A personal portrait of World Champion Anand

12/23/2007 – The Indian network CNN-IBN has published an extraordinary TV portrait of Viswanathan Anand. In it Anand himself, his wife Aruna, his and her parents, friends, trainers, colleagues, all talk about the nation's favourite son. This includes music, food, clothing, travel, hobbies, ambitions, salsa and kickboxing. Yes, kickboxing. Take some time to watch this broadcast. It is a Christmas treat.

Russian Superfinal with lots of fighting chess

12/22/2007 – This is what people want to see: 2700+ players in a crisis, bouncing back dramatically, as Svidler and Morozevich did. Just 50% of the games in the Russian Championship so far were drawn, White won 28% and Black 22%. In the women's section it was even more dramatic: just 23% drawn games, with 44% white and 33% black wins. One lady, Natalija Pogonina, has a perfect 3.0/3.0 score.

Women's Super-tournament – participants and venue

12/22/2007 – In March 2008 the Turkish Chess Federation, together with the country's largest bank, is staging a spectacular international women's event on the 41st storey of the tallest building in the center of Istanbul. Two weeks after the tournament was announced the ten participants have been fixed. You may want to plan a trip to Turkey next March to watch this tournament in rarified heights.

Chess Festival in Benidorm – where a new genre is born

12/21/2007 – The Sixth International Chess Festival in Benidorm, Spain, attracted hundreds of players from all over the world. Aleksander Delchev of Bulgaria won the Open Master, World Champion Vishy Anand gave a very strong simul on 35 boards. But the show was stolen by the smallest event, an Advanced Chess Tournament, where the participants were allowed to use computer assistance.

Kasparov in New York – and on Al Jazeera

12/20/2007 – What does the former World Champion do when he is not taking part in political rallies against Russian leader Vladimir Putin, or serving a prison sentence in Moscow for political activities? Garry Kasparov spends quality time in New York, doing book signings in the mega bookshops of the US metropolis. We have pictures from recent signings and a remarkable must-watch TV report on Al Jazeera.

Get into the mood for Bonn 2008

12/20/2007 – Yesterday's announcement of the next World Championship match Anand vs. Kramnik in October 2008 in Germany was great news. Another top event in chess history, and a fascinating perspective for the coming year. For everyone who is still missing something for Christmas, Bob Long strongly recommends Kramnik's DVD 'My Path to the Top'. Simply superb. Buy it now or read more.

Russian Superfinal under way in Moscow

12/19/2007 – The Russian Championship Superfinal runs from 17-30 December (rest days 21st and 25th), at Moscow's Central House of Chessplayers (the former Moscow Central Chess Club). Round one saw a terrible loss for Svidler with the white pieces, a spoiled brilliancy for Morozevich, and a beautiful queen sacrifice from one of the outsiders. Report with pictures.

Take care – it's the Caro-Kann

12/19/2007 – Caro-Kann players have to be a hardy lot. There are quite a few aggressive schemes against it, and a moment's carelessness can get even a player slaughtered. Tonight our Playchess lecturer Dennis Monokroussos looks at a example by the great Caro-Kann expert Alexey Dreev. Be there and learn.

Anand vs Kramnik World Championship Match 2008

12/19/2007 – After lengthy negotiations FIDE, the two players and the organizers Universal Event Promotion (UEP) have come to an agreement: the next World Chess Championship will take place from October 11 – 30, 2008, in the National Art Gallery in Bonn, Germany, with the reigning world champion Viswanathan Anand taking on challenger Vladimir Kramnik in a twelve-game match. Press release.

Chess and Nutrition – how to feed a chess grandmaster

12/19/2007 – Many aspects of the extraordinary abilities of top chess players have undergone the scrutiny of science. Mental and physical exercises have been devised to optimise their performance. Now a nutritional scientist has systematically studied the eating habits of grandmasters – 72 of them. His paper culminates in a catalog of dietary instructions for serious chess players.

Understanding Grandmaster play – Fabiano annotates

12/18/2007 – Recently a 15-year-old won the Italian Championship. Fabiano Caruana took the title in this twelve-player round robin with a resounding three-point victory and a 2740 performance, which exceeded a theoretical GM norm by a point and a half (Fabiano already has the GM title). Lase week we featured this achievement in a special report. Today we bring you a key game annotated by the champ.

New: Mega Database 2008 is out!

12/17/2007 – It once started as a disk. Now the new ChessBase Databases Big and Mega 2008 come on DVDs, with 3.8 million games. Mega Database 2008 with 61,000 commented games is the starting point for any serious study of chess. All games are classified by ECO key, names, tournaments, etc. and include the Playerbase 2008 with 30,000 pictures. Buy Mega 2008 now or read more.

Khanty-Mansiysk Final: Kamsky wins, to challenge Topalov

12/16/2007 – American GM Gata Kamsky has won the FIDE World Cup. In the fourth game he was able to force a perpetual check and hold Alexei Shirov to a draw, which meant that he had won the Final with a score of 2.5:1.5 (three draws, one win). Kamsky won, did not lose a single game and performed 102 points higher than his nominal 2714 rating. Congratulations Gata!

Arpad Elo and the Elo Rating System

12/16/2007 – Ask chess players about their rating you will get an immediate response, ask them where the term "Elo" comes from and you get a puzzled look. Most think it is some kind of abbreviation or acronym. In Reality it comes from a Hungarian-born chess player and physicist, Árpád Imre Élö, who gained immortailty with his rating system. It is comprehensively described in this article by Daniel Ross.

Bisik-Bisik with Viktor Moskalenko

12/15/2007 – Bisik-Bisik is a word from the Malay Archipelago, and means the act of “whispering” from one person to another. Starting with this inaugural article Edwin Lam will seek to “whisper” to all our readers out there the previously unknown other side of his interview partners. He kicks off with a conversation between Edwin and Ukrainian Viktor Moskalenko, grandmaster, teacher and chess author.

Khanty-Mansiysk Final: Shirov fails to equalise

12/15/2007 – In his second must-win game with the white pieces Alexei Shirov had a promising position, but once again his American opponent, Gata Kamsky, defended solidly and held the Latvian-Spanish GM to a draw. This means that Kamsky leads by 2.0:1.0 points and Shirov has to win the final game with the black pieces. The adage for tomorrow must be: fire on the board! Pictorial report.

Valeriy Aveskulov is the 2007 Ukrainian Champion

12/14/2007 – He is 21 years old, has played since he was five, won multiple youth medals and received his GM title a year ago. Now Valeriy Aveskulov has won the 76th Ukrainian Chess Championship. Top players Ivanchuk, Karjakin, Ponomariov and Moiseenko, were absent, but still Valeriy had to compete with 19 other GMs. He finished sole winner with 6.5/9 points. Illustrated report by Olena Boytsun.

Khanty-Mansiysk Final: Kamsky draws first blood

12/14/2007 – Gata Kamsky has scored a first victory in game two of this four-game match. Avoiding a theoretical fight in the Sveshnikov the American GM produced a novelty on move nine and then went on to outplay his opponent Alexei Shirov, a world-famous firebrand, in a very volatile position. Kamsky now leads 1.5:0.5. Full report with analysis by GM Dorian Rogozenko.

Kasparov ends bid for Russian Presidency

12/13/2007 – On Monday Russian President Vladimir Putin hand-picked a successor, who on Tuesday said he would ask Putin to become his prime minister. Meanwhile Garry Kasparov, former world chess champion, was forced to abandon his own bid for the Presidency after his organisation was unable to rent a convention hall anywhere in Moscow before the Wednesday deadline. News reports.

Fabiano Caruana, Italian Champion 2007

12/13/2007 – Our recent article which called 15-year-old Fabiano Caruana "Italy's top grandmaster" drew some criticism. While the youngster was definitely very talented, we were told, he was not the Italian champion or even clearly the strongest player in the country. Last week Fabiano put an end to the debate with a resounding three-point victory in the 2007 Italian Championship. Interview.

Khanty-Mansiysk Final: First game drawn

12/13/2007 – As expected by many the first encounter in the FIDE World Cup final ended in a draw, but it was a high-quality game from both players. Kamsky showed once again that he came to Khanty-Mansiysk very well prepared. Meanwhile, promped by readers, our annotator GM Dorian Rogozenko discovered that in the semi-finals Shirov had overlooked a clear win – in 208 moves!

Super-Grandmaster Koneru Humpy speaking

12/12/2007 – She turned twenty in March this year, and is, after Judit Polgar, the second strongest female player in chess history. She became a grandmaster at 15, three months earlier than Judit, and in recent months crossed the Elo 2600 mark, the second women to ever achieve this feat. The Indian portal LatestChess.com spoke with the national superstar. Here is the interview.

More questions

12/11/2007 – Dipping back into the reader mailbag, our ChessBase Workshop columnist holds forth on such diverse topics as engine locking, RAM footprints, and permanent database sorting. You'll find this and more in the latest ChessBase Workshop. Just remember -- you asked for it... Workshop...

Edward Winter presents: Unsolved Chess Mysteries (20)

12/11/2007 – After Pillsbury died, did a chessplayer examine his brain? Was Edward Young a pseudonym used by Fred Reinfeld? Did Blackburne overlook a standard queen sacrifice? Who discovered Capablanca’s missed win against Fine at AVRO, 1938? Did Fischer play a training match in the 1970s against Collins? On these and other matters from Chess Notes readers are invited to join in the hunt for clues.