7/3/2018 – Tuesdays at 18:00 CEST (5:00 pm UK time, Noon EDT) Lawrence Trent goes on air on Playchess.com. In his show, Lawrence will be dealing with the latest trends, games and combinations from elite chess tournaments. This week features GM Cristian Chirila's exploits in Las Vegas...playing chess of course!

6/3/2018 – The Land of Sky is a traditional tournament in Ashville, North Carolina. ChessBase contributing Grandmaster ALEX YERMOLINSKY made the treck, and (belatedly) tells the tale as part of his ongoing "travelogue" series of stories. A figurative snapshot of open tournament life in the USA, plus an actual snapshot of the 'Yermomobile', Yermolinsky's car!

5/21/2018 – More than twenty Grandmasters including the World Championship Challenger Fabiano Caruana (pictured playing tandem blitz) came together in New York on Sunday for the 2nd annual event, a day of quad tournaments, GM blitz, simuls, and other special events. The proceeds from the event will go to Mount Sinai Hospital Ovarian Cancer Translational Research Laboratory. Last year's donation to another cancer charity exceeded $20,000! GM Maxim Dlugy was the blitz winner. | Photo: Vanessa Sun

4/29/2018 – Both Sam Shankland and Fabiano Caruana won crucial tenth round games. Caruana came out swinging with the black pieces, going for a Sicilian, while Shankland played the last placed but still dangerous Alexander Onischuk. ALEX YERMOLINSKY looks at the key games of the round. With one more to play Shankland is tantalizingly close to his first U.S. Championship victory, but Caruana remains close behind. Annie Wang easily drew with multi-time U.S. Women's Champ Anna Zatonskih and remains a half point up on Nazi Paikidze. But while Wang has black in the final round, Paikidze will have white against Rusa Goletiani, which should make for an exciting conclusion. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

4/28/2018 – On the surface, the round was a quiet one, with eleven draws out of the twelve games in both events, but things were not so simple. More than a few games seemed likely to leave a body behind, but this was not counting the defenders desire to not lose. Sam Shankland had a promising position against Fabiano Caruana with an extra pawn, but never quite built it up enough to win. Both Women’s leaders Nazi Paikidze and Annie Wang were dead lost in their games, but lived to fight another day. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

4/27/2018 – Sam Shankland and Fabiano Caruana both drew and remain tied after a tumultuous round in St. Louis. Ray Robson and Alex Lenderman scored full points with Robson's win coming after 144 moves over Varuzhan Akobian. In the women's championship, a whopping six decisive games, including another win from Annie Wang who scored a big point against Irina Krush and retains her full point edge, with just three rounds to go. |Photos: Lennart Ootes

4/26/2018 – Leader Sam Shankland played a calm draw against Wesley So, in the seventh round of the US championship, and remains at the top, but he was joined by Fabiano Caruana who scored his fourth win, defeating Varuzhan Akobian. So, meanwhile, had time for some fun trash-talk, giving all the commentators a good time during the live-broadcast, don't miss it! In another surprise, the "favorites fright" Zviad Izoria defeated Hikaru Nakamura. Annie Wang won once again in the Women's and now has a full point edge. After round six, players were invited to a party dubbed "Chess After Dark", abd the next day they gave simultaneous exhibitons against local students. | Photos: Lennart Ootes

4/25/2018 – The World Chess Hall of Fame and Museum, which opened across the street from the Saint Louis Chess Club in September, 2011, has long boasted of having the "world's largest chess piece" outside its front door. King ‘Kong’, as it was known, was massive and many doubted the record — officially sanctioned by Guinness World Records — would ever be broken. But in 2014, St. Louis were bested by a small town in Belgium! Now they've taken the record back. | Photo: Austin Fuller

4/20/2018 – The 2018 edition of Final Four of Collegiate Chess was held from March 30th to April 1st at the Marshall Chess Club in New York City. This edition was also touted as the strongest Final Four in history, as out of a total of 22 players, there were 18 grandmasters! The University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) team (pictured) was the surprising winner, taking their first collegiate chess title. | Pictured: Vladimir Belous, Andrey Stukopin, Kamil Dragun, Bartlomiej Macieja (coach) Dr. Douglas Stoves (manager), Hovhannes Gabuzyan, Carlos Antonio Alejano Hevia | Photo: Paul Truong

2/21/2018 – PRESS RELEASE: Five Chess Legends Selected as 2018 Inductees to U.S. and World Chess Halls of Fame to be Honored in Saint Louis. Induction Ceremony Will Kick Off the 2018 U.S. and U.S. Women’s Chess Championships. | Pictured: (left) Aron Nimzowitsch circa 1924 (right) Alex Onischuk in 2015 | Photo: Lennart Ootes

2/16/2018 – The Saint Louis Chess Club hosted the 2018 Saint Louis Norm Congress, from February 8th to 13th. The tournament features invited players from outside the USA to ensure Grandmaster and International Master title norm opportunities. Pavlo Vorontsov (Ukraine, 2548), the top seed in the GM tournament (pictured left), won clear first, while the IM tournament Sergei Matsenko (pictured right) dominated! | Photos: Austin Fuller

12/31/2017 – The Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championships (Pan-Am) concluded Saturday, December 30th, 2017, with Webster University becoming Pan-Am champions. Qualifying for the President’s Cup (the “Final Four of College Chess”) are the following schools: Webster University, Saint Louis University (2nd place), Texas Tech University (3rd place), and The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (4th place). | Pictured: Webster’s “A” team with Coaches FM Truong and GM Polgar and the organizer of the Pan-Am Kelly Bloomfield. | Photo: A. Root

12/30/2017 – The Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championships (Pan-Am) had one dispute and several close matches in rounds 4 and 5. Despite announcements before each round to leave cell phones back in hotel rooms, in round 4 the Michigan “B” team forfeited a game because of a cell phone. Also in round 4, Webster’s “A” team and SLU’s “A” team notched 2½ : 1½ victories over their opponents. Thus, by Friday afternoon, both Webster “A” and SLU had won four out of four matches. In round 5, Webster “A” defeated SLU 2.5-1.5. The only other team entering round 5 with four match wins, the UTRGV “A” team, lost. Therefore Webster “A” is the only team with 5 out of 5 match wins going into the sixth and final round on Saturday morning. Pictured: Shimanov and Kovalyov | Photo: A. Root

12/29/2017 – Round three of the Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championships (Pan-Am) in Columbus, Ohio, ended on Thursday night, December 28th. As expected, the seven highest-rated teams have won every match thus far. There have been surprises, such as Webster University changing its “A” team lineup. However, the Pan-Am is not all about the top-rated teams. There are players and teams playing in their first Pan-Am who will grab your attention, such as Northwest University (pictured) Walter Borbridge (Board 3), Elliott Neff (Coach), Benjamin Mukumbya (Board 1), Phiona Mutesi (Board 2), Andrew Uptain (Board 4), Joseph Castleberry (Northwest University President) | Photo: A. Root

12/27/2017 – The Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championships (Pan-Am) is December 27-30. Since there are 64 squares on the chess board and this tournament is being held for the 64th time, the players and the organiser anticipate a memorable event. In this first of four reports, WIM Alexey Root interviews Grandmaster Razvan Preotu of The University of Texas at Dallas and the organiser of the 2017 Pan-Am, Mr. Kelly M. Bloomfield. Games will be available at the organiser’s web site, and at Live.ChessBase.com

11/14/2017 – Today, the Champions Showdown in St. Louis will end. Ding Liren and Magnus Carlsen will play 12 blitz games with a time-control of 5 minutes for the whole game. After three days Carlsen leads by 50-18 and thus secured the match. Even if Ding Liren won all 12 blitz games today he would not catch up. But no matter the result, 12 high-class blitz games are still worth watching. The games begin at 18:00 CET (11 am in Saint Louis) on Tuesday. You can follow the action live.

11/12/2017 – Day 4 featured impressive comebacks from both Caruana and So, who won their respective matches. Meanwhile Nakamura had locked up his $60,000 winner's prize already with nine games to spare! Carlsen put the the screws to Ding in the Game 20 portion of their match and has a sizeable lead. Three matches are in the books but the fourth continues Monday and Tuesday in Saint Louis, USA. Games begin at 20:00 CET (1 pm in Saint Louis) Monday, and at 18:00 CET (11 am in Saint Louis) on Tuesday.

11/1/2017 – Recently, the 2017 Spice Cup was held in St. Louis, Missouri, and won by Lazaro Bruzon Batista, Yunieska Quesada, and Dariusz Swiercz. This traditional event is organised by Webster University, also home to the strongest collegiate team in the US. It brought players from around the globe, including a field rich in titled players. Among them was our correspondent Alex Yermolinsky, who performed well, and brings his report with some fantastic games and notes. Not to be missed! | Photo: Paul Truong

10/14/2017 – Grandmaster Bill Lombardy died in California on Friday morning, of a likely heart attack. Lombardy was the World Junior Champion in 1957 (the first American to win that title) scoring a perfect 11-0, a performance that has never been repeated. He shared first at the U.S. Open Championship three times (1963, 1965 and 1975). But he is perhaps best known as a coach of Bobby Fischer. Lombardy was with Fischer throughout the 1972 World Championship match in Reykjavik. He would have turned 80 years old in December.

10/11/2017 – A new exhibit at the World Chess Hall of Fame in Saint Louis puts a new twist on the question of professional chess player dress codes. In cooperation with the Saint Louis Fashion Fund, the museum launched a "Designer Chess Challenge" which paired up professional fashion designers with chess pros to craft a chic but practical tournament outfit. The results are on display in "PINNED!", which opened October 6th and runs until Spring, 2018. | Designer Photos: Geoff Story, TOKY | Chess photos: Austin Fuller, Matt Kile, and Spectrum Studios

10/3/2017 – Ten days ago we proposed a contest to "fix" the cover of New Scientist magazine's September 23rd issue, which featured a fictitious illustration of President Trump squaring off against North Korea's Kim Jong Un, in what was dubbed 'Endgame'. The position was nonsensical. Of the many creative suggestions, here are our favourites. | Illustration: Robert Carter (crackedhat.com)

9/29/2017 – German GM Georg Meier narrowly won the A-group of the latest invitational tournament hosted by the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis. The tournament brought together 20 GMs and IMs in two sections. In the B-group GM Josh Friedel secured tournament victory with an impressive 6½/9 score. Grandmaster Ruifeng Li was there, and sends his account of the round-by-round action. | Photos: Austin Fuller, CCSCSL

9/23/2017 – The September 23rd issue of New Scientist magazine has a striking cover illustration featuring President Trump squaring off against the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, in what one presumes is a high stakes chess game with nuclear tipped missiles. While visually impressive, the position makes absolutely no sense. Why can't a major magazine using chess as a geopolitical metaphor make a tiny effort to have the game presented coherently? It was a missed opportunity, and I think ChessBase readers can do better. Here's your chance to propose an alternative. | Illustration: Robert Carter (crackedhat.com)

9/18/2017 – The next stop in GM Alex Yermolinsky summer chess journey took him to the mighty State of Iowa where the 63rd edition of the Iowa Open was held. The number alone commands respect for longevity and tradition, and as he explains, there are good reasons. Instead of focusing on seeing it as an example of growing suburbia, we are shown the scenic views, and reasons why players return year after year | Photos: Alex Yermolinsky