12/5/2015 – Maxime Vachier-Lagrave came closest to scoring the full point today. He had a winning position against Hikaru Nakamura but he failed to convert it. Magnus against Fabi was quite an interesting struggle, while the rest three were pretty dull draws. David Howell was able to beat Nick Pert to take the lead in the British Knockouts. We also have some pictures from the FIDE Open. Detailed illustrated report.
new: ChessBase Magazine 225
Chess Festival Prague 2025 with analyses by Aravindh, Giri, Gurel, Navara and others. ‘Special’: 27 highly entertaining miniatures. Opening videos by Werle, King and Ris. 10 opening articles with new repertoire ideas and much more. ChessBase Magazine offers first-class training material for club players and professionals! World-class players analyse their brilliant games and explain the ideas behind the moves. Opening specialists present the latest trends in opening theory and exciting ideas for your repertoire. Master trainers in tactics, strategy and endgames show you the tricks and techniques you need to be a successful tournament player! Available as a direct download (incl. booklet as pdf file) or booklet with download key by post. Included in delivery: ChessBase Magazine #225 as “ChessBase Book” for iPad, tablet, Mac etc.!
Winning starts with what you know The new version 18 offers completely new possibilities for chess training and analysis: playing style analysis, search for strategic themes, access to 6 billion Lichess games, player preparation by matching Lichess games, download Chess.com games with built-in API, built-in cloud engine and much more.
This isn’t just another chess tutorial—it’s your all-access pass to the strategies, insights, and techniques that define modern grandmaster play.
€39.90
The 7th London Chess Classic, England's premier tournament, takes place
at its traditional venue of Kensington Olympia from Friday December 4th
to Sunday December 13th. The main event, the strongest ever held in the
UK, is a nine-round ten-player super tournament played at a rate of 40 moves
in 2 hours, followed by the rest of the game in one hour with a 30-second
increment from move 41. The overall prize fund is $300,000, with the winner
getting $75,000.
When the games are running, clicking on the above link will take you to
our live broadcast. It is free and open to all – as a Premium Account
member you have access to the Live Book, Chat, chess engine analysis –
all in your browser, on a notebook, tablet or even your smartphone. And
the Let's
Check function will show you what the most powerful computers in the
world think of the current position, as each move is being played. Below
are the four most-watched boards.
Round 2 Sat. 5 Dec, 14.00-21.00
Anish Giri
½-½
Michael Adams
Levon Aronian
½-½
Viswanathan Anand
Magnus Carlsen
½-½
Fabiano Caruana
Hikaru Nakamura
½-½
M Vachier-Lagrave
Veselin Topalov
½-½
Alexander Grischuk
Commentary Round 2: Oliver
Reeh/Karsten Müller
15-minute summary of round two by Daniel King
London Chess Classic Round Two: All games drawn!
Report from London by Sagar Shah
Today the FIDE Open at the London Chess festival, in which I am participating,
had two rounds. Usually when you have to play a double round in a normal
event you wonder about what is to be done in the break between the two games.
But at the London Chess Classic this was not at all a problem. As soon as
my game finished, I rushed to the auditorium where the second round of the
elite category was just about to begin.
Before the start of the game: Anish in a snazzy
shirt, blazer and tie, and Anand in his informal avatar
A loss yesterday didn’t seem to deter
Veselin, who came to the second game in good spirits
A few minutes into the game and the players
had already started kibitzing
All of us, at some point or the other, have followed live games on the
Internet. The excellent video coverage provided by elite events like Shamkir,
Norway, London, etc. ensures that you get a near-to-being-present feeling
at the venue. However, it is completely different to be seated in the auditorium
and to witness the drama unfold in real life right in front of your eyes.
The game which everyone was looking forward
to was definitely Carlsen against Caruana
Magnus played the relatively toothless 5.Re1 in the Berlin. But the game
soon reached an exciting position, one where Caruana had to deal with the
dangerous white passed pawn on d6. He managed to hold on to a draw, but
only by a whisker.
[Event "7th London Classic 2015"] [Site "London ENG"] [Date "2015.12.05"]
[Round "2.4"] [White "Carlsen, Magnus"] [Black "Caruana, Fabiano"] [Result
"1/2-1/2"] [ECO "C67"] [WhiteElo "2850"] [BlackElo "2787"] [Annotator
"Sagar Shah"] [PlyCount "84"] [EventDate "2015.12.04"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3
Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6 4. O-O Nxe4 5. Re1 {Magnus goes for a pretty sedate line,
trying to get a small edge.} Nd6 6. Nxe5 Be7 7. Bf1 Nxe5 8. Rxe5 O-O 9.
Nc3 Ne8 10. Nd5 Bd6 11. Re1 c6 12. Ne3 Be7 13. c4 Nc7 14. d4 d5 15. cxd5
Nxd5 16. Nxd5 cxd5 17. Bf4 {All of this has been seen before in the game
Areshechenko-Bacrot in June 2015. White won that game. The position is
very symmetrical. However, White seems to have a small edge due to better
placement of his pieces, like the rook being on e1 and the bishop on f4.
However, this is nothing much.} Bf6 18. Be5 Bxe5 19. Rxe5 {One of the
reasons why White should have a small edge here is because the d5 pawn
is on a light square, which means that the bishop on c8 is slightly a
bad piece.} Re8 20. Rxe8+ Qxe8 21. Qb3 {Magnus was playing his moves pretty
quickly and confidently.} Qc6 22. Bb5 Qb6 {Black is ready to sacrifice
his d5 pawn in order to get some counterplay.} (22... Qd6 23. Rc1 (23.
Re1 Be6 $11) 23... Be6 {also looks fine. But Caruana wanted to be more
precise and hence chose Qb6 over Qd6.}) 23. Qxd5 a6 $1 {Very accurate.}
(23... Be6 24. Qc5 $1 Qxc5 25. dxc5 $16 {is just an extra pawn.}) 24.
Bd3 {Magnus retreats to a square where he can create some mating threats
with Bd3.} Be6 25. Qe4 g6 26. d5 {It seems as if White has things going
his way, but Caruana has everything under control.} Bf5 27. Qe2 Bxd3 28.
Qxd3 Qxb2 {Black recovers the pawn. However, the d5 pawn is not at all
a unit that should be underestimated.} 29. Re1 Rd8 30. d6 Rd7 {Stopping
the pawn in the tracks. This is not all easy to defend but Caruana does
a fine job.} (30... Qxa2 31. Qd4 $1 {looks pretty dangerous with Qf6 coming
up next.}) 31. g3 $5 {Magnus takes out time to secure his back rank.}
Qf6 32. Rd1 Qe5 33. Qa3 a5 34. f4 {This move might well be practically
strong, however in the end it was this move that led to the perpetual
check.} Qe2 35. Qc1 Qe6 36. Qc5 b5 37. Qxb5 (37. Qe5 $11 {Anand and Aronian
analyzed this move in their press conference and it is also equal.}) 37...
Rxd6 $1 {Caruana is tactically alert and sacrifices his rook in order
to get a perpetual check.} 38. Qb8+ Kg7 39. Qxd6 Qe3+ 40. Kg2 Qe2+ 41.
Kg1 Qe3+ 42. Kg2 Qe2+ 1/2-1/2
Magnus put some pressure on his opponent…
…but “Fabi” was up to the
task!
Overnight leader Anish Giri was playing quickly
and moving around confidently on the stage…
…but England’s Michael Adams gave
him absolutely no winning chances
[Event "7th London Classic 2015"] [Site "London ENG"] [Date "2015.12.05"]
[Round "2.2"] [White "Giri, Anish"] [Black "Adams, Michael"] [Result "1/2-1/2"]
[ECO "E37"] [WhiteElo "2778"] [BlackElo "2744"] [Annotator "Sagar Shah"]
[PlyCount "52"] [EventDate "2015.12.04"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4
4. Qc2 d5 5. a3 Bxc3+ 6. Qxc3 Ne4 7. Qc2 c5 8. dxc5 Nc6 9. Nf3 Qa5+ 10.
Bd2 Qxc5 11. e3 Nxd2 12. Nxd2 dxc4 13. Bxc4 O-O 14. b4 Qe7 15. Bd3 h6
16. Qc3 a6 17. O-O Bd7 18. Nc4 Rab8 19. Nb6 Rfd8 20. Rac1 Be8 21. Be4
{[#]} Na7 $1 {[%csl Gb5,Gc6][%cal Ge8c6,Ga7b5] You can bank on Michael
Adams to find the most accurate way to equalize the game. The knight frees
the c6 square for the e8 bishop, while at the same time it is also threaning
to come to b5 with a tempo.} 22. a4 Qd6 23. Nc4 Qe7 24. Nb6 Qd6 25. Nc4
Qe7 26. Nb6 Qd6 {Optically it seems that White should be clearly better.
But on close inspection you realize that Black is completely fine and
the position is just equal.} 1/2-1/2
Veselin Topalov went on the scoreboard with
a draw against Alexander Grischuk
A draw with black was not a bad result for
Grischuk who found the nice Qb8-b4 maneuver
[Event "7th London Classic 2015"] [Site "London ENG"] [Date "2015.12.05"]
[Round "2.5"] [White "Topalov, Veselin"] [Black "Grischuk, Alexander"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "C65"] [WhiteElo "2803"] [BlackElo "2750"] [Annotator
"Sagar Shah"] [PlyCount "65"] [EventDate "2015.12.04"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3
Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6 4. d3 Bc5 5. c3 O-O 6. Nbd2 d6 7. h3 a6 8. Bxc6 bxc6 9.
O-O Re8 10. Re1 h6 11. Nf1 Bb6 12. Ng3 Bd7 13. Be3 {I like this game because
of Grischuk's imaginative activation of the queen.} Qb8 $1 {Just look
how the queen comes in to the game.} 14. Qd2 Bxe3 15. Rxe3 a5 16. d4 exd4
17. cxd4 Qb4 $1 {[%cal Gd8b8,Gb8b4] After the queen exchange the position
is equal. } 18. b3 Qxd2 19. Nxd2 a4 20. a3 axb3 21. Rxb3 Ra4 22. Rb7 Rxd4
23. Nf3 Ra4 24. Rxc7 Rc8 (24... Rd8 {the knight attacks the e4 pawn.}
25. e5 Ne8 26. Rb7 c5 27. exd6 Bc6 28. Rb3 Nxd6 $11 {is also round about
equal.}) 25. Rxc8+ Bxc8 26. e5 dxe5 27. Nxe5 c5 28. Rc1 Rxa3 29. Rxc5
Be6 30. Rc1 Ra8 31. Nf3 Rc8 32. Rxc8+ Bxc8 33. Nd4 1/2-1/2
For a brief while Anand was under pressure
against Levon Aronian,
but after an inaccuracy by the Armenian the game ended in a draw
[Event "7th London Classic 2015"] [Site "London ENG"] [Date "2015.12.05"]
[Round "2.1"] [White "Aronian, Levon"] [Black "Anand, Viswanathan"] [Result
"1/2-1/2"] [ECO "D38"] [WhiteElo "2781"] [BlackElo "2803"] [Annotator
"Sagar Shah"] [PlyCount "67"] [EventDate "2015.12.04"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4
e6 3. Nf3 d5 4. Nc3 Bb4 5. Bd2 O-O 6. e3 c5 7. a3 Bxc3 8. Bxc3 Ne4 9.
Qc2 Nxc3 10. bxc3 Nd7 11. Bd3 h6 12. cxd5 exd5 13. Qb2 Qe7 14. O-O Nf6
15. Rfb1 c4 16. Bc2 Ne4 17. a4 Re8 18. a5 $1 {White has some pressure
as the c8 bishop cannot be developed for the time being. However, Black
can easily solve the problem either with Rb8 or, as Anand does in the
game, Nd6.} Nd6 19. Qb4 Be6 20. Re1 $6 {Aronian would like to play e3-e4
but he removes the pressure from the b7 pawn. This helps Anand to exchange
the key bishops.} (20. Ne5 {was much better keeping a minute edge.}) 20...
Bf5 $1 21. Bxf5 Nxf5 { After this exchange the position is completely
equal.} 22. Qxe7 Rxe7 23. h4 h5 24. g3 Nd6 25. Reb1 Rc8 26. Kg2 f6 27.
Ng1 g5 28. Nf3 Ne4 29. Ra3 Rf8 30. Rb5 Rd7 31. Rb2 Rg7 32. Rb5 Rd7 33.
Rb2 Rg7 34. Rb5 1/2-1/2
Aronian would have wanted to test Anand more
with the position he had achieved out of the opening, but Re1 made the Indian
player’s task quite easy. By the way do you see something unusual
in the picture?
The hand with the red nail polish is, of course,
not Aronian’s! It belongs to
Jennifer Shahade who is doing a commendable job of interviewing of all the
elite players
The game of the day was surely the one between Hikaru Nakamura and Maxime
Vachier-Lagrave. Nakamura’s unusual opening experiment fared pretty
badly as he came out of the first phase with an inferior position, that
too with the white pieces. Maxime played excellently and at one point had
a clear win. However, he couldn’t find the critical continuation and
the game petered out to equality.
[Event "7th London Classic 2015"] [Site "London ENG"] [Date "2015.12.05"]
[Round "2.3"] [White "Nakamura, Hikaru"] [Black "Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "A48"] [WhiteElo "2793"] [BlackElo "2765"] [Annotator
"Sagar Shah"] [PlyCount "113"] [EventDate "2015.12.04"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3
g6 3. e3 $5 {Nakamura plays something offbeat to get an original position.}
Bg7 4. c4 O-O 5. Be2 {By not developing his knight on c3 White dissuades
Black from playing the Grunfeld.} c5 (5... d5 6. cxd5 Nxd5 7. e4 {is considered
pleasant for White.}) 6. d5 d6 7. Nc3 e6 8. O-O exd5 9. cxd5 {Now we are
in Benoni territory where White has played the e3 Be2 line. Of course
this is in no way theoretically threatening, especially because White
will be a tempo down in the main lines when he has to go e3-e4. However,
the position is still quite interesting and White can hope for a small
edge.} Na6 10. Nd2 Rb8 11. e4 Re8 12. f3 Nh5 13. f4 Nf6 14. Kh1 Nc7 15.
a4 a6 16. a5 Bd7 { Black has a very comfortable version of the Benoni.
White's pieces are clumsily placed. Black can use the b5 square for his
own pieces.} 17. Bf3 Nb5 18. e5 $6 dxe5 19. fxe5 Rxe5 $17 {Nakamura sacrifices
a pawn to muddy the waters, but the position is just clearly better for
Black.} 20. Nc4 Rf5 21. Ne2 Rxf3 $5 {A very interesting exchange sacrifice.}
(21... Ng4 $1 22. Bxg4 Rxf1+ 23. Qxf1 Bxg4 $17 {was even stronger.}) 22.
gxf3 Bh3 23. Re1 Qxd5 24. Nf4 Qxd1 25. Rxd1 {Black has two pawns for the
exchange and excellent co-ordination.} Bd7 26. Be3 Bc6 27. Kg2 Re8 28.
Kf2 g5 29. Nd3 g4 30. Nde5 Bd5 31. Rg1 h5 32. h3 {[#]} Bxc4 $6 (32...
gxf3 $1 {would have lead to a winning position for Black but requires
great deal of calculation.} 33. Bh6 Ne4+ $1 34. Ke3 (34. Kxf3 $2 Ng5+
$19) 34... Kh7 $1 35. Bxg7 f2 $1 36. Rg2 Nd4 $19 {and Black is a complete
rook down, but with threats like Nc2+ he has a winning position. Of course
this is not so easy to see during the game.}) 33. Nxc4 $11 {The worst
is over for White.} Nd5 34. fxg4 Nxe3 35. Nxe3 Bxb2 36. Rae1 Bc3 37. Re2
Bd4 38. Kf3 Nc3 39. Ree1 Ne4 40. gxh5+ Kh7 41. Rg2 Nd6 42. Ree2 Re5 43.
Nc2 Rxh5 44. Nxd4 cxd4 45. Rg4 Rxa5 46. Rxd4 Nf5 47. Rb4 b5 48. Kf4 Nh6
49. Ke5 Ra3 50. h4 Rg3 51. Ra2 Rg6 52. Rb1 Re6+ 53. Kf4 Rf6+ 54. Ke4 Re6+
55. Kf4 Rf6+ 56. Ke4 Re6+ 57. Kf4 1/2-1/2
Nakamura had a grim day at the office, but
he hung in there
I was sooo close to winning, I just don’t
know where I went wrong!
Game of the Day Round two
Veselin Topalov against Anish Giri was nominated game of the day
for round one by readers and visitors.
The lucky winner of the London
Chess Classic poll is Lee Phillips. He wins a copy of Fritz 15
DVD, which will be delivered to him.
British Knockout Championships
We had a decisive result in the second game of the British Knockout Championships
final between David Howell and Nick Pert. The game started with an English
Opening that looked highly drawish. No pawns were exchanged until move 19,
and by move 24 the players had reached a completely equal rook ending with
seven pawns each. Well, the position was equal, not drawn. The finalists
fought hard in the endgame trying to make use of every little resource available
in the position. There were some nice themes of mutual zugzwang. Finally,
Pert made a few errors and Howell scored the full point. He leads the match
with a score of 1.5:0.5.
David Howell came in a fighting mood
The game seemed to be hardly interesting out
of the opening...
... but full credit to both the players for
not agreeing to a draw and fighting right to the bitter end
There were two rounds at the FIDE open today. After three games ten players
are in joint lead with 3.0/3. Top seed Evegeny Postny of Israel scored two
fine victories and so did Eric Hansen of Canada. A few of the higher rated
players who aren’t playing up to par are Tigran Gharamiyan, Edouard
Romain, Sergey Grigoriants and Rinat Jumabayev – all of them are on
2.0/3.
Editorial note: IM Sagar Shah, who is writing these reports
and at the same time playing the open section, has with gratuitous modesty
neglected to mention that he too is on 3.0/3. He beat Andrew Harley (2226)
and Vuilleumier Alexandre (2342) in rounds 2 and 3. He is on track to complete
his third GM norm.
Before coming to London, Sagar spent a week at the ChessBase office in
Hamburg, where his first DVD Learn from the Classics was released.
Learning from the Classics
By IM Sagar Shah
Languages: English
ISBN : 978-3-86681-500-1
Delivery: Download, Post
Level: Tournament player, Professional
Price: €29.90 or €25.13 without VAT (for Customers outside
the EU) $27.06 (without VAT)
Wise and successful players of the game have always told us to study
the classics – games by the great masters of the past. But in
this age of cutting-edge opening theory, preparation and engines,
is studying the classics really that helpful?
On this DVD, Sagar Shah does'nt merely preach. First, he shows you
classical games of great legends such as Petrosian, Botvinnik, Fischer,
Korchnoi and Kasparov, looking at typical patterns and ideas from
the middlegame. The author then goes on to explain how you can use
these ideas in your own battles – by showing you examples of
applied classical knowledge from his own games!
As well as looking at the middlegame, Sagar also focuses on the
opening. The information explosion has ensured that opening theory
continues to evolve at a rapid pace. The author shows that playing
through the classics can help us establish a strong and stable feel
for the initial phase of the game, and analyzes the opening duel between
Botvinnik and Petrosian from their World Championship match in 1963.
Going over these games will give you an excellent idea of how the
classics can be used to prepare your own openings.
The games are being broadcast live on the official web site and on
the chess server Playchess.com.
If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there
and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase
or any of our Fritz
compatible chess programs.
Sagar ShahSagar is an International Master from India with two GM norms. He loves to cover chess tournaments, as that helps him understand and improve at the game he loves so much. He is the co-founder and CEO of ChessBase India, the biggest chess news portal in the country. His YouTube channel has over a million subscribers, and to date close to a billion views. ChessBase India is the sole distributor of ChessBase products in India and seven adjoining countries, where the software is available at a 60% discount. compared to International prices.
Rossolimo-Moscow Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 10950 games from Mega 2025 and the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 612 are annotated.
The greater part of the material on which the Rossolimo/Moscow Powerbook 2025 is based comes from the engine room of playchess.com: 263.000 games. This imposing amount is supplemented by some 50 000 games from Mega and from Correspondence Chess.
Focus on the Sicilian: Opening videos on the Najdorf Variation with 6.h3 e5 7.Nb3 (Luis Engel) and the Taimanov Variation with 7.Qf3 (Nico Zwirs). ‘Lucky bag’ with 38 analyses by Anish Giri, Surya Ganguly, Abhijeet Gupta, Yannick Pelletier and many more.
Throughout the video course, Sasikran shows various examples from his career to explain sacrifices for initiative, an attack, a better pawn structure and much more.
In this insightful video course, Grandmaster David Navara shares practical advice on when to calculate deeply in a position — and just as importantly, when not to.
The Trompowsky is especially suited for faster time controls as you don‘t have to memorise endless lines of theory, and you push your opponent out of their comfort zone after your second move.
€49.90
We use cookies and comparable technologies to provide certain functions, to improve the user experience and to offer interest-oriented content. Depending on their intended use, analysis cookies and marketing cookies may be used in addition to technically required cookies. Here you can make detailed settings or revoke your consent (if necessary partially) with effect for the future. Further information can be found in our data protection declaration.
Pop-up for detailed settings
We use cookies and comparable technologies to provide certain functions, to improve the user experience and to offer interest-oriented content. Depending on their intended use, cookies may be used in addition to technically required cookies, analysis cookies and marketing cookies. You can decide which cookies to use by selecting the appropriate options below. Please note that your selection may affect the functionality of the service. Further information can be found in our privacy policy.
Technically required cookies
Technically required cookies: so that you can navigate and use the basic functions and store preferences.
Analysis Cookies
To help us determine how visitors interact with our website to improve the user experience.
Marketing-Cookies
To help us offer and evaluate relevant content and interesting and appropriate advertisement.
Learning from the Classics
