Play the Author - Thematic tournament with Robert Ris

4/9/2021 – Our ChessBase Magazine subscribers recently received a particularly interesting offer: A thematic tournament with Robert Ris! "Play the Author" lets readers play chess against their favourite author in a round-robin tournament. Another attraction is the predefined opening that is played in each round. In the first "Play the Author" episode, a gambit in the Sicilian Defense was chosen, which Robert Ris had already discussed in detail in CBM #199. | Photo: Frans Peeters

Polgar Challenge: Three leaders

4/9/2021 – Three players are sharing the lead after round 5 at the Polgar Challenge, the first event of the Julius Baer Challengers Chess Tour. Praggnanandhaa, Christopher Yoo and Nodirbek Abdusattorov each scored 4 points on the first day of competition. Three players stand a half point behind, including Lei Tingjie, who was the sole leader after round 4 and was inches away from scoring a win in her last game of the day. | Photo: David Llada

Kader-Challenge: Rasmus Svane and Jana Schneider defend their lead

4/9/2021 – Round 5 of the men's tournament at the German "Kader-Challenge" in Magdeburg brought a number of interesting endgames and two decisive results. Niclas Huschenbeth won against Dmitrij Kollars and Daniel Fridman defeated Frederik Svane. Rasmus Svane drew against Luis Engel but that was enough to defend his lead and with 3.5/5 he is still sole first. In the women's tournament table leader Jana Schneider (pictured) lost her first game - against Annmarie Mütsch - but still leads with 3.0/4. | Photo: Bernd Vökler

Mad Queen problem – the solution

4/9/2021 – It was an Easter puzzle. We asked you to take a try to solve this truly remarkable study by a truly remarkable composer, Mario Matouš. You were asked to win the position against a rampaging queen which wants to sacrifice itself to stalemate the black monarch. Were you able to solve it? Many readers found the problem quite difficult, and extremely clever. Today we give you the full solution, on a replay board with full engine support.

Robert Ris’ Fast and Furious: The Fantasy Variation (1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.f3)

4/8/2021 – In this week’s show, well-known Dutch trainer Robert Ris takes a look at the Fantasy Variation, an interesting way to fight the Caro-Kann that often leads to sharp and double-edged positions. | “Fast and Furious” is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

Kader-Challenge: Rasmus Svane takes the lead

4/8/2021 – Wednesday, April 7, brought a double shift for the players in the German "Kader-Challenge" - rounds 3 and 4. Rasmus Svane made the most of these opportunities: in round 3 he won against his younger brother Frederik and in round 4 he defeated Niclas Huschenbeth, and is now sole leader with 3.0/4. In the women's tournament only one round was played. Jana Schneider continued to win and now leads with 3.0/3. But it was Antonia Ziegenfuß, who played the game of the day: she defeated Elisabeth Pähtz in a powerful attacking game. | Photo: Frank Hoppe

Two Chinese brilliancies

4/8/2021 – In the last couple of decades, China has become a chess powerhouse, with Ding Liren fighting at the highest level, the national squads accumulating success after success in team events and the women players continuing to show their strength. A week and a half before the resumption of the Candidates — where two of the participants are Chinese — we revisit two brilliant games by players born in the world’s most populous country: Liu Wenzhe and Wei Yi. | Photo: Niki Riga

Game of the Week: Svane vs Svane

4/7/2021 – This week Merijn van Delft shows a duel between two brothers - Rasmus Svane and Frederik Svane. The two faced each other in round three of the German "Kader-Challenge" in Magdeburg and everyone who expected a lifeless draw was pleasantly disappointed. | Merijn's show is available at 16.00 UTC (17:00 CET, 12:00 EDT) and on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

Candidates Storytellers (2) - Leontxo Garcia

4/7/2021 – Leontxo Garcia is a Spanish lecturer, presenter, commentator and one of the best and most famous chess journalists in the world. Leontxo also is Eric van Reem's guest in episode 27 of Eric's "Lets-Talk-About-Chess" podcast, where he shares funny and interesting stories about the Candidates, e.g. how he fled from Yekaterinburg at the Candidates 2020 though still officially quarantined. | Photo: Vishy Anand, Leontxo Garcia, Magnus Carlsen (Bilbao 2012)

Vincent Keymer analyses

4/7/2021 – The young German Grandmaster Vincent Keymer played a major role in the surprising success of the SF Deizisau in the European Online Chess Club Cup: in the preliminaries he scored 7.0/9, in the play-offs he came to 3.0/4, and in the finals he convinced with 5.5/7. In a video made by the SF Deizisau, Keymer now analyses his victory against Yuriy Kuzubov in the last round of the play-offs - a strategically and tactically highly interesting game. | Photo: Vincent Keymer

110 years ago: Capablanca wins in San Sebastián

4/7/2021 – 110 years ago, a very strong tournament was played in San Sebastián. Almost all the top players of the time participated. In the end, the winner was a newcomer, José Raúl Capablanca, who was still completely unknown in Europe.

German "Kader-Challenge" - Blübaum strikes back

4/7/2021 – With a rating of 2670 Matthias Blübaum is Germany's number one but in round 1 of the "Kader-Challenge" tournament in Magdeburg he surprisingly lost against FM Frederik Svane. However, in round 2 Blübaum bounced back and won against Niclas Huschenbeth, crowning a fine game with a unique mate. The other four games all ended in a draw and with 1.5/2 Frederik Svane remains sole leader. In the women's tournament Jana Schneider leads with 2.0/2. | Photo: Georgios Souleidis (Archive)

German top tournament starts with a surprise

4/6/2021 – The "Kader-Challenge", where ten of the best German players meet over-the-board in Magdeburg, began with a surprise. Frederik Svane (pictured), a FM with a rating of 2421, convincingly outplayed Germany's current number one Matthias Blübaum and took the lead as the four other games all ended in draw. In the women's tournament, Germany's number one women player, Elisabeth Pähtz, fared better than Blübaum and won the first round with Black against Annmarie Mütsch. | Photo: Bernd Vökler (Archive)

ChessBase India Talent Test

4/6/2021 – In 2017 IM Sagar Shah travelled to the house of R. Praggnanandhaa in Chennai and gave the youngest IM in the world a set of test positions to solve. This ritual then continued with more talents, like Nihal Sarin, Raunak Sadhwani and others. Even experienced GMs like Adhiban and Ganguly have dipped their feet into ChessBase India's talent test. Now Sagar presented a set of twelve positions to a new talent – and filmed the entire process. See if you can compete with the twelve-year-old.

The Weekly Show: A strong performance by Pepe Cuenca

4/6/2021 – In his "Weekly Show" IM Lawrence Trent will be taking a look at the victory of his "ex-flatmate and good friend GM Pepe Cuenca Jiménez" at La Nucia over the Easter weekend. | Lawrence's show is available at 17:00 UTC (18:00 CET, 12:00 ET) on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

Trapped?

4/6/2021 – The duel knight against bishop is often deep and full of surprises. In the diagram position Black's knight on d1 seems to be in danger to get caught. But can White profit from its precarious position?

The Polgar Challenge for young stars kicks off Thursday

4/5/2021 – Chess legends Judit Polgar and Vladimir Kramnik have joined forces with Play Magnus Group to launch a new elite online tour designed to support rising young players and advance gender equality in the sport. The first event, dubbed the Polgar Challenge, kicks off on April 8. The lineups of Team Polgar and Team Kramnik have been revealed.

‘Urban Chess’ initiative continues to expand in the Netherlands

4/5/2021 – Jesús Medina Molina’s initiative to promote the placement of public chess tables in open spaces has expanded in the Netherlands. Tables in The Hague, Dordrecht and Groningen were recently inaugurated. Medina invites more countries to follow this initiative, which intends to make chess more accessible, especially for kids.

José Cuenca prevails in La Nucía

4/5/2021 – José ‘Pepe’ Cuenca was the clear winner of the “Semana Santa” tournament that took place on Easter weekend in La Nucía, Alicante. The 34-year-old from Granada was the only player to score 7½ points in the 9-round Swiss tournament. No fewer than eight players finished half a point behind, with Aarón Alonso and Marc Narciso getting second and third places on tiebreak criteria. | Photos: Patricia Claros Aguilar

Anand and Humpy win Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Decade in Sportstar Aces Awards

4/4/2021 – On April 3, Sportstar premiered the ‘Sportstar Aces Awards 2021’ on their YouTube channel. Vishy Anand was nominated for ‘Sportsman of the Decade Non-Olympic Sport’ along with Pankaj Advani (billiards) and Rajat Chauhan (compound archery). Koneru Humpy was nominated for ‘Sportswoman of the Decade Non-Olympic Sport’ along with Harika Dronavalli and Jyothi Surekha (compound archery). Arjuna Awardees Dibyendu Barua and Tania Sachdev presented the awards to Anand and Humpy respectively. | Photo: Sportstar

Starting Monday: Kader-Challenge in Magdeburg

4/4/2021 – With ten players in the men’s section and eight participants in the women’s category, the Kader-Challenge — organized by the German Chess Federation — kicks off on Monday at Magdeburg’s Maritim Hotel. A number of measures will be in place to deal with the current sanitary crisis. Matthias Bluebaum and Alexander Donchenko are the top seeds in the men’s event, while Elisabeth Paehtz and Josefine Heinemann are the highest-rated players among the women.

Understanding before Moving 21: Strong knight vs bad bishop - (1)

4/4/2021 – Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books about chess training and chess strategy. In the 21st instalment of his ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving", Herman shows a classic example of a strong knight who fights against a bad bishop. | Photo: Tommy Grooten

Spurning the morsel

4/4/2021 – In the mid-nineteenth century, sacrifice was king, and it was supposedly considered “ungentlemanly” to disdain the tasty bait which the opponent proffered. In today’s column, Jon Speelman looks at three examples of the decision-making process behind accepting or not a sacrifice made by the opponent. | Pictured: Vasily Smyslov | Photo: Dutch National Archive

40 years ago: Kavalek wins in Bochum

4/3/2021 – When a chess club reaches a nice round anniversary, a proper celebration is called for. And what better way to celebrate than with a grandmaster tournament? That’s what the ‘SG Bochum 31’ club did in 1981, when it celebrated its 50th anniversary with the “International German Championship” held at Stadtpark Restaurant. Those who were already active chess fans at the time will certainly look back and remember one or two of the participants — among them was Lubomir Kavalek, who in fact won the tournament! It all happened 40 years ago to the day. | Photo: Gerhard Hund, via Wikimedia Commons