10/17/2025 – Born from a Reddit post and a shared love of chess, Beers by the Bay (PB Chess Club) has become one of San Diego's most vibrant social hubs. Founded by Mark Laturno, Aidan Ryan, and Julia Gale, the club celebrates its first anniversary on 17 October at Tavern in Pacific Beach. Blending chess, conversation, and community, it offers a welcoming space where players of all levels gather weekly to connect, relax and unplug.

10/17/2025 – The concept behind the "60 Minutes" courses is simple: one hour of video instruction for just under 10€. There are also courses on middle game and endgame topics, but most courses focus on opening variations. In the first instalment of a short series, Jochen Schwarz presents the most important "60 Minutes" courses for 1.e4 players against the Sicilian.

10/17/2025 – Take a look at this position. In order to have any winning chances, White must clearly move his rook. There are nine squares it can safely occupy, but only one retains the win. Can you find it? Today we have four problems that will challenge your endgame skills. Try to solve them by moving pieces on our interactive diagrams. The video solutions will be provided in a week.

10/16/2025 – Wilhelm Steinitz, born in Prague in 1836, is regarded as the first official World Chess Champion after winning the historic 1886 match against Johannes Zukertort. He founded modern chess theory by replacing romantic, attacking chess with strategic and positional thinking, formulating numerous principles that still shape the game today. The Master Class, featuring four international experts, presents his most important openings, strategic ideas, endgames, and combinations through engaging video lessons.

10/16/2025 – Hans Niemann was the sole winner in Round 4 of the Open section at this year’s U.S. Championships. Playing Black, he defeated Sam Shankland to move into a tie for second place with defending champion Fabiano Caruana and Levon Aronian, half a point behind leader Wesley So, who drew his game against Abhimanyu Mishra. In the Women’s Championship, by contrast, five players scored victories. With second-placed Alice Lee drawing against defending champion Carissa Yip, leader Anna Sargsyan extended her lead to a full point thanks to her win over Megan Paragua. Thursday is a rest day in St. Louis. | Photos: Lennart Ootes / St. Louis Chess Club

10/16/2025 – In the diagram position, Black found a brilliant way to give his attackers access to the white king h1. Please copy!

10/16/2025 – Richard Rapport had the best individual result at the European Team Chess Championship in Batumi. Playing on board 1 for Hungary, he scored 5.5 points from 7 games and had a performance rating of 2869, the highest of all players in Batumi. In the final round, he won a nice and theoretically interesting game against Maksim Chigaev. | Photo: Lennart Ootes (Archiv)

10/15/2025 – The European Team Championship was exciting from start to finish and in the end the well deserved winner was Ukraine. Their top scorer Igor Kovalenko has a very impressive life story, having served at the front lines of the war for 2.5 years and now returning to top level chess. Our Game of the Week is his positional masterpiece from the important seventh round encounter against the Netherlands, in which he outplayed Loek van Wely with a very creative manoeuvre. | Merijn's show is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

10/15/2025 – The Colle and Zukertort Systems offer White a simple yet powerful setup with d4–Nf3–e3–Bd3, aiming for rapid development and a strong kingside attack. The Colle-Koltanowski focuses on c3 and e4, while the Zukertort System employs b3 and a fianchettoed bishop for added strategic depth. Easy to learn and highly effective for club players, this course teaches key sacrifices, maneuvers, and attacking ideas through classical and modern grandmaster games.

10/15/2025 – Two decisive games were seen in the open section and four in the women's section as round three of the US Chess Championships took place in Saint Louis. In the open, Wesley So defeated Sam Shankland to move into the sole lead on 2½ points, while Grigoriy Oparin scored his first win of the tournament. In the women's championship, Nazi Paikidze caught Anna Sargsyan at the top after defeating Tatev Abrahamyan, while Irina Krush, Alice Lee and Thalia Cervantes also claimed victories. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

10/15/2025 – In a surprising move, FIDE has officially approved a new world championship format: the Total Chess World Championship Tour, organized by Norway Chess. The Tour will determine a FIDE World Combined Champion across three disciplines – Fast Classic, Rapid, and Blitz – through four global events each year. With a $2.7 million annual prize pool, the series aims to find “The Total Chess Player” and bring faster, tech-enhanced formats to a wider audience. A pilot event launches in fall 2026, followed by the first full season in 2027. | Photo: FIDE

10/15/2025 – The fight bishop against knight can be tricky: White to move and win?