8/16/2024 – Alireza Firouzja took the sole lead after the first day of blitz at the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz tournament. The French representative goes into the final 9 rounds of 5-minute games with a 1½-point lead over Wesley So and Ian Nepomniachtchi. It was So who obtained the best score on Thursday, as he scored 7/9 points despite losing his round-12 encounter against Firouzja. | Photo: Lennart Ootes
new: Fritz 20
Your personal chess trainer. Your toughest opponent. Your strongest ally. FRITZ 20 is more than just a chess engine – it is a training revolution for ambitious players and professionals. Whether you are taking your first steps into the world of serious chess training, or already playing at tournament level, FRITZ 20 will help you train more efficiently, intelligently and individually than ever before.
YOUR PERSONAL CHESS COACH - Whether you’re taking your first steps into the world of club chess, or already playing at a tournament level: with FRITZ, you can train more efficiently, intelligently and with a more personalised approach than ever before. FRITZ is more than just a chess engine – it’s a training revolution! Whether you’re taking your first steps into the world of club chess, or already playing at a tournament level: with FRITZ, you can train more efficiently, intelligently and with a more personalised approach than ever before.
From the 2026 Candidates Tournament, featuring a video review by Dorian Rogozenco, to Jan Werle’s opening video on the French Tarrasch Defence, and Oliver Reeh’s tactical column ‘Top Grandmasters at Work’. Analyses by Giri, So, Wei Yi and many others.
€21.90
A quick tactical eye
The first half of the blitz section at the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz tournament saw Wesley So and Alireza Firouzja climbing in the standings by scoring 7 and 6½ points respectively. Firouzja, who tied for first place in the rapid section, is now the sole leader, while So is now sharing second place with Ian Nepomniachtchi, at a 1½-point distance from Firouzja.
Tense struggles saw many of the games being decided by one-move blunders. Following the games live with the great commentary by Yasser Seirawan, Peter Svidler and Nazi Paikidze is surely entertaining, as the participants showcase their ability to make difficult decisions in deep time trouble - until one of them falters decisively.
In this video course, experts including Dorian Rogozenco, Mihail Marin, Karsten Müller and Oliver Reeh, examine the games of Boris Spassky. Let them show you which openings Spassky chose to play, where his strength in middlegames were and much more.
Besides Firouzja, Nepo and So, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Levon Aronian are well within reach of winning the tournament - i.e. half the field have realistic chances of claiming overall victory before the final 9 rounds of blitz.
In the crucial encounter between Firouzja and So, the latter failed to foresee a tactical idea that allowed Firouzja to promote a pawn by sacrificing an exchange.
50...Re1+ was a decisive mistake, as after 51.Kh2 Rb1 there is 52.Rxc6 bxc6 52.Bb4, blocking the b-file. So resigned.
Wesley So | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Two rounds later, after beating Leinier Dominguez, So got a lucky break - Aronian went from having a clearly better position to blundering the game away with a single queen manoeuvre.
69.Qxb5 loses the queen to 69...Qf1+, with a skewer.
In this video course, GM Surya Ganguly joins IM Sagar Shah and drawing from his colossal experience, shares some uncommon endgame wisdom. The material mostly features positions with rook against rook and a pawn, and starts by covering the fundamentals.
Carlos Alberto ColodroCarlos Colodro is a Hispanic Philologist from Bolivia. He works as a freelance translator and writer since 2012. A lot of his work is done in chess-related texts, as the game is one of his biggest interests, along with literature and music.
YOUR PERSONAL CHESS COACH - Whether you’re taking your first steps into the world of club chess, or already playing at a tournament level: with FRITZ, you can train more efficiently, intelligently and with a more personalised approach than ever before.
The Hyper-Accelerated Dragon is fast, from the very first moves, your bishop heads to g7, seizes the long diagonal, and turns into the most feared piece on the board.
It rewards players who love initiative and clear attacking plans.
The Hyper-Accelerated Dragon is fast, from the very first moves, your bishop heads to g7, seizes the long diagonal, and turns into the most feared piece on the board.
It rewards players who love initiative and clear attacking plans.
The Hyper-Accelerated dragon is fast, from the very first moves, your bishop heads to g7, seizes the long diagonal, and turns into the most feared piece on the board.
It rewards players who love initiative and clear attacking plans.
“Mate is great!” – Tactical training with Oliver Reeh, “The 8th rank” – Andy Woodward analyses his game against Magnus Carlsen from TePe Sigeman 2026, “A modern Nimzo-Indian” – Andrei Volokitin introduces readers to "his" system and much more!
Chess is a concrete game. There is no way around training your calculation skills. Improve your visualization, pattern recognition and learn calculation techniques such as reciprocal thinking with this course.
This compact course is designed specifically for practical play. Instead of overwhelming you with endless theory, it focuses on the critical lines, typical plans, and recurring tactical ideas.
Slav and Semi-Slav Powerbase 2026 is a database and contains a total of 11 766 games from Mega 2026 or the Correspondence Database 2026, of which 1136 are annotated.
€9.90
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