Dennis Monokroussos writes:
Former world champion Mikhail
Tal (1936-1992), especially in his dazzling rise to the top from 1957-1960,
was a man whose colossal energy, imagination, and willingness to go on sacrificial
adventures made him perhaps the most beloved chess player of modern times.
Those of you familiar with his chess know exactly what I mean, and those of
you who are not are in for a special treat. Some of his games are more like
dreams than real life, and that holds true for his 1979 win against another
grandmaster with a penchant for ultra-sharp play, Dragoljub Velimirovic. Ironically,
Tal started the game with "normal" positional play, taking advantage
of his opponent's strategic errors. He could have continued in this vein, but
at a certain point it was as if a switch was turned on, and then Tal started
to create. Eschewing a safe, sound edge, Tal sacrificed a piece for an enduring,
altogether non-stereotyped attack. There were few threats and Black's king had
the opportunity to seek shelter in any part of the board, yet no matter what
Velimirovic did Tal seemed to create a whole new swarm of threats out of thin
air.
There were a few players, like Polugaevsky and Korchnoi, whose great skill
in calculation enabled them to successfully withstand Tal's attacks on a regular
basis, but most – including many strong GMs – could not. After hours
of heavy calculation and psychological pressure, they would break. And so it
was for Velimirovic. He defended very well for a while, but by about the third
wave of the attack, he (and his position) started to break down, and Tal finished
in style.
Reading a description of the game is well and good, but seeing the game is
even better. Therefore, I hope you'll join me tonight, Wednesday night, at 9
p.m. ET as I present this gem on ChessBase's playchess.com server. (For more
directions, see this post.) See you there!
Dennis Monokroussos'
Radio ChessBase
lectures begin on Wednesdays at 9 p.m. EST, which translates to 02:00h
GMT, 03:00 Paris/Berlin, 13:00h Sydney (on Thursday). Other time zones
can be found at the bottom of this page. You can use Fritz or any Fritz-compatible
program (Shredder, Junior, Tiger, Hiarcs) to follow the lectures, or download
a free trial client. |
You can find the exact times for different locations in the world at World
Time and Date. Exact times for most larger cities are here.
And you can watch older lectures by Dennis Monokroussos offline in
the Chess Media System room of Playchess:
Enter the above archive room and click on "Games" to see the lectures.
The lectures, which can go for an hour or more, will cost you between one and
two ducats.
That is the equivalent of 10-20 Euro cents (14-28 US cents).
Monokroussos in Mexico: World Championship 2007
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Dennis Monokroussos is 41, lives in South Bend, IN, where
he teaches chess and occasionally works as an adjunct professor of philosophy
at the University of Notre Dame and Indiana University-South Bend.
At one time he was one of the strongest juniors in the U.S. and has reached
a peak rating of 2434 USCF, but several long breaks from tournament play have
made him rusty. He is now resuming tournament chess in earnest, hoping to reach
new heights.
Dennis has been working as a chess teacher for ten years now, giving lessons
to adults and kids both in person and on the internet, worked for a number of
years for New York’s Chess In The Schools program, where he was one of
the coaches of the 1997-8 US K-8 championship team from the Bronx, and was very
active in working with many of CITS’s most talented juniors.
When Dennis Monokroussos presents a game, there are usually two main areas
of focus: the opening-to-middlegame transition and the key moments of the middlegame
(or endgame, when applicable). With respect to the latter, he attempts to present
some serious analysis culled from his best sources (both text and database),
which he has checked with his own efforts and then double-checked with his chess
software.
