Advent calendar: December 20

12/20/2016 – From December 1 to December 24 we invite our readers every day to open a door in our advent calendar. Click and enjoy a little chess treat. Behind door 20 waits a report about a remarkable match. Advent calendar, door 20.

2016 Christmas Buyer's Guide: From start to finish

12/20/2016 – While openings are unquestionably important, even a winning advantage can be squandered if the middlegame and endgame skills are lacking. There is no lack of top-notch courses to help you, ranging from beginner tactics to advanced strategic motifs, not to mention numerous exemplary works on the endgame. In this Buyer’s Guide you will find all you need on learning to play chess, mastering the middlegame, and converting the endgame.

Lubomir Kavalek: Nailed to the chessboard for 50 years

12/20/2016 – His graduation from National Master and International Master to full GM took just seven months and happened 51 years ago. “A grandmaster title is like a driver’s license,” an experienced colleague told him. “You don’t yet know how to drive well, you learn on the go.” In his Huffington Post column Lubos Kavalek looks at memorable players – Flohr, Spassky, Petrosian, Fischer – and games from that time. His article is historically and didactically interesting.

Young generation triumphs in Israeli Championships

12/20/2016 – The Israeli Championships took place in the ancient city of Tiberias but at the board youth triumphed over experience: 25-year old Tamir Nabaty won the Open section and 17-year old Michal Lahav became new Women's Champion of Israel. Report and results...

Bodychecks and blows

12/20/2016 – Every week ChessBase magazine author and renowned endgame expert Karsten Müller presents a remarkable or particularly instructive endgame in his blog. A click on the diagram opens a larger board. Test your endgame skills, improve and have fun!

Three lead at the Sunway Sitges 2016

12/20/2016 – The Sunway Sitges 2016 is currently taking place in Spain from the 16th to the 23rd of December 2016. The tournament is extremely strong with 28 grandmasters playing in the field of 117 participants. Gata Kamsky and Sasikiran are the top seeds with a rating of 2661. However, the most impressive thing about the event is the beautiful setting. IM V. Saravanan, who himself is playing at the event, sent us an impressive pictorial report

Advent calendar: December 19

12/19/2016 – From December 1 to December 24 we invite our readers every day to open a door in our advent calendar. Click and enjoy a little chess treat. Today a former World Champion shows a little opening trick. Advent calendar, door 19.

2016 Christmas Buyer's Guide: Openings

12/19/2016 – With Christmas just around the corner, you might be tempted to give someone a cool ChessBase DVD from the extensive catalogue, but with hundreds of items, and new ones coming out all the time, it can be daunting to know which item has their name written on it. With this in mind, we have put together a few Buyer’s Guides to help you choose. In this Buyer's Guide you will find suggestions for all styles and strengths on Openings, whether it be a full repertoire or openings taught by World Champions.

The First Lady of the London Chess Classic

12/19/2016 – The London Chess Classic has come to a close now and we’ve known for a couple of days that Wesley So would take home the title. We’ve also seen a French domination in the FIDE Open, but this weekend was all about the outstanding performance by Valentina Gunina winning the rapidplay with 9/10.

Wesley So, double winner in London

12/18/2016 – Winning the Grand Chess Tour is a great achievement for Wesley So - his biggest success so far as he said, and a lot of spectators are expecting more to come. On Sunday, he also secured first place in London - so he won 295.000 $ in total. Fabiano Caruana couldn't catch up for a tied first place - a draw was not enough. Veselin Topalov finally managed to win a game; Anish Giri finished with 9/9 draws. More...

The Super Rapidplay in Memory of Michael Uriely

12/18/2016 – The Super Rapidplay at the London Chess Classic started yesterday, and this year the tournament is stronger than ever and has an incredible 474 participants! The tournament is being held in memory of a talented young chess player from London, whose life was taken far too early. Read about the action from today’s rapidplay and other events....

Advent calendar: December 18

12/18/2016 – From December 1 to December 24 we invite our readers every day to open a door in our advent calendar. Click and enjoy a little chess treat. Today we share some theoretical research and offer a number of not particularly original but perhaps immortal games. Advent calendar, door 18.

London Chess Classic, Rd. 8: Wesley So wins Grand Chess Tour 2016

12/17/2016 – Round 8 of the London Chess Classic was relatively quiet. The most exciting game was Veselin Topalov vs Vishy Anand, in which Anand came up with a stunning novelty and later profited from a blunder by Topalov to score the only win of the round. Wesley So will be happy about the quiet round. He drew with Black against Fabiano Caruana and with this draw he is certain to win the Grand Chess Tour 2016 - the biggest triumph of So's career. Report and games.

The French do it for MVL

12/17/2016 – We have been truly blessed with some exciting chess this year, with decisive results all over the shop in the main event. Whilst Giri may still be sticking to his solid draws, most are using Topalov as a punching bag. However, today was all about Hikaru Nakamura’s moment of fame as he destroyed the Najdorf expert in the same line he lost to yesterday. Mehr...

A Master Class on the "Human Machine"

12/17/2016 – José Raúl Capablanca was called the human chess machine. His games were filled with simplicity and beauty that can be understood quite easily, but are extremely difficult to emulate in practice. In the fourth volume of the Master Class series Niclas Huschenbeth, Mihail Marin, Oliver Reeh and Karsten Müller delve deeply into the various facets of the Cuban's play. After watching the DVD Aditya Pai, the author of this article, writes: "Since it covers all aspects of Capablanca's play, it helps the viewers comprehensively improve their chess understanding. A review.

Advent calendar: December 17

12/17/2016 – From December 1 to December 24 we invite our readers every day to open a door in our advent calendar. Click and enjoy a little chess treat. Today we offer some magic. Advent calendar, door 17.

Caruana's brilliancy: The Engine Challenge

12/16/2016 – When a grandmaster analyzing a game, professes a move or type of move as exceptionally challenging for an engine, it is obviously going to be scrutinized left and right. That is precisely what happened in the analysis of Fabiano Caruana’s fantastic queen sacrifice against Hikaru Nakamura in game six of the London Classic. The comments on engines were not entirely wrong, but as we will see, there are notable exceptions! Learn how the entire sacrifice could have been solved in seconds.

London, Rd. 7: The Nakamura Show

12/16/2016 – The man of the day was once again Hikaru Nakamura. After his devastating loss in the round before, he didn't hesitate to opt for the ultrasharp 6.Bg5 in the Najdorf and destroyed Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in exemplary fashion - as shown by Georg Meier in his notes. By the way, it was the same line, Nakamura went to rack and ruin with Black the day before. The other four games ended in a draw, Wesley So remains in the lead, Fabiano Caruana is trailing him by half a point. Mehr...

The Americans love Wesley So

12/16/2016 – Wesley So might be the newest member of the U.S. Chess team, and many may consider him to be a “transfer”, but he is slowly growing in popularity. After helping the U.S. team win a gold medal in Baku and doing it with such grace and style, it is no wonder the U.S. is falling for the American-Filipino.

Mate comes first

12/16/2016 – Tactics can seem deceptively simple, particularly when seeing an engine analysing grandmaster games. Strange, however, how difficult it is to find the right move and to calculate variations properly when playing yourself. It is easier if you solve tactical puzzles regularly. In the ChessBase Magazine and his tactics column Oliver Reeh helps you to do so.

Advent calendar: December 16

12/16/2016 – From December 1 to December 24 we invite our readers every day to open a door in our advent calendar. Click and enjoy a little chess treat. Today we invite you to a little quiz: you have to guess the name of a famous chessplayer who celebrates a milestone birthday this year. Oh, and you can win something. Advent calendar, door 16.

London Chess Classic, Rd. 6: Simply Fantastic

12/15/2016 – In a round with a lot of exciting chess Fabiano Caruana played the most brilliant game by defeating Hikaru Nakamura with a positional queen sacrifice. Wesley So crushed Veselin Topalov with a violent kingside attack and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave countered Levon Aronian's optimistic winning attempts. Anish Giri chased Vishy Anand's king across the board but had to content himself with a draw. Vladimir Kramnik and Michael Adams played a relatively sober draw. Report and games.

Jon Speelman's Agony Column #32

12/15/2016 – One of the worst nightmares of a chessplayer is to resign in a won position. Agony, pure and simple. But no reason to give up chess and the joys it offers.

The history of chess in England

12/15/2016 – There have been some historical moments in chess, which date back even as far as the 19th Century in England. You could even go as far as to say that some of these moments have helped to define the game today. So, if England has such a strong chess culture, why do they not host more events? This article explores the history of chess in England and investigates the tournament scene. | Photos: Lennart Ootes