Zor-Champ wins Freestyle Tournament

4/16/2006 – In a very exciting final the team of Zor-Champ, located in the United Arab Emirates, took first place and the $8,000 prize money in the Second PAL/CSS Freestyle Tournament. The team was driven by the program Hydra, which runs on multi-processor speical-purpose hardware. Second was IM Vasik Rajlich, assisted by his own program Rybka. Report and games.

The Velimirovic Correspondence Chess Attack

4/16/2006 – The realm of postcard and email chess tends to be wrongly neglected – it is a treasure trove of great, theoretically significant games. Our Playchess lecturer Dennis Monokroussos shows us a spectacular example. It's for people who love sharp openings and wild tactics.

Ekaterina Atalik and Zdenko Kozul European Champions

4/16/2006 – Croatia's top GM Zdenko Kozul won the men's section of the 2006 European Individual Championships in Kusadasi, ahead of top seed Vassily Ivanchuk. In the women's tournament WGM Ekaterina Atalik, who plays for Turkey, delighted her hosts by taking the title. Report and games.

Breaking news: Topalov vs Kramnik confirmed

4/14/2006 – "Today is a historic day for for our sport!" FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov has just announced that the long-awaited match between Veselin Topalov and Vladimir Kramnik will take place from September 21 to October 13 in Elista, the capital of Kalmykia. It will be over 12 games and the prize fund a guaranteed minimum of one million US dollars.

World Computer Chess Champion: Zap!Chess

4/13/2006 – Our new program, Zap!Chess, is the reigning computer chess world champion, written by Anthony Cozzie from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. Zap!Chess uses the same singular extensions algorithms as the famous Deep Blue program, and has one of the best parallel implementations in the world. It also uses 64-bit machines to their full potential. Read and buy.

Elections 2006: the battle becomes belligerent

4/13/2006 – "Turkish Gambit" is an article published on Kirsan's Campaign 2006 website, attacking the candidate for Deputy President on the rival ticket. The Israeli delegate Israel Gelfer, a very influential member of FIDE's Executive Board, criticizes Presidential candidate Bessel Kok, who replies forcefully. Campaign news.

Reader mail...

4/13/2006 – As our ChessBase Workshop columnist says at the start of the latest column: "I never intended for ChessBase Workshop to be a column driven by reader questions and comments, but as long as interesting e-mails keep coming, I'll keep printing them." He's printed another batch for your perusal along with his replies in his new column. Workshop...

FIDE's April 2006 ratings – revised

4/12/2006 – FIDE has done a silent update to their April 2006 rating list. Vassily Ivanchuk and Nigel Short had both lost points from games they had never played. Ivanchuk is now at number seven (originally ten) and Short has moved up ten ranks, from 37 to 27. Efimenko lost 14 points and dropped 15 places. Corrected list (updated).

Long live the Hedgehog!

4/12/2006 – Playchess lecturer Andrew Martin presents a grab bag of games today, starting with the Hedgehog system of defence, to the eccentric genius of Oleg Romanishin and a successful effort in a Caro Kann game of his own. Note that from now on the lecture will begin one hour later – so our trainer can get some cricket practice.

Kusadasi: Ivanchuk, Kozul, Nikolic lead

4/11/2006 – In the men's section of the European Championships top seed Vassily Ivanchuk is sharing first with 4th seed Kiril Georgiev and number 25 player Pedrag Nikolic. In the women's section we find Tea Bosboom and Ekaterina Atalik, ranked 24 and 25, in the lead group. Today's report brings you pictures of the venue, the coastal city of Kuşadası.

Topalov vs Nisipeanu – the final game annotated

4/11/2006 – As already reported, the match in Bucharest ended 3:1 for the FIDE world champion Veselin Topalov. We brought you extensive tutorial annotations, by GM Mihail Marin, of the first three. Today we complete it with game four. And a picture of one of the guests of honour at the tournament, whom we bet you do not recognise.

Topalov takes the lead against Nisipeanu

4/9/2006 – After a draw in the first, the second game in the match between Veselin Topalov and Dieter Nisipeanu ended in a white victory for the FIDE world champion. We bring you expert commentary by GM Mihail Marin, plus a pictorial report of the host country, Romania, withe its magnificent architecture and a castle that people say was owned by an unsavoury count.

Best game of the past 20 years?

4/9/2006 – That's what Jan Timman called the game between two of the world's best players thirty years ago: Ljubojevic vs Andersson. The superlative attacker against the consummate defender. Our Playchess lecturer Dennis Monokroussos tells us who blinked first.

Topalov beats Nisipeanu 3:1

4/9/2006 – FIDE world champion Veselin Topalov, Bulgaria, outplayed European Champion Dieter Nisipeanu, Romania, in the last game of their match in Bucharest on Sunday. Topalov won both white games to take overall victory with a 3:1 score. A final report will follow, today we bring you extensive commentary on game three.

Koneru Humpy leads in Indian Championship

4/8/2006 – Here's some exciting news: after five rounds of the very strong Indian championship, with many GMs and IMs, the only female player is in the lead. Not just in the lead, but with a 5/5 score. GM Koneru Humpy has just turned 19 and is the second strongest woman player in the world (after Judit Polgar). You would do well to watch the championship and this girl.

Nigel Short – Inside Africa

4/8/2006 – It is not often one sees the army summoned to attend a chess federation meeting, but that is what happened in Kabwe, Zambia. GM Nigel Short was on an African goodwill and campaign tour, when he faced considerable animosity from certain dignitaries in Botswana and Zambia. Here are the graphic details.

Kusadasi: sensations in the women's section

4/8/2006 – After four rounds of the European Individual Championships we have three players, Jobava, Dgebuandze and Anastasian, in the lead, with 22 following them. In the women's section a lot of 2400+ players are languishing in the bottom half of the table, while the remarkable Muzychuk sisters are stealing the show. As promised here's a big photo report from the women's section.

The 'Game of the Champions' begins

4/7/2006 – It is a four-game match, being played between FIDE world champion Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria, and reigning European Champion Dieter Nisipeanu of Romania. The venue is Bucharest, the time controls are classic. The first game ended in a draw. We bring you an illustrated report with commentary by GM Mihail Marin.

Election '06: All about Kirsan and Kalmykia

4/6/2006 – Today we received an email from the Kirsan Election Campaign center, pointing us to an article on the "somewhat controversial figure" of their candidate for President of FIDE. It is (piquant, piquant) by members of the rival ticket. Coincidentally there is a big story on Ilyumzhinov and Kalmykia in today's Times, unveiling Kirsan's latest plan.

Reader mail

4/6/2006 – The reader mail created by our two ChessBase Workshop columns on distributed computing and the "solvability" of chess continues to pour in unabated. Our intrepid columnist once again braves the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune (or at least those of our readers) to present some e-mail commentary generated by the topic, as well as his replies. Workshop...

'League for Truth and Veracity' – a meta-prank

4/5/2006 – Apparently there is no such organisation. Google finds only one reference to it – in our April 1st story, which resulted in many hundreds of emails flooding our inbox. But wait a minute, amongst these were warnings and threats from LT&V. And some very entertaining efforts, like the wag who wrote: I never meta-prank I didn't like!

7th European Championships start in Kusadasi

4/5/2006 – With 85 GMs (20 over 2600) and 37 IMs from 36 countries in the men's section, and 81 titled players from 27 countries in the women's section, this is a stellar event. The five-star accommodation and a €78.000 prize fund have tempted a total of 234 to the beautiful western Mediterranean coast of Turkey. Big pictorial report.

Kirsan on the campaign trail

4/4/2006 – The next FIDE elections will be held in early June 2006. During the past few months we have been hearing quite a bit from the Right Move ticket. Now the incumbent President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, who is running for a third term, has launched his own campaign web site. It claims the support of 40 federations and included an interview with Anatoly Karpov.

Heavyweight clashes on the ChessBase Show

4/4/2006 – Our Playchess lecturer Andrew Martin shows us how Anand makes a mess of Kasimdzhanov in a topical Ruy Lopez, how Black triumphs in a complicated variation of the King's Indian in Topalov-Svidler 2006, and the scourge of many a one-minute game, 1.d4 c5, as in Fridman-Rustemov from the Bundesliga. Meet you on the server!