Winning starts with what you know
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In 2019, Dubov introduced many new ideas in a rare variation of the Tarrasch Defense, which quickly attracted attention at the top level. Several of the world’s best players have tried it, including Carlsen who employed it successfully in the 2019 World Rapid and Blitz Championships. Dubov’s double-edged opening system is based around concepts that are suggested by the newer engines, including early h-pawn advances and pawn sacrifices for the initiative.
Note that both game annotations are based on work I did for my book, The AI Revolution in Chess.
At the top level these days, everyone uses neural network (or hybrid) engines. It is much less common to see the clash of styles between a classical and neural network engine, as occurred frequently in 2019 and 2020 (such as the first game of the previous article, Grischuk – Nakamura).
Instead, we see a battle of AI-approved ideas in many games at the highest levels. This clash of preparation can rapidly drive opening theory forward. An example of how theory has advanced in a fashionable line of the Rossolimo is analysed below.
Navigating the Ruy Lopez Vol.1-3
The Ruy Lopez is one of the oldest openings which continues to enjoy high popularity from club level to the absolute world top. In this video series, American super GM Fabiano Caruana, talking to IM Oliver Reeh, presents a complete repertoire for White.
There are two final points regarding modern engines that I want to mention briefly: (1) practical use of these engines, and (2) the extent of their impact on chess.
The themes discussed in these two articles can be useful for the practical player. Besides providing creative and fresh opening ideas, modern engines can give insight into many types of positions that the classical ones struggled to play well in. Among others, strategic/closed middlegames and material imbalances have shown to be difficult for older engines to handle.
Lastly, the originality of the newer engines’ play is an interesting discussion point. Have they invented new ideas or simply reintroduced old ones?
From my work on the topic, I saw that modern engines have done both: they found new ideas and drew attention to older ideas in every popular opening system. For example, advancing the h-pawn to h6 in the Grunfeld (e.g., Paravyan – Wagner from the previous article) has been known for many years, long before Stockfish and AlphaZero. However, the point is that newer engines have a greater appreciation for such concepts, attracting the attention of top players during opening preparation, and thus increasing its popularity. This process of developing ideas applies to many other opening and middlegame concepts, several of which were examined in these two articles.
