7/29/2021 – The International Koltanowski Conference on Chess in Education is being held July 29 – 30, 2021 at the Crowne Plaza Philadelphia Cherry Hill. Audience will attend in person and online. The Conference will be streamed and available for later viewing. With panelists and speakers active in their specialties, the conference emphasizes praxis. | Official site

7/28/2021 – Magnus Carlsen and Sam Shankland made a big step towards reaching the semifinals of the 2021 FIDE World Cup in Sochi, as they kicked off their matches against Etienne Bacrot and Sergey Karjakin with victories. While Carlsen displayed excellent dynamic feel for the position to win with the black pieces, it was Shankland’s endgame technique which allowed him to make the most of an unlikely blunder by his opponent. | Expert analysis by GM Karsten Müller. | Photo: Eric Rosen

7/28/2021 – This week, Merijn van Delft takes a close look at the encounter between Magnus Carlsen and Radoslaw Wojtaszek at the FIDE World Cup 2021 - a game full of tactical blows and surprises. | Merijn's show is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

7/28/2021 – Only after an extremely tense struggle did Magnus Carlsen manage to knock out Andrey Esipenko to reach the quarterfinals of the FIDE World Cup in Sochi, where he will face Etienne Bacrot. Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Vladimir Fedoseev, Amin Tabatabaei and Sergey Karjakin also went through. In the women’s section, Anna Muzychuk knocked out Nana Dzagnidze and qualified to the Candidates. | Photo: Eric Rosen

7/28/2021 – The 2021 FIDE World Cup in Sochi, Russia has narrowed down the 206 starting participants to just 8 remaining players. Canadian FM Joshua Doknjas analyzes some of the most interesting games from the first half of the event. | Photos: Anastasiia Korolka (FIDE)

7/28/2021 – In round 1 of the classical part of the GM Tournament at the Biel Chess Festival three games ended with a decision. Alan Pichot won against Boris Gelfand, Kirill Alekseenko defeated Nihal Sarin and Gata Kamsky won against Noel Studer. Vincent Keymer and Maxime Lagarde drew. | Photos: Biel Chess Festival

7/27/2021 – Svitlana Demchenko is back to present us her smart moves, especially after playing chess constantly in the last couple of weeks. The 17-year-old WIM left Canada, to travel to Serbia, Sochi, Moscow, and finally to Mykolayiv, Ukraine. She competed in the Serbian Open, and fought hard in the World Cup in Sochi, against a more than 300 rating points stronger opponent. Finally, she is playing a tournament in the Ukraine. Nonetheless, she made some time for a new episode, in which we take a look at her whole travel experience, her World Cup game, and play three blitz games against each other. | Photos: Svitlana Demchenko

7/27/2021 – In his "Weekly Show" IM Lawrence Trent will of course continue to talk about the World Cup but will also take a short look at the other big tournaments that are currently taking place. The game of the day is Vidit’s smooth win vs Durarbayli as Black, in which the Indian Grandmaster used a lovely little opening novelty. | Lawrence's show is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

7/27/2021 – The week long Festival de Fontainebleau chess tournament which started on 18 July doesn't feature any Grandmasters or International Masters. While the Open section comprises players with ratings under 2000, competitors in the three closed tournaments - each of which has eight players - have Elo ratings ranging from around 1800 to 2200. But what makes this tournament unique is its location and the Covid-19 related health controls that have been put in place here. | Photos: Club d'échecs de Fontainebleau-Avon

7/27/2021 – While the participants in the Grandmaster Tournament are enjoying a day of rest, the open tournaments at the Biel Chess Festival have started. The Master Tournament has an extremely strong field of participants: 27 Grandmasters are taking part, twelve (!) of them with an Elo rating of over 2600, furthermore 13 IM (International Masters) are present. The first round of the Amateur Tournament was also played today, which is completely booked up with 120 participants. | Photo: Biel Chess Festival

7/27/2021 – GM Gregory Kaidanov won the 2021 U.S. Senior Championship title after defeating GM Larry Christiansen in an exciting playoff tiebreak, scoring 1.5 - 0.5 in the two-game rapid match. After a draw in game one, Kaidanov seized his chance in game two, finding a brilliant resource to win an exchange and convert his advantage in the ensuing complications. It was the first national title victory for Kaidanov. | Photo: Courtesy of Saint Louis Chess Club, Lennart Ootes

7/27/2021 – Karsten Mueller again enjoys some Endgame Magic and together with his guest Thomas Stark he presents endgame highlights from the Goldmoney Asian Online Rapid Tournament that ended in the beginning of July, and that was won by Levon Aronian - who showed his endgame skills in a very crucial game.