3/21/2019 – There was one winner in the Open opener: 18-year-old GM Jeffrey Xiong (pictured), who turned the tables on the bold play of the ever-eccentric Timur Gareyev. All other games were drawn. In the Woman's group, however, not a single game ended in a split-point! Krush, Zatonskih, Wang, Yu, Feng and Yip, therefore all reached 1.0/1. | Photo: Lennart Ootes
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.
In this course, Grandmaster Felix Blohberger delivers a complete opening repertoire for White, centred around the flexible move 1.Nf3.
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Six decisive games between the Women!
So let's start there! Conventional wisdoms says that all-women events tend to have a lower drawing percentage, and the first round of the U.S. Women's Championship could be offered as 'Exhibit A'. The results were more or less according to rating, except for Maggie Feng's upset (with Black!) of Tatev Abrahamyan who out-rates Feng by 178 Elo points.
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After having an edge in the middlegame with a "good knight vs bad bishop", Abrahamyan, who has been in the running for the U.S. Championship before but has never won, first allowed Feng to equalise and then drifted in a position where accurate play was required.
Abrahamyan vs Feng
Position after 37...Rb7
Abrahamyan had been treading water, to use an analogy, but the exchange of pawns on the kingside only served to increase the potential scope of Feng's previously walled-in bishop. Now Tatev seemingly 'got tired and drowned'. 38.♘f8+? ♚h6 39.♘g6 ♜f7! 40.♘f4 ♜f5 winning the h-pawn and the game.
Abrahamyan, the perennial number three seed | Photo: Justin Kellar / Saint Louis Chess Club
Video: Feng discusses the game with Maurice Ashley
Xiong outmanoeuvres Gareyev
It's quite rare nowadays to find a position, between strong players in a prestigious tournament like the US Championship, that has been played less than 200 times after just three moves! But that was the situation in Timur Gareyev vs Jeffrey Xiong in round one on Wednesday after Xiong's 3...♝g4:
Gareyev vs Xiong
Position after 3...Bg4
This position was reached recently in Duda-Laznicka from the Prague Masters, where Duda played 4.♕b3 as in the majority of games thus far. Gareyev opted for the rarer 4.♘e5 and after 4...♝f5 5.e3 ♞f6 the players were already 'out of book'. But that's where things got hairy. Gareyev, after thinking for 20 minutes, tossed the grenade 6.g4?!
The aim of these Dvd's is to build a repertoire after 1.c4 and 2.g3 for White. The first DVD includes the systems 1...e5, the Dutch and Indian setups. The second DVD includes the systems with 1...c5, 1...c6 and 1...e6.
Position after 6.g4
Apparently the best continuation is to first take 6...dxe3 7.fxe3, then 7...♝e4 8.♖g1 e6 9.♗b2 and Black is fine or slightly better, but it's complicated. Xiong played 6...♝e4 straight away and after 7.f3 ♝g6 Gareyev thought for a further 39 minutes on 8.♗b2, a time investment that woudl come back to bite him later. The position remained equal until move 20.
The players traded rooks in a rather unusual manner 18...♛xh1 19.♕xh4 a5 and now Gareyev went awry: 20.♕f2 (20.♕g4 or O-O-O keeps the balance) axb4 21.axb4 ♜xa1+22.♗xa1 ♛e4 and Xiong's strong queen couple with Gareyev's overextended queenside pawns quickly gave Black a winning advantage.
Dynamic play is what makes your chess effective and most importantly fun! Timur Gareyev shows severeal examples which aspects are important to remember when seizing for the initiative!
The first DVD deals with the initial phase of the game, when the all the reigning principles can be crystalized into just one: DEVELOPMENT!
Xiong: "I was also very confused most of the way"
Most of the other games were close throughout, save for the last game to finish — between Awonder Liang and Aleksandr Lenderman — which ended drawn only after 120 moves and many missed opportunities for both sides. For example:
Double rook endings occur frequently and are different from single rook endings in several respects.
Liang vs Lenderman
Position after 46.Kf3
Lenderman played 42...♜1c5 here, but 42...♜f1+ 43.♔e2 ♜b1 would win the b-pawn for nothing. Liang eventually traded the b-pawn for Black's a-pawn and his remaining passed pawn gave him counterplay that eventually lead to a draw.
Awonder what he's thinking? | Photo: Lennart Ootes
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Macauley PetersonMacauley served as the Editor in Chief of ChessBase News from July 2017 to March 2020. He is the producer of The Full English Breakfast chess podcast, and was an Associate Producer of the 2016 feature documentary, Magnus.
Ruy Lopez Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 12092 games from Mega 2025 and the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 1276 are annotated.
In this 60 Minutes, Andrew Martin guides you through all the key ideas you need to know to play with confidence. Whether you’re looking to surprise your opponents, or simply want a straightforward weapon against e5, the Centre Attack has you covered.
Videos by Mihail Marin: Najdorf Variation with 6.f4 and Nico Zwirs: Italian ‘giucco pianissimo’. ‘Lucky bag’ with 45 analyses by Edouard, Ftacnik, Gupta, Pelletier and others. Update service with over 50,000 new games for your database!
This video course provides a comprehensive and practical White repertoire in the Ruy Lopez! Through instructive model games and in-depth theoretical explanations, you will learn how to confidently handle both main lines and sidelines.
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.
€21.90
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