8/16/2010 – It was an epic match with 50 slow games and 200 rapid games, spanning 250 games in all. The Chinese took the slow games 27-23, but in the rapid games they barely edged out the visiting team 101-99. Individually, the Chinese men's team won their encounter, while the Russian women won theirs. To conclude the coverage we bring you a number of pictures in this illustrated report.

8/16/2010 – Recently Stephen Kullas, a review author at ChessCafe, installed our flagship program on his computer – and was impressed by the "enormous scope" of the software. He did run into a bit of trouble when accessing the one-year Premium Playchess.com account which is part of the Deep Fritz 12 package (he needed to give his serial number every time he logged in). Here's how to solve this problem.

8/16/2010 – The French magazine Europe Echecs has a very outspoken interview with FIDE presidential candidate Anatoly Karpov, who accuses the incumbent of putting pressure on countries and delegates. Meanwhile Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has visited Israel and Palestine, while the ECU presidential candidates Silvio Danailov and Ali-Nihat Yazici have published campaign statements. Election news.

8/15/2010 – The 2010 edition of this high level tournament has started, and is a double round-robin team match between a team of experienced veterans and a team of rising stars. Team Experience is composed of Gelfand, Svidler, Heine Nielsen, Van Wely, and Ljubojevic, and face on the other side Nakamura, Caruana, So, Giri, and Howell. After three rounds the teenagers lead 9.5-5.5. Here is the report.

8/15/2010 – Two days ago we published a report on FIDE Presidential candidate Anatoly Karpov's proposal to move the Candidates matches to Kiev, Ukraine. Today we received a message from the Ukrainian Chess Federation confirming that it would gladly host the matches – in a longer format and with a break before the final. The UCF also wants to organise a "Chess Davos". Press release.

8/15/2010 – Things looked clear in the World Junior Chess Championship in Poland, but after the penultimate round there are two leaders with three striving to join them. In the (very fashionable) girls' section Anna Muzychuk lost her first game after winning nine and drawing two. It was enough to be caught by Russian WGM Olga Girya. Meanwhile we were sternly criticized for a remark about Copernicus.

8/14/2010 – The World Junior Chess Championship used to be held every two years – now it is an annual event. The winners from the past include a number of players who went on to become full World Champions: Spassky, Karpov, Kasparov, Anand (oops, we have spoilt our trivia quiz). Here's a first report with a large number of meticulously captioned pictures by Diana Mihajlova.

8/14/2010 – After striking their first blow to the Chinese men's team, the Russian men were entitled to some high-fives, and a slight feeling of relief. Unfortunately for them, the very next day the Chinese men struck back vigorously with a 14-11 win, in spite of Vitiugov's 4.0/5, and took the day for 26-24. It was high quality and entertaining chess with many flashy moments, which you won't want to miss.

8/14/2010 – Once a year the Ukrainian/German industrialist Josef Resch, founder of the UEP chess promotion company (that organised Anand-Kramnik in Bonn in 2008) stages a match between a top Ukrainian grandmaster and an interesting foreign player. This year it is Zahar Efimenko, 2689, vs top German GM Arkadij Naiditsch, 2684. Illustrated report with GM commentary.

8/13/2010 – In last week's column, entitled "French Aristocrat's Folly", GM Lubomir Kavalek examined the rules of pawn promotion as formulated by French aristocrat Barthelemy de Basterot and Australian writer Cecil J.S. Purdy, and presented three problems that followed these rules to the letter – but playfully misunderstood their intention. Today Kavalek provides the weird solutions.

8/13/2010 – It didn't seem normal to be reporting defeat after defeat of the Russian men who do actually have a ten elo advantage. They finally pulled in a victory, turning around more than one hairy situation. However, the Chinese women also rallied, and won their encounter by the same score, for an overall draw. Here is the report for Day Two, and more brain teasers for your pleasure.

8/13/2010 – ... of this year's Sparkassen Chess Meeting in Dortmund was the duel between Germany's number one Arkadij Naiditsch and the many times tournament winner Vladimir Kramnik. After a piece sacrifice by Black this position could have occurred. How would you judge the situation following 31...Qf4+ 32.Kb1 Qe4+ now ?
A) White's king can get into safety, his plus piece decides;
B) positional draw (perpetual check);
C) Black wins.
The solution is here, but first ponder over it with a larger version of the diagram.