8/18/2022 – Fischer leads by three points. The Match of the Century was coming to a head, with Spassky, despite all his efforts, unable to reduce the deficit. "I felt that Fischer was like a large fish in my hands," he lamented, "one that was slippery and hard to hold on to. At certain moments I let him slip. And then again the psychological torment would begin. Everything had to be begun again from the start ..." Spassky was beginning to feel despondent. | Photo: Skáksamband Íslands

8/18/2022 – Finally, the beloved WIM from Canada is back, and shows us a couple of games from the Olympiad in Chennai. In the first game, she crushed the strong female Dutch GM Peng Zhaoqin with the London system. In preparation, she discovered the interesting manoeuvre 11. Qa4!?, which you can add to your repertoire now. In the second game, Svitlana used the peculiar Horwitz attack against the French Defense. The Gambit is also known as "Papa-Ticulat Gambit". Due to a pretty knight sacrifice, she succeeded in her game against the Puerto-Ricon player.

8/18/2022 – Praggnanandhaa and Magnus Carlsen are sharing the lead with perfect scores at the FTX Crypto Cup in Miami. In Wednesday’s third round, Pragg defeated Hans Niemann while Carlsen got the better of Levon Aronian. Le Quang Liem and Alireza Firouzja were the remaining winners of the day, with the latter climbing to shared third place after beating Anish Giri in Armageddon.

8/17/2022 – In his “Game of the Week” show #529 Merijn van Delft looks at another impressive game played at the Chess Olympiad in Chennai: Raunak Sadhwani's win against Leinier Dominguez, in which the young Indian managed to make the of life the American top player surprisingly difficult. | Merijn’s show is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

8/17/2022 – After the closing ceremony, well past midnight, IM Sagar Shah made his way to the Grand Sheraton hotel where the Uzbekistan team was staying. Youngsters - Nodirbek Abdusattorov, Nodirbek Yakubboev, Javokhir Sindarov, Shamsiddin Vokhidov, and Jakhongir Vakhidov had just won the gold medal at the Chess Olympiad 2022. The Uzbek team was kind enough to give their time for an interview where all five of them sat together. We asked them about their best moves, and best games, and also spoke about what this victory means to them and their country.

8/17/2022 – Magnus Carlsen and Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu are the only players who have collected three points in each of the first two rounds at the FTX Crypto Cup in Miami. With 6 out of 6 points, they have a 1-point lead over Levon Aronian in third place. In Tuesday’s second round, Carlsen lost the first game against Hans Niemann, but managed to recover magnificently, winning three games in a row to get match victory.

8/13/2022 – After ten games in the World Championship match in Reykjavik, 1972, the score was 6½-3½ for Challenger Bobby Fischer. The match seemed virtually over – in the last eight games Boris Spassky had only managed to score 1½ points. In game 11 Spassky took on the Poisoned Pawn variation of the Najdorf Sicilian. "Fighting with the desperation of the doomed: he sensationally crushed his opponent in the 11th game" (Kasparov). In the twelfth he held Fischer to a comfortable draw. And then came the 13th round. Fischer played, for the first time in a top-level game, the Alekhine Defence. It turned into one of the most exciting battles of the match, and is beautifully annotated by GM Robert Byrne.

8/13/2022 – In the diagram position, White has yet to react properly to the black queen's check, then he may happily start searching for mates - feel free to join!

8/12/2022 – Lawrence has prepared some stunning tactics, played by the German legend Wolfgang Uhlmann. The French Defence expert was a masterful chess player for ages, and beat Bobby Fischer in 1960, with this very opening. We continue with our journey to reach a rating of 3000. Meanwhile, we are comfortably sitting around 2550.

8/12/2022 – In his "Power Play Show" Daniel King features games from the Olympiad. Apart from the usual puzzles, Daniel will take close look at Nihal Sarin versus Sebastian Bogner, a masterful performance by the gold-medal winner on board 2 for India 2. | Power Play is on air most Fridays. Watch it on-demand with a ChessBase Premium account. All the usual puzzles, games and instruction will be on offer.

8/12/2022 – The World Chess Hall of Fame (WCHOF) pays homage to American chess phenom Bobby Fischer with the largest exhibition of its kind, 1972 Fischer/Spassky: The Match, Its Origin, and Influence", on view from August 18, 2022, through April 30, 2023. A public opening reception is happening on Thursday, August 18, 2022, 5-8 pm, with free admission. | Photo: worldchesshof.org

8/12/2022 – Recently, the Exzelsior Verlag published the third and final volume of their huge biography of Emanuel Lasker, mathematician, philosopher, writer, and World Champion from 1894 to 1921. Richard Forster, Michael Negele and Raj Tischbierek edited the three volumes. Like its predecessors, the third volume sheds light on many aspects of Lasker's personality and his wide ranging intellectual interests, and it is a beautiful, carefully designed book well worth reading.