9/14/2009 – ... was the white bishop on b3, in view of the threat ...a5-a4, which has prompted White to resort to violent measures with 21.Bxd5. How would you assess the continuation?
A) best, White wins a second pawn with a clear advantage; 
B) not as strong as it looks, Black gets one pawn back by force, leaving him only marginally worse; 
C) this move is actually a mistake, White loses a piece.
The solution is here, but first ponder over it with a larger version of the diagram.

9/14/2009 – The Editor of Chess Notes has taken up a series of questions from a reader in the United States about discrepancies in half-a-dozen Alekhine games played between 1910 and 1942. In several cases it has been far from easy to establish whether the published moves in the great world champion’s games did in fact occur over the board. Readers are invited to join in the hunt for clues.

9/14/2009 – By the skin of their teeth, we might add, half a tiebreak point ahead of Russia, which took Silver, and 1.5 ahead of Ukraine, which took Bronze. In the final round the Chinese team played Vietnam, which was in last position but appeared to be winning two games against the leaders. However, both were suddenly agreed as drawn, which led to suspicion of match fixing. Report and games.

9/14/2009 – ... in front of your king can really make you nervous, particularly with the major pieces already lined up behind them. Here Black had just played 33. ... Nd5 What is the best move for White now?
A) 34.Bxd4
B) 34.Bxd5
C) 34.Ka1

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

9/13/2009 – Initially the grandmaster and chess author Dr John Nunn, who is one of the driving forces behind Gambit Publications, wanted to write an advanced book on endgames. It was to start with a brief survey of all the things the reader would be assumed to know. However, it quickly became clear that the "introductory chapter" would be more like a book in itself, which is now available. Review.

9/13/2009 – Same title as the previous report? Yes, same title. Nothing changed, Levon Aronian could not be caught, and since both games were drawn even the exact oder of the following players remained the same. Aronian had a 2919 performance in Bilbao and is good for a 2784 rating on the next FIDE list – just four points behind the world's second-highest rated player Vishy Anand. Final report.

9/12/2009 – ... with a round to go! Levon Aronian defeated Alexei Shirov to take an unassailable lead of twelve Bilbao points. This means that the Armenian GM, currently number three in the world, is already the winner, and Saturday's final round can change nothing in that respect. Alexander Grischuk defended an interesting endgame against Sergey Karjakin to keep second place. Round five report.

9/12/2009 – Once a year, when the anniversary of the September 11th attack on the World Trade Center comes around, when the media channels are full of memorials and vivid reruns of the events on that horrific day, we remember what we were doing at the time (doesn't everybody?). We were setting up our new ChessBase news page, which was due for launch on September 12th 2001. Here's the first report.

9/11/2009 – It was the third consecutive win for Armenia's top grandmaster, after he had lost his first game in Bilabo. And it was the second consecutive loss for the Russian, who had won is first two games in this event. Levon Aronian vs Alexander Grischuk was definitely the game to watch in round four of the Grand Slam Final, which Aronian now leads with nine "Bilbao points". Illustrated report.

9/11/2009 – In continuation of our Paris Championship report we follow the successful chess career of a young Indian grandmaster. Parimarjan Negi participated at his first tournament when he was four, and became a grandmaster at 13, the second youngest in chess history. Now 16, his freshest victory was at the recent Politiken Cup in Denmark. Diana Mihajlova spent a day in Paris with Parimarjan.

9/10/2009 – The wonder that is YouTube occasionally throws up something really fascinating. We have a great example – a ten-minute video that shows a blindfold simultaneous display, given by the immortal Mikhail Tal. The date is unclear and the commentary is all in Russian, but we have prepared a summary transcript in English. We were even able to reconstruct four game fragments. Must watch.

9/9/2009 – What an unusual tournament: at halftime we note that there has been just one undecisive game (drawing average 16%!). Today Sergey Karjakin defeated the tournament leader Alexander Grischuk, while Levon Aronian beat Alexei Shirov with the black pieces to join Grischuk in the lead, both now having six Bilbao points. Illustrated round three report.