5/14/2010 – The 2010 US Chess Championship is taking place from May 13 (round one at 2:00 p.m. local time) to May 25 (possible tie breakers) at the Chess Club & Scholastic Center of Saint Louis, which is hosting the event for the second year in a row. The prize fund has risen to $170,000 – more than a 25 percent increase from last year. The winner will take home $35,000. Live coverage on Playchess.

5/14/2010 – ... was Black's reasoning in this position, when he surprisingly uncorked the exchange 19...Bxd5. How would you evaluate the situation after 20.Rxd5?

A) the double attack 20...Qa8 simply conquers a piece;
B) White can save his material by a counterattack;
C) Black wins after all, but the real hammerblow is yet to come.

The solution is here, but first ponder over it with a larger version of the diagram.

5/14/2010 – Three weeks ago the chairman of the supervisory board of RCF, Arkady Dvorkovich, stated that the Federation had nominated incumbent Kirsan Ilyumzhinov as its candidate for FIDE presidency. A quick response by rival Anatoly Karpov said this was a unilateral decision by an Ilyumzhinov ally, not the formal vote that was required. That took place today and nominated Karpov. Details.

5/13/2010 – The location is the same as for the first five Grand Prix tournaments: the Caucasian region in southern Russia. There are 14 players in a round robin, with high stakes, since the players are competing for a place in the candidates' matches. This explains the sluggish start with 76% draws after three rounds. On the other hand, the opening ceremony was quite flashy. Pictorial report.

5/13/2010 – Immediately after the final game of the World Championship match in Sofia GM Robert Fontaine, roving reporter of the French chess magazine Europe Echecs, conducted an interview with the old and new Champion. Anand discussed his thoughts in some key positions, and about the match in general, in a second interview with the Indian news agency NDTV. Definitely worth a watch.

5/13/2010 – The Max Euwe Centrum is located in the Max Euweplein 30-a in Amsterdam. It is a chess promotion center which periodically holds high-category events, like the one that is currently running and pits five talented young Dutch players against experienced grandmasters. Top pairing: Nigel Short vs Anish Giri. Find out why Anish was barred from the opening ceremony.

5/12/2010 – Naturally Anand's victory was celebrated most of all in India, where he has around one billion fans. The broadsheets were full of the event – with rush video or telephone interviews, of which we have a number of examples for you to enjoy. The reporters also descended on Anand's parents and extracted statements from them. Review of the reports and feedback from our readers.

5/12/2010 – The endgame of rook+bishop against rook+knight is also known in chess literature as the Fischer ending, at least if the side with the bishop has the upper hand. The name arose because the American world champion Robert James Fischer was very successful with this distribution of material against Soviet grandmasters, with one of many examples being the fourth game in his Candidates match against Taimanov in Vancouver 1971. Karsten Müller has annotated for ChessBase Magazine Online a recent model example of the Fischer endgame, namely the game Jakovenko-Rakhmanov. ChessBase Magazine Online.

5/12/2010 – In this tutorial on the Playchess software, you will discover some of the new features in the interface related to broadcasts – such as watching several boards at once, not to mention many of the great options available for free to premium accounts such as multimedia commentary of events, and multimedia lectures (openings, famous games, etc.). Don't miss out on the fun.

5/11/2010 – After eight rounds top Czech GM David Navara still had a clean, 100% score and a performance rating in the 32 hundreds.This did not seem realistic and was recalculated using a proposal by computer scientist Ken Thompson. In the final round David generously drew a game and thus obtained a proper Elo performance: 2963. But the debate continues: how should we evaluate 100% or 0% results?

5/11/2010 – Viswanathan Anand, playing black in the final game, avoided a decision by rapid and blitz tiebreak. In a balanced Queen's Gambit Declined, the World Champion took a shot at weakening his Bulgarian challenger's king. Veselin Topalov panicked, as in a flash his chances were dashed and the Bulgarian could wrap up his defence. A fantastic final game by Anand who retains his crown.

5/11/2010 – "Before the game I tried to guess the opening," says our commentator GM Anish Giri, "and believe it or not, I actually managed to predict it!" Anand played the solid or trustworthy Queen's Gambit Declined, employed a relatively unknown idea, equalized and profited from a suicidal pawn exchange by his opponent. "Great and flawless play by Anand," says Anish in his instructive analysis.