5/11/2024 – Svitlana and Arne will participate in the Biel International Chess Festival this year! Last year, the masters section had some stunning tactics on the board, and Svitlana picked some of her favourites for your delight. Le Quang Liem, who won the last two events consecutively, has played the majority of interesting tactics! But this year, Vincent Keymer, Praggnanandhaa, Javokhir Sindarov, Haik Martirosyan, and Abhimanyu Mishra will join the Triathlon masters, to give you even more interesting games to watch.

5/3/2024 – Now, all of us chess players know that the World Championship is battled out by Gukesh and Ding Liren. Both players faced each other in classical chess only twice before, in Wijk aan Zee 2023, and 2024. One of their games was fairly interesting, and Svitlana is analysing it.

4/12/2024 – Arne recently played in a chess tournament, and one of his opponents played the unusual 1.f4, which was quite a surprise. Sadly, he didn't film this Smart Moves episode before the tournament, to get to know the surprising answer Nh6!? The so called - Horsefly Defence in the Bird Opening. Even the engines think that this counter is absolutely legit, and the Mega Database shows excellent results as well. Svitlana shows, why it is a powerful move!

4/3/2024 – Together with Arne Kähler, Canadian WIM Svitlana Demchenko (photo) regularly entertains and trains readers of our website on the Svitlana’s Smart Moves show. The 20-year-old from Ukraine also made smart moves at the Canadian Women’s Zonal tournament in Toronto, which ended at the beginning of April. She started as number 5 in the seeding list and ended up in a tie for first place with 7½/9 points. She finished second on tiebreaks behind rating favourite Maili-Jade Ouellet. | Photo: ChessCanada Facebook page

4/2/2024 – Svitlana dug deep to find some outstanding, beautiful tactics, by all the men's and women's candidates, who will compete in Toronto soon. Arne is trying hard to solve all the puzzles, and get 8 out of 8 in both videos. Will he succeed? And how will you do, dear viewer? These two videos are the perfect start to get into the mood for the candidates tournament!

3/14/2024 – This episode was lost in the depths of 2023, but luckily returned! The Gruenfeld is a very hyper-modern opening, which gives White the centre, while Black has to fight around the flanks. If Black knows the opening well, White has a difficult time gaining some advantage. But with an example game from Vincent Keymer, the move "h4" is a beautiful way to attack the Black pieces. Svitlana shows us how to master this idea.

3/10/2024 – The Carlsbad Pawn structure, or formation, is normally deriving from the Queen's Gambit declined, London System, or the Caro-Kann. A common structure, which actually has some ideas, and plans to accomplish. Svitlana tells us, what the major plans are for White, and Black, by showing us two example games. One of them is Garry Kasparov vs. Nigel Short!

2/24/2024 – The Methodical Attacking Principles within certain pawn structures hold high importance. From the opening to the middlegame, the patterns, plans, and theories derived from our initial pawn moves necessitate different actions. Those who frequently play the Queen's Gambit likely have a better understanding of an isolated pawn compared to aficionados of the Ruy Lopez. Svitlana discusses an excellent game by Jan-Krzysztof Duda, highlighting how he gradually leverages his pawn structure advantage for an unstoppable attack.

2/2/2024 – With the stunning result of 5 out of 5 on board 1, Svitlana participated in the Canadian University Championship! One of her games included the Portuguese Variation in the Scandinavian Opening, which is "Svitlana's Smart Moves" most viewed episodes! She won against an FM, and her opponent was almost without a chance. Maybe, this opening is much better, than everybody thought?

1/26/2024 – This episode is a must-watch for every endgame beginner, and soon to be expert. Svitlana is presenting some essential endgame positions and how to deal with them. May it be rook vs. bishop, queen vs. rook, and other positions, which every chess player had on the board already, at least once in their life. Our advice: Use Fritz 19, and replay the positions from the replayer to actively learn the patterns you saw in this video.

1/19/2024 – No, you haven't missed a game of the Tata Steel 2024. Svitlana decided to travel a year back in time, and analyse one of the most interesting games of the Dutch tournament, 2023. Interestingly, both protagonists - Gukesh D, and Praggnanandhaa - will face each other soon enough, again in Wijk aan Zee! This is a sweet teaser for their upcoming match-up.

12/31/2023 – Once again, a fantastic chess year is coming to an end. As usual, Svitlana gathered some of her absolute favourite tactics, for the viewer and Arne to solve. Happy new year everybody, and see you in 2024!

12/22/2023 – Today's episode is about two Dutch grandmasters playing the French defence. Friso Nijboer is facing Jan Timman, and the position is quickly advancing to a very interesting middle game. A tactical masterpiece is ready to be solved by the viewer!

12/16/2023 – Magnus Carlsen faced Levon Aronian several times in his career. The game Svitlana chose to analyse together with us, points out some crucial initiative decisions by Magnus, which made him win the game. Sacrificing one pawn to gain some advantage is a common practice. But sacrificing two pawns is already quite exceptional.

11/22/2023 – Every now and then, Svitlana talks about a new opening. This time, it is the suspicious Budapest Gambit. To Arne's disappointment - if you play the opening correctly, some variants seem to move to a very calm middle- and endgame, rather than setting the board on fire. It might be interesting to get to know the Gambit a bit better because it is actually quite sound.

11/16/2023 – Three more games to go, and the score between humans vs. Fritz 19 is now 1.5 to 1.5, after Robert Ris conquered the aggressive bull. Svitlana Demchenko's opponent is the turtle, an endgame aficionado. This animal is considered one of the more challenging Fritz 19 characters, and difficult to break. In the Sicilian Kan Variation, the Canadian WIM cannot really advance, until a material imbalance shows up out of nowhere! But things aren't getting easier ...

10/29/2023 – Svitlana is taking us through the Panov Attack against the Caro-Kann Defence. The aggressive opening turns out to be an ambitious variation, full of attacking potential, if you can live with an isolated queen pawn. The basics are well explained, and should motivate you to look a bit deeper into this surprising Caro-Kann counter.

10/16/2023 – One of the strongest national chess tournaments is still running, and it looks as if Fabiano Caruana can win the US Championship trophy in 2023. Svitlana found some exciting tactics and invites everybody to guess the correct, or best move. Especially the women's section was not shying back!

10/9/2023 – Svitlana Demchenko celebrated her 20th birthday recently, marking this year's World Junior Championship in Mexico as her final appearance. She enjoyed the tournament atmosphere, and met many chess friends. In this episode, she shows us a well-prepared Italian Game.

9/14/2023 – Fabiano Caruana had to face the underdog Nijat Abasov in the match for third place at the Baku World Cup. In round 8.2, the US player made a fairly unknown move in the Four Knights Sicilian, by moving the bishop to f4. Svitlana offers insights into various variations arising from this opening. The endgame provides valuable lessons as well!

9/8/2023 – In 2004, Vladimir Kramnik and Peter Leko played a match for the World Championship. After a nail-biting series of games, the match ended in a 7-7 draw, with Kramnik retaining his title by winning the 14th game on demand. But Svitlana shows us one of the two wins by Leko (who, incidentally, is celebrating his birthday today!) - a fascinating game with an interesting side story.

8/21/2023 – In today's episode, Honorata shows us how an attack is set for success if all pieces work together. Emanuel Lasker's game was considered one of the most beautiful attacks in chess history, and you are about to find out why. We want to point out that Svitlana Demchenko also made an episode about this sacrifice, which we added to our links — so you can watch two experts analysing the same game!

8/18/2023 – In July, Svitlana participated in the open section of the 2023 Canadian Junior Chess Championship, and faced some tough opponents. Impressively, she managed to reach the overall third place and added one more trophy to her collection. In addition, she will travel to Mexico for the World Junior Championship!

8/12/2023 – During the FIDE World Cup, Magnus Carlsen and Humpy Koneru fought back brilliantly, and moved to the tiebreaks instead of taking the next flight home. How do world-class players actually manage to achieve such great comebacks? Svitlana shows us the three golden rules of how you can strike back in a "must-win" situation!