The New York Times and Chess

11/5/2014 – In 1972 America went chess crazy. Bobby Fischer played the Match of the Century against Boris Spassky and chess was everywhere. The New York Times hired grandmaster Robert Byrne to run the chess column. In his first submission Byrne wrote about a "brilliant win" of Huffington Post columnist Lubomir Kavalek at the Skopje Olympiad, which Kavalek has deeply analysed.

Tashir 01: Grischuk cleans up

11/5/2014 – Making it look very easy, Grischuk was able to dispatch Inarkiev by obtaining a strong position from the opening and nursing his advantage into a winning endgame. The other three games were draws where neither side had any particularly good winning chance, except perhaps Leko who obtained a slight edge against Morozevich's 2...a6 Sicilian. Annotated games and report of round one.

BBC's Across the Board: Demis Hassabis

11/4/2014 – Wikipedia describes Demis Hassabis as "a British artificial intelligence researcher, neuroscientist, computer game designer, and world-class games player." While accurate, this doesn't begin to do him justice. At 13 he was second in chess only to Judit Polgar, at age 17 he designed a hit video game. He now sold his company DeepMind to Google to work on Artificial Intelligence.

Anand vs. Carlsen: After the first match

11/4/2014 – In the first match between Vishy Anand and Magnus Carlsen for the World title Carlsen clearly won 6.5:3.5. But does that also make him the favorite in their second match that will begin 7. November? To find out more about the mindset of Anand and Carlsen before their second match Sagar Shah took a look at the year between the two matches.

Knight surprise

11/4/2014 – Endgames often appear simple and somewhat dull. After all, there are only a few pieces left and sacrifices and mating attacks seem only to occur in studies. However, that's no reason to go on autopilot. Endgames often are more difficult than one might believe on first sight. And endgame expert GM Karsten Müller knows that one should expect the unexpected.

Tashir Super-Tournament starts in hours

11/4/2014 – There is no rest in the chess world! Only a couple of days after the Tahskent Grand Prix finished there already is a super-tournament starting. The Category 21 TASHIR Tigran Petrosian memorial will start in Moscow and with only seven rounds it is a perfect segway for chess aficionados before the World Chess Championship. Preview and report on a lovely opening gala.

Remembering Adriaan de Groot

11/4/2014 – Adriaan de Groot never became a grandmaster but his influence on chess is enormous. In 1965 his book "Thought and Choice in Chess" appeared in English and showed how chessplayers think. It changed our views on chess, talent, learning and knowledge. On the occasion of de Groot's 100th birthday the Dutch institute Cito now paid a fitting tribute.

Tashkent Closing

11/4/2014 – Andreikin started off the Grand Prix series on the wrong foot, but his impressive result in Tashkent puts him now on the leaderboard. However, even this victory is not enough to place the Russian player in the sweet top two qualifying spots - those are currently being held by Caruana and Nakamura. We bring you the closing ceremony report and the new Grand Prix Standings.

Reliving the World Championship 2013 – Part two

11/3/2014 – Just four more days to the World Championship in Sochi, the second match between Magnus Carlsen and Viswanathan Anand. In our review of the previous encounter we got to round five, where Anand faltered badly after a promising start. Once again Sagar Shah provides us with a wealth of analysis in his report on how last November Magnus Carlsen became the 16th world champion.

Magnus Carlsen: World Champion, Model, Actor?

11/3/2014 – Magnus Carlsen made a very successful career as a chessplayer, created headlines as a model, and now there are rumors that he might appear in Christopher Nolan's new movie "Interstellar", alongside Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Michael Caine. For Enzo Catalano it is the "most awaited movie of the year" and he speculates about Carlsen's role in it.

Reliving the World Championship 2013 – Part one

11/2/2014 – Just five more days and then it's here: the World Championship "return" match between Magnus Carlsen and Viswanathan Anand, in Sochi, Russia. To get you into the mood for what's coming Sagar Shah looks back at the 2013 encounter and analyses what went wrong in Chennai for Anand. His two-part review includes some incredibly deep analysis of the games.

Tashkent 11: Andreikin Wins

11/2/2014 – All the Russian grandmaster needed was a quick draw with Anish Giri in the final round to seal the deal. None of his suitors managed to win their games and Andreikin crowns hi mself the champion of the second leg of the 2014-15 FIDE Grand Prix. Nakamura and Mamedyarov tied for second, while in today's games Karjakin and Caruana won against Kasimdzhanov and Jakovenko. Report, games, analyses.

Tashkent 10: More peace

11/1/2014 – For the second time in the Tashkent Grand Prix, all six games have been drawn. This means that going into the last round of the tournament Andreikin keeps his lead of half a point over Nakamura and Mamedyarov, while MVL and Jobava are only another half a point away. Caruana and Jobava seem like the survivors today, as both Karjakin and Giri had good winning chances.

Sturua, Nunn lead at World Seniors

11/1/2014 – It is an experiment to test if his brain is still working. After winning a series of world problem solving championships, ahead of so many sharp young upstarts, British GM John Nunn decided to take part in the 24th World Senior Chess Championship in Katerini, Greece. After eight years of absence from competitive chess, an at 59 years of age, John is leading the 50+ group. Yep, still working fine!

November 2014 ratings – minor adjustments

11/1/2014 – Minor adjustments at the top, anyway. The gap between the perennial leader Magnus Carlsen and Italian pretender Fabiano Caruana has widened slightly, and Aronian and Grischuk have switched places four and five. Young Wesley So, now affiliated as USA, has climbed into the top ten. Hou Yifan is completely dominating in the Women's, Juniors and Girls. Here are all the lists.

BDO Chess: writing history in Haarlem (2/2)

11/1/2014 – In part two of his report on the BDO Chess tournament, Frits Agterdenbos presents the two tournaments, the Premier won by Dutch veteran Friso Nijboer, and the Challenger won by 13-year-old Dutch talent FM Robby Kevlishvili who also scored an IM norm. With each portrait you will find a summary of their tournament, as well as notable results and the players' impressions.

BBC's Across the Board: Sol Campbell

10/31/2014 – Sol Campbell is one of England's great defensive footballers, having a key role in all the teams he played for, and is the first to represent England on the pitch at six consecutive international tournaments. In 2002, after the World Cup, he was the only England player to be named in the FIFA World Cup All-Star Team. And he regularly plays chess.

Tashkent 09: Costly mistakes

10/31/2014 – Both Jobava and Jakovenko lost with white today after making very big mistakes in their games. Jakovenko blundered a sequence that left him in a lost endgame while Jobava's opening was strange to begin with, something that we have come to expect from the Georgian player, but in a difficult position he erred and everything collapsed. This leaves Andreikin in the solo lead.

Ilyumzhinov, Putin meet, discuss Sochi match

10/31/2014 – Yesterday Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is reputed to have spent over 50 billion dollars on the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, met with Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, President of FIDE, who is staging a World Championship there next week. Ilyumzhinov reported to Putin that things are going well, including the Internet coverage, which has to be able to handle hundreds of millions of visitors.

Challenger under pressure

10/31/2014 – 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.

BDO Chess: writing history in Haarlem (1/2)

10/31/2014 – Frits Agterdenbos was one of the leading chess photographers in the eighties, and has graced our pages with articles and photos over the years. His first full-fledged article was in 2005, and now he comes full circle with a lovely article on the 10th BDO Chess tournament, complete with his high standard of photography and a native's guided tour of the area.

BBC's Across the Board: Sigrid Rausing

10/30/2014 – The third episode of Across the Board brought in Sigrid Rausing, founder of the Sigrid Rausing Trust, one of the United Kingdom's largest philanthropic foundations, having distributed over 200 million pounds to human rights organizations in the last decade. She is the heiress and granddaughter of Ruben Rausing, the founder of the Tetra Pak company, and plays chess every day.

ChessBase Complete: Manual and reference guide

10/30/2014 – "Players new to ChessBase 12 should seriously consider buying a copy of ChessBase Complete, and long-time users might want to as well," writes John Hartmann. "It is a sturdy tutorial to the various features of the program, and it doubles as a user-friendly reference guide. I suspect that about 90% of what you need to know about ChessBase can be found in these pages." Review.

Chess in the High Tatras (2/2)

10/30/2014 – In this second part, author Adam Jarmula recounts the quest for the elusive third IM norm for his son FM Lukasz Jarmula, while sharing the impressions of the High Tatras mountain range and the tournament. For anyone seeking to mix day-long excursions in nature, with a nice tournament in a convivial environment, the appeal it has on players is no surprise.