Soenke Maus and his contribution to opening theory

by Johannes Fischer
6/20/2026 – At the end of the 1980s, Soenke Maus, who was born on 11 June 1967 in Bad Schwartau and celebrated his 59th birthday last week, was regarded as one of Germany's greatest talents. But in 1995 he ended his chess career and became a successful marine researcher in Norway. Maus played his most famous game in 1989 at an open tournament in Lugano: he won in just 19 moves, in a theoretically important variation, against Dr Robert Hübner. | Pictured: Soenke Maus, 1994 | Photo: Torsten Szobries
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Innovations such as 13.O-O-O spread around the world at lightning speed today thanks to modern media, but at the time two more prominent players still fell victim to it.

Maus' win against Hübner caused a sensation in German chess circles, but it took a while for the novelty to reach the wider chess world. This sluggish flow of information brought Stefan Kindermann an easy win a week later in the fourth round of the Dortmund Grandmaster Tournament against Russian grandmaster Lev Psakhis.

Stefan Kindermann: GM, successful coach and ChessBase author | Photo: Stefan Kindermann

A further month later, on 13 April 1989, Chandler's discovery claimed another victim - Wolfgang Uhlmann, one of the greatest French Defence experts of all time.

Nowadays, in the internet age, such successes are scarcely possible anymore. Engines already warn of possible dangers during opening preparation, and spectacular novelties have a short shelf life. But opening preparation remains important, even if one has to look for new ways to surprise one's opponents.

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Topics: Robert Hübner, Sönke Maus, Stefan Kindermann, Wolfgang Uhlmann
Johannes Fischer was born in 1963 in Hamburg and studied English and German literature in Frankfurt. He now lives as a writer and translator in Nürnberg. He is a FIDE-Master and regularly writes for KARL, a German chess magazine focusing on the links between culture and chess. On his own blog he regularly publishes notes on "Film, Literature and Chess".
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A memorable upset: Wolfgang Uhlmann beats the world champion at the 1962 Varna Olympiad

5/9/2026 – Winning against the reigning world champion is always difficult. The first German player to achieve this feat after the Second World War was Wolfgang Unzicker, for many years the number one player in the Federal Republic of Germany. At the 1961 European Team Championship, he <a href="https://de.chessbase.com/post/aussenseitersiege-w-unzicker-vs-m-botvinnik-oberhausen-1961">outplayed</a> the then world champion Mikhail Botvinnik. Wolfgang Uhlmann, for many years the number one player in the GDR, was not to be outdone. In 1962, at the Chess Olympiad in Varna, he defeated Botvinnik - though not quite as convincingly as Unzicker had done a year earlier. | Image: Wolfgang Uhlmann in 1970 | Photo: <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:IBM-schaaktoernooi,_Bestanddeelnr_923-6899.jpg?uselang=de">Rob Mieremet, Anefo</a>
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Notes of an Overwhelmed Student - Remembering Robert Hübner

1/28/2025 – Dr Thorsten Heedt took chess lessons from Robert Hübner (1948–2025) for a long time and got to know the German Grandmaster very well. They became good friends and Heedt even asked Hübner to be best man at Heedt's wedding. After Hübner's death on 5 January 2025, Heedt shares some personal memories...
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Video

60m English New ideas in the Najdorf_E

‘New ideas in the Najdorf – a Power Play 18 Update’ aims to complement Daniel King’s popular DVD from last year ‘The Sicilian Najdorf - a repertoire for Black’. Such a dynamic and popular opening as the Najdorf is developing the whole time. On this download, Daniel King updates lines that were included on his DVD but also responds to viewers’ requests, considering lines that he omitted from his original repertoire. The lines examined on this update are: • 1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 a6 6 h3 e5 7 Nde2 • 5….a6 6 Bc4 in combination with the English Attack (Be3, f3 etc) • 5…a6 6 Be3 and the …a5 variation • 5…a6 6 Be2 and 9 Re1 • 5 f3 (instead of 5 Nc3) It isn’t necessary to have seen the original Najdorf DVD to understand the lines examined here – but it would help as they form part of a complete repertoire.