappeared from elite play for many years. So imagine Jan Gustafsson's shock in round two, when he found himself facing it in the hands of its most notorious killer. And what a game! Report with notes by GM Alejandro Ramirez.

Ftacnik: 1.Nf3: A Variable Repertoire for White

7/13/2012 – "Lubomir Ftacnik is the sort of strategically-minded GM who makes positional chess look simple and forces the viewer to sometimes reconsider their approach to the game," writes Seven Dowd in Chess Cafe. One thing you really learn from Ftacnik's five-star DVD was how to utilize closed positions to your advantage. "You can never have too many examples of these in your chess memory." Review.

Ivan Sokolov wins 40th Annual World Open in Philadelphia

7/13/2012 – A quick draw in the final round left Ivan Sokolov and Alex Shabalov tied for first in the Open Section, with 7.0/9 points each. They were not caught by three GMs half a point behind, and so had to take part in an Armageddon play-off. Sokolov had the white pieces and five minutes, Shabalov the black pieces, three minutes and draw odds. Ivan Sokolov won and became the 2012 World Open Champion.

Deep Fritz 13: how to use the engine cloud (Part 2)

7/12/2012 – "Can I connect my notebook to my 16-core desktop at home?" – "How much does it cost to rent other people's computers?" – "OMG, why is it so cheap?!" – "Okay, show me how to set this up!" Look, Peter, Alex, Anish, I can't do it for each of you separately. Why don't you watch the series of instructional videos produced by Nick Murphy. They answer your most pressing questions.