London Chess Classic 2010

Magnus Carlsen won the first place at the 2010 edition of the London Chess Classic.

Though Viswanathan Anand and Luke Mc Shane had tied with Carlsen at 4.5 points after 7 games (also Anand and McShane defeated Carlsen!), Carlsen was declared the winner due to the tiebreak system (greater number of blacks). The sofia system of scoring (3 points for win and 1 point for draw) led to a high percentage of fighting games.

Official Tournament Site
Download games in PGN and a Free Souvenir article in PDF
Reports on Chessbase and TWIC

63rd Russian Championship

Ian Nepomniachtchi is the new Russian Men's Champion. In an exciting final, he defeated Sergey Karjakin to win the event.

This year's event was held from Dec 11-22 at the Central Club of Chess in Moscow and was a 11 round all-play-all event with a time control of 40 moves in 90 minutes, followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the game, and a 30 second increment for every move throughout the game. It carried a prizefund of 3.5 million rubles.

Though 71% of the games were drawn, the event had an exciting finish with Karjakin and Nepomniachtchi catching up with Svidler at the top of the leaderboard towards the final stages of the tournament.


Official Tournament Site (in russian)
Download games in PGN: Regular + Tiebreak
Tournament Reports on TWIC
Ian Nepomniachtchi on Wiki & ChessGames

Chessbase Puzzles

Click here for the Homepage of all Chessbase Puzzles

Anand - praise from a mentor

Read this very touching article by World Champion Anand's mentor and spanish parent, Mauricio Perea.

In this is explained how the Perea couple first met Anand, how they came close to him and why they consider him like their son.

ChessBase Christmas Puzzles 2010

Check the Christmas Puzzles composed by Dr John Nunn

Behind each of the following date-images you will find a separate set of puzzles, one per day from Christmas to the New Year. The first for 25th is a Help-mate.

Simple Checkmates - King+2Rooks vs King

This is the simplest checkmate.

1. Both the Rooks give check file-by-file or rank-by-rank.
2. If any Rook is attacked, go to the other side of the respective rank or file.

Other Simple Checkmates on CWBlog: K+Q vs K, K+R vs K

Bishop Pair

The Bishop is an attacking piece and when both colour Bishops get together, it forms an effective unit in both offense and defense.

This is referred to as having the Double bishop advantage and if the centre is open or semi-open it is even more formidable.

2 Instructive wins on this topic: Capablanca & Kramnik
Check an excellent example online here
View this great video on the power of Bishop Pair
Another good example from Georgi Orlov

Sethuraman is India's youngest GM

Sethuraman P (born 1993) of Tamil Nadu became India's youngest Grandmaster at the age of 17 years.

He secured the title by winning the recently concluded Voivoda's Cup International Chess tournament at Legnica, Poland.

Click here to read the TOI Report

Sethuraman on ChessGames

Game of the Century

Bobby Fischer, regarded as one of the greatest chess players of all time has played many famous games.

At the age of 13, when he brilliantly defeated his strong opponent, who was one of America's leading chess masters, it caused a sensation.

A spectacular Queen sacrifice followed by a series of discovered checks earned this game the title of "Game of the Century".

Game of the Century on Wiki & ChessGames
Download PGN of this game

White: Donald Byrne
Black: R.J. Fischer

New York Rosenwald 1956, (Round 8)
Gruenfeld Defense
1. Nf3 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. d4 O-O 5. Bf4 d5 6. Qb3 dxc4 7. Qxc4 c6 8. e4 Nbd7 9. Rd1 Nb6 10. Qc5 Bg4 11. Bg5 Na4 12. Qa3 Nxc3 13. bxc3 Nxe4 14. Bxe7 Qb6 15. Bc4 Nxc3 16. Bc5 Rfe8 17. Kf1 Be6 18. Bxb6 Bxc4 19. Kg1 Ne2 20. Kf1 Nxd4 21. Kg1 Ne2 22. Kf1 Nc3 23. Kg1 axb6 24. Qb4 Ra4 25. Qxb6 Nxd1 26. h3 Rxa2 27. Kh2 Nxf2 28. Re1 Rxe1 29. Qd8 Bf8 30. Nxe1 Bd5 31. Nf3 Ne4 32. Qb8 b5 33. h4 h5 34. Ne5 Kg7 35. Kg1 Bc5 36. Kf1 Ng3 37. Ke1 Bb4 38. Kd1 Bb3 39. Kc1 Ne2 40. Kb1 Nc3 41. Kc1 Rc2# 0-1

Rook on the 7th Rank

OpenFile --> Rook --> 7th Rank
The Rook on the 7th Rank is a very strong piece which can dominate the position. The opponent pawns can be attacked from the enemy back rank and also in the Endgame, the enemy King can be restricted from coming out.

An Instructive Game where the power of Rook on the 7th Rank is illustrated:
Capablanca (1-0) Tartakower, New York 1924

Mark Dvoretsky Interview

Mark Dvoretsky is a famous chess coach and author.

Below is a very instructive interview in which he answers questions from visitors of the Chessvibes site.

Part 1 of the Interview -- Part 2 of the Interview

Dvoretsky on Wiki & ChessGames

Alisa Galliamova wins Russian Womens SuperFinal

Alisa Galliamova is the 60th Russian Women's Champion.

The Superfinal is the round robin final stage of the National championship that was held in Moscow.

After 11 rounds, along with Alisa Galliamova, Natalia Pogonina and Tatiana Kosintseva were tied with 7 points. Galliamova and Pogonina had the same tie-break score, so they played a 2-game tie-break blitz. The first game was a draw and Alisa managed to win the second game to retain the championship.


Reports: ChessBase, TWIC
Download all games in PGN
Alisa on Wiki & ChessGames

DRAW

When both White and Black cannot win in a game, the result is a Draw.

There are 6 ways in which a game can become a Draw.

1. Insufficient Material
- When both White and Black cannot checkmate each other.
Example - K vs K, K+B vs K, K+N vs K
2. Stalemate
- No check
- No other possible move
3. Perpetual Check
- Continous checks
- No Checkmate
4. 3 Times Repetition
- If any position is repeated 3 times continously (photographic repetition), a Draw can be claimed.
5. 50 Move Rule
- Set of 50 moves (1 white move + 1 black move = 1 move) does not have any Pawn moves and does not have any captures, a Draw can be claimed.
6. Mutual Agreement
- Both players agree to a Draw.

Details on Wiki & ChessInvasion

World Blitz Championship

Levon Aronian won the World Blitz Championship at Moscow scoring 24.5 points in 38 rounds. Second as Teimour Radjabov with 24 points and Third was Magnus Carlsen with 23.5 points.

Download all games in PGN

View some excellent videos alongside the Game Viewer: Videos1 & Videos2

Reports: ChessBase & TWIC

Official Tournament Site

Harika wins Bronze at Asiad

D Harika of India won the Bronze medal in the Individual event at the 16th Asian Games, Guangzhou – China.

Her score in 9 rounds was 6.5 points (win, loss, win, win, win, draw, draw, draw & win) and included a draw with the top-seed, Hou Yifan.

Individual Event Results for Women:
Gold – Hou Yifan (China)
Silver – Zhao Xue (China)
Bronze – Harika Dronavalli (India)

Individual Event Results for Men:
Gold – Rustam Kasimdzhanov (Uzbekistan)
Silver – Le Quang Liem (Vietnam)
Bronze – Bu Xiangzhi (China)

Reports on ChessBase & TWIC
Download games in PGN: Men & Women
Official Site

Larry Evans is no more

Larry Evans passed away on Nov 15th in Reno, Nevada.

He was a popular American Grandmaster who had won or shared US Chess Championship 5 times and US Open Chess Championship 4 times.

He was Fischer's second for the Candidates matches leading to the World Championship of 1972.

Also, he was a noted writer and has authored several chess books ("This Crazy World of Chess" is one of his entertaining books). He had also founded the American Chess Quarterly and was editor of Chess Digest. His weekly column, "Evans on Chess" in Chess Life ran for over 30 years.

Eulogies - ChessLife, ChessBase, Huffington Post & TWIC
Larry Evans on ChessGames
Larry Evans on Wiki

Aronian and Karjakin win Tal Memorial

Levon Aronian and Sergey Karjakin were the joint winners of the Tal Memorial tournament which concluded in Moscow, yesterday.

Both the above players and Shakiyar Mamedyarov tied for top spot with 5.5 points in 9 rounds, but Mamedyarov was third place with a lower tie-break score.

The historic tournament was a 9 round round robin event between 10 of the top players of the world. Three players had a 2800+ performance and 45 games were played in total.

Official Tournament Site

Download all games in PGN

ChessBase-Report, TWIC-Report

World Problem Solving Championship

GM John Nunn won the World Chess Problem Solving Championship 2010.

The event this year was held in Greece in October and attracted 71 participants from various countries. The championship has 6 rounds spread over 2 days with each round having a particular type of problem to be solved within a time limit.

Download the Bulletin with Results, Problems and Solutions (PDF document)

Read John Nunn's article on this event - with Solutions

Detailed Report can be found here

More Info on Wiki

Two Knights Endgame

The Endgame K+N+N vs K is a Draw.

If the player with the lone king plays correctly, it is not possible to corner him to the corner. For example:
White: Kg6, Ne5, Nf5
Black: Kg8
White to play

1. Nf5-e7+ Kg8-f8
(here if black plays the blunder 1......Kg8-h8?? then white can give mate with Ne5-f7#)
After Kg8-f8, white cannot force the black king to the corner and black can claim a draw after the 50th move.

More on this endgame on Wiki

Youngest ever Chess GM

The record for the youngest ever Chess Grandmaster is held by Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine when he achieved the title in 2002 at the age of 12 years and 7 months.

The youngest ever female player to achieve the Grandmaster title is Hou Yifan of China in 2008 at the age of 14 years and 6 months.

The youngest Indian Grandmaster is Parimarjan Negi when he achieved the title in 2001 at the age of 13 years and 142 days.

Youngest ever GMs
--------------------------
==Name== :: ==Country== :: ==Age== :: ==Year Achieved==
Sergey Karjakin :: Ukraine :: 12 years 7 months :: 2002
Bu Xiangzhi :: China :: 13 years 10 months 13 days :: 1999
Ruslan Ponomariov :: Ukraine :: 14 years 17 days :: 1997
Etienne Bacrot :: France :: 14 years 2 months :: 1997
Peter Leko :: Hungary :: 14 years 4 months 22 days :: 1994
Judit Polgar :: Hungary :: 15 years 4 months 28 days :: 1991
Bobby Fischer :: USA :: 15 years 6 months 1 day :: 1958

Youngest ever woman player to be GM
-------------------------------------------------
==Name== :: ==Country== :: ==Age== :: ==Year Achieved==
Hou Yifan :: China :: 14 years 6 months :: 2008
Koneru Humpy :: India :: 15 years 1 month :: 2002

Magnus wins Nanjing Super GM Chess Tournament

Magnus Carlsen won the Nanjing 2010 super-GM tournament with an unbeaten score of 7 points in 10 games. He had been the winner previously in 2009 and this year the win was more convincing with a round to spare.

World Champion Vishy Anand came second with 6 points while Etienne Bacrot was third with 5 points.

The tournament was a 10 round double round-robin event in which each player played every other player twice with alternate colours.

Official Tournament Site
Download all Games in PGN

GM Alik Gershon breaks simul World Record

GM Alik Gershon of Israel created a Guinness Record for maximum number of simul games. He played 523 players in Rabin square in Tel Aviv, Iran and won 454 games, 58 draws and just 11 losses (86% in total) which met the required 80% norm to the Guinness record. The event lasted 18 hours and 30 minutes and this achievement is all the more remarkable since it was in the 30 plus degrees of highly humid summer of Tel Aviv.

The players were from all ages with the youngest at 5 and oldest at 84 years. The event was organized by the Israeli Chess Federation with the co-operation of Tel Aviv municipality to celebrate 20 years of blessed Aliya from the former Soviet Union and its contribution to life.

Watch a video of this event in YouTube below

Kramnik wins Shanghai-Bilbao Chess Masters

Vladimir Kramnik scored a tremendous victory at the Shanghai-Bilbao Chess Masters tournament. World Champion Vishy Anand came second and Magnus Carlsen was third in this 6 round double all-play-all event.

Official Tournament Site

Download all games in PGN

En-Passant

En-Passant is a special rule only for pawns. One pawn --> on starting Rank --> for its first move, it moves 2 squares Opponent pawn --> 2 Ranks away & on the next File --> can capture The only condition is that it must be captured when you have the chance to do so. You cannot capture En-Passant after playing some other move in-between. En-Passant on Wiki

enPassant on my Lichess study

Rules of Chess

The official Rules of Chess as per the FIDE Handbook is below:

Laws of Chess for Over the Board Play + Appendices

Chess Equipment

Tournament Rules

Swiss System Rules

Full Handbook

Details on Wiki

Pawn Promotion

When any Pawn reaches the last rank, it must be promoted to a new piece. Any pawn can be promoted to either the Queen, Rook, Bishop or Knight but not the King. Usually the Queen is taken because it is the strongest piece. Pawn Promotion on Wiki

Pawn Promotion on my Lichess study

Rules of Castling

Castling is a special rule only for King and Rooks. There are 2 ways of castling:

King-side castling - with King-Rook

Queen-side castling - with Queen-Rook

King --> moves 2 squares

Rook --> moves to the other side of the King

Rules

1. The King and castling Rook should not have moved in the game before.

2. There should not be any piece in-between the King and castling Rook.

3. When Check is given, you cannot castle.

4. If the King would come in Check after castling, you cannot castle.

5. If the King would come in Check in-between castling, you cannot castle.

Castling on Wiki

Importance of the Centre

The 4 squares around the middle point of the chess-board (e4, d4, e5, d5) are called as the Centre.

The Centre is a very important area on the board because any piece or pawn becomes stronger and can control more space when it comes to the Centre.

So, to get a good position, try to occupy and control the Centre.

Centre Control on Wiki

Chess Links

Online Playing
ICC :: ChessCube :: Chess :: ChessHere :: InstantChess :: Lichess

Information
ChessBase :: TWIC :: ChessCafe :: NewInChess :: ChessOPolis :: ChessCorner :: ChessDom :: ChessManiac :: ChessVibes

Turn-based Chess
ChessWorld :: RedHotPawn :: GameKnot

Chess Blogs
ChessworldIn :: SusanPolgar

Online Database
ChessGames :: LaMecca :: ChessLab :: ECODb :: ChessLive :: OpeningsDb

Official
FIDE :: AICF :: KCA

Correspondence
ICCF :: AICCF

General
WorldChampions :: ChessResults :: ChessVideos :: EnPassant

Tactics Practice
ChessTempo :: IdeaChess :: ChessTactics :: CTS :: WikiBooks :: Top10 :: MCB :: ChessEBook :: Exeter :: TotalChess :: TopPDF :: TacticsServer

Chess playing Programs
ChessCentral :: Fritz 5.32 :: FreeChess :: Pawn

ICA Chess Tournament - Final Standings

Below are the Final Standings of the ICA Chess Tournament conducted on 5th September 2010 at Rajajinagar, Bangalore.

Click here to view the Photographs of this event

Place/Name /Score/Progr.
--------------------------------------
1 /SUMAN RAMESH /6 / 21.0
2 /SUJITH RAMESH /5 / 19.0
3 /HAZUIN HUSSAIN /5 / 16.0
4 /MADHUCHANDRA G /4 / 17.0
5 /ASHRIT RM /4 / 15.0
6 /NARAYAN R /4 / 15.0
7 /AMOGH VARDHAN /4 / 14.0
8 /MAHANTESH C /4 / 14.0
9 /SHREYAS RAO /4 / 13.0
10 /RASHMI DEV /3.5 / 15.0
11 /AUSHIM N /3.5 / 14.0
12 /EASHWAR NS /3.5 / 12.0
13 /ANISH K /3.5 / 10.0
14 /NAGASHREE R /3 / 12.0
15 /ROHIT RM /3 / 11.0
16 /ASHWIN KV /3 / 10.0
17 /ROHIT MG /3 / 8.0
18 /SAIDARSHAN /3 / 8.0
19 /ANAHITHA S /3 / 8.0
20 /ABHISHEK D /3 / 7.0
21 /VAISHNAVI I /3 / 7.0
22 /NAVEEN K /2.5 / 6.0
23 /ANUSHKA JAIN /2 / 10.0
24 /SHRADDHA B /2 / 9.0
25 /ANIL R KASHYAP /2 / 8.0
26 /JHOSH JORDAN /2 / 6.0
27 /ABHISHEK P /2 / 5.0
28 /AKASH IR /2 / 5.0
29 /SIYA /2 / 4.0
30 /SATYAVELU K /2 / 3.0
31 /RAKESH P /1.5 / 6.0
32 /SUDARSHINI V /1 / 5.0
33 /PALLAVI NAGESH /1 / 5.0
34 /VARSHINI V /0 / 0.0

Carlsen beats Anand

Magnus Carlsen continued his fantastic run of victories with yet another first place at the Arctic Securities Chess Stars tournament.

In the final, he defeated World Champion Anand 1.5 – 0.5 in a set of 2 rapid games (20m+10s). Though Anand had impressed in the qualifying games, this result was a setback for Anand after winning the World Championship against Topalov.

In the first game, playing Black, Anand set up a solid structure in the opening, but later blundered a pawn. Anand was stuck with a very passive position which Carlsen skillfully converted to a full point in his favour.

The second game had Anand with White, but he could not make much progress against Carlsen’s defense and agreed to a draw on move 28.

Click here for a detailed report
Download all games of the Final in PGN

Mikhail Tal

Mikhail Tal was the greatest attacking Grandmaster of all time.

Born in Riga, Latvia on Nov 9, 1936, he learned chess while watching his father. In 1951 he qualified for the Latvian championship and by 1954 became a Soviet Master. By winning the Soviet Championship in 1957, he got the title of Grandmaster.

He defeated Botvinnik in the famous 1960 match to become the youngest (till then) World Champion at the age of 23. His highest ELO rating was 2705 achieved in 1980.

Tal won several strong tournaments like Bled 1961, Hastings 1963, Tbilisi 1969, Novi Sad 1974, Montreal 1979 and Buenos Aires 1991.

His playing style was magical. He often sacrificed material for attack and created vast complications in which his opponents would get lost. During his later years, he adopted a more positional style.

He was troubled by health problems throughout the better part of his career, which seriously affected his chess results. Every time he would recover and score another victory.

He was also a profilific journalist of repute (editor of Latvian chess magazine) and authored some famous chess books (Life and Games of Tal). He was a popular person among fellow masters who would be obsessed with blitz chess even during free time.

He died of kidney failure on June 28, 1992 in Moscow.

Tal on Wiki & Chessgames
Best Games of Tal
Play through over 3000 games of Tal

Check this win over Spassky which was awarded the Brilliancy Prize

Immortal Game

White: Adolf Anderssen 

Black: Lionel Kieseritzky 

London 1851 

Kings gambit accepted 

 1.e4 e5 

2.f4 exf4 

3.Bc4 Qh4+ 

4.Kf1 b5 

5.Bxb5 Nf6 

6.Nf3 Qh6 

7.d3 Nh5 

8.Nh4 Qg5 

9.Nf5 c6 

10.g4 Nf6 

11.Rg1 cxb5 

12.h4 Qg6 

13.h5 Qg5 

14.Qf3 Ng8 

15.Bxf4 Qf6 

16.Nc3 Bc5 

17.Nd5 Qxb2 

18.Bd6 Bxg1 

19.e5 Qxa1+ 

20.Ke2 Na6 

21.Nxg7+ Kd8 

22.Qf6+ Nxf6 

23.Be7+ 

1-0 

Play through Immortal game on my Lichess study 

Immortal game on Wiki & ChessGames 

Play through the game on Chess.com 

Download the game in PGN  

Also see the Evergreen Game by Anderssen

World Junior Chess Championship 2010

Dmitry Andreikin of Russia and Anna Muzychuk of Slovenia won the Boys and Girls events at the prestigious World Junior Chess Championships respectively.

The tournament took place in Chotowa, Poland between 3rd to 16th August and had 13 rounds of swiss league. 122 participants were in the Boys event and 81 in the Girls event.

Dmitry was the top seed and tied for top place with fellow russian Sanan Sjugirov; he was declared winner on tie-break. Dariusz Swiercz of Poland playing on home turf took the bronze medal. Parimarjan Negi of India was placed 11th in the open event.

Anna dominated the girls event. Despite the loss to Deysi Estela of Peru, she won the event with 11/13. Olga Girya of Russia was second while Padmini Rout of India was third.

Official Tournament page
Detailed info - Boys & Girls
Download all Games in PGN

Hou Yifan wins Women’s Grand Prix

Hou Yifan of China won the 5th FIDE Women’s Grand Prix Chess Tournament 2010 at Ulaanbataar in Mongolia.

Hou topped the field with 8 points out of 11 rounds, a clear half point ahead of Antoaneta Stefanova who ended with 7.5 points. Koneru Humpy from India played well and ended 5th with 6.5 points.

In the final round Hou faced Antoaneta and needed just a draw to clinch first place. Antoaneta needed to win to overtake Hou for first place; after a tough game, a draw was the result.

Hou remained undefeated throughout the tournament and in the interview said that her main goal was to play well and not worry about the result. She said the first round game with Kosintseva where she survived a very dangerous position was the most difficult game for her in the tournament and was happy to have won this event.

Click here to find the official tournament site
Click here for final standings and round-by-round results
Click here to find Hou Yifan on Wiki

Below is a game from Round 3 in which Hou defeats Xu in a sparkling game.
White: Hou Yifan
Black: Xu Yuhua
1. e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 c5 4.Ngf3 cxd4 5.exd5 Qxd5 6.Bc4 Qd6 7.0-0 Nf6 8.Nb3 Nc6 9.Nfxd4 Nxd4 10.Nxd4 a6 11.Re1 Bd7 12.Bg5 0-0-0 13.Re3 Bc6 14.Rd3 Be4 15.Rd2 Qc7 16.Nxe6 Rxd2 17.Qxd2 Qd6 18.Nxf8 Qxd2 19.Bxd2 Rxf8 20.f3 Bg6 21.c3 Rd8 22.Be3 Nd5 23.Bd4 Nf4 24.Re1 b5 25.Bf1 Nd3 26.Re2 Nc1 27.Rd2 Nxa2 28.Be3 Rxd2 29.Bxd2 Kb7 30.Kf2 Kc6 31.Ke3 a5 32.b4 axb4 33.cxb4 f6 34.Kd4 Bf7 35.Bd3 h5 36.h4 g6 37.g3 g5 38.f4 g4 39.Be4+ Kd6 40.Bc2 Kc6 41.Bd3 1-0

Immortal Zugzwang game

White: Friedrich Saemisch
Black: Aron Nimzowitsch

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nf3 b6 4. g3 Bb7 5. Bg2 Be7 6. Nc3 O-O
7. O-O d5 8. Ne5 c6 9. cxd5?! cxd5 10. Bf4 a6 11. Rc1 b5
12. Qb3 Nc6 13. Nxc6 Bxc6 14. h3? Qd7 15. Kh2 Nh5
16. Bd2 f5! 17. Qd1 b4! 18. Nb1 Bb5 19. Rg1 Bd6 20. e4 fxe4!
21. Qxh5 Rxf2 22. Qg5 Raf8 23. Kh1 R8f5 24. Qe3 Bd3
25. Rce1 h6!!
0-1
Check the video on the above Immortal Zugzwang game

Aron Nimzowitsch

Aron Nimzowitsch was the most famous of Hypermodern chess masters. He was born in Riga in 1886 into a wealthy family. He learnt chess from his father and chose a career of professional chess player in 1904. The next few years saw him score several important tournament wins.

During the 1917 revolution, Nimzowitsch escaped to Berlin and after a few years to Copenhagen, where he lived the rest of his life.

His chess career was at a peak in the late 1920s and early 1930s. He became the third best player in the world during this time (behind Alekhine and Capablanca). Among his notable achievements were first place at Copenhagen 1923, Marienbad 1925, Dresden 1926, Hannover 1926 and Carlsbad 1929.

He is recognized as one of the greatest writers in chess. His works influenced numerous other players; the book "My System" written in 1925 is one of the most important books on chess strategy, even today. Concepts such as 'overprotection', control of the centre by pieces, 'blockade' and 'prophylaxis' were first discovered and elaborated by him. He was also the leading advocate and exponent of the fianchetto development of the bishops.

His death came early at the age of 49, in 1935, when he was bedridden for several months before succumbing to pneumonia.

Click here to find a site dedicated entirely to Nimzowitsch
Click here to find Nimzowitsch on Wiki
Click here for the Immortal Zugzwang game won by Nimzowitsch

Czech Open 2010

Anton Korobov won the Grandmaster event of the Czech Open in a convincing manner, ahead of 38 GMs and 54 IMs, with a score of 8/9.

The tournament was the 21st edition of international chess and games festival with dozens of tournaments, and brought 1314 players from 44 countries.

Click here for Final Standings, many nice photographs and few sample games by the winner

Click here to download all games in PGN

British Chess Championship 2010

The British 2010 championships began on 26th July (Monday) at Canterbury, Kent. It is organized by English Chess Federation and concludes on August 7th.

More than 800 players are participating in various categories. The Senior group has top seed Mickey Adams (FIDE 2706) with 77 other strong players in this 7 round tournament.

After 4 rounds, Adams leads the table with 4 points. The games are transmitted live on the Internet, starting at 6.45 PM India time.

Click here for the official website for this championship

Check the below game in which Adams crushed Eames.
WHITE: Robert Eames (2287)
BLACK: Michael Adams (2706)
1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3.Bc4 d5 4.Bxd5 Nf6 5.Nf3 Nxd5 6.exd5 Qxd5 7.Nc3 Qf5 8.0-0 Nc6 9.d4 Be6 10.Ne2 g5 11.b3 0-0-0 12.Bb2 Bg7 13.c4 g4 14.Ne1 f3 15.gxf3 Rhg8 16.f4 g3 17.Nf3 gxh2+ 18.Kh1 Bf6 19.Qd2 Qg4 20.Rf2 Bf5 21.Qe3 Nb4
0-1

Click here for live webcast of the games
Click here to view the latest standings and pairings

World Correspondence Chess Championship

Aleksandr Dronov of Russia won the 22nd World Correspondence Chess Championship organzied by ICCF.

17 players participated in the all-play-all Final in which 2 players (Aleksandr and Jurgen Bucker of Germany) scored the highest of 11.5 points. Aleksandr got first place by better SB tiebreak score. The tournament was organized on the ICCF Webserver with a time control of 10 moves in 50 days. The event started on 31st December 2007 and took a little more than 2 years to complete.

Click here to see the cross-table
Click here to download all the games in PGN

Value of Pieces and Pawns

Click here to view the Chess Pieces and Pawns

How to Practise Chess

Chess practise is very important for improvement of your game. But, it is not so easy to find a good forum for regular practise.

Below are a few possibilities.

1. Join a Chess Club
This would be the best option. Practise with other players; if chess clock is also available, it would be great. After the game, analyse the game for a few minutes with the opponent.

2. Play through Grandmaster games
Grandmaster games are the easiest way to practise chess. If the games have explanatory analysis, it would be very instructive. Each master has his typical style and games by the greatest players should be studied closely.

3. Online Playing
There are several websites where one can play with other users who would have logged in. Some of the better sites in my knowledge are below:

[a] ICC (Internet Chess Club) - one of the best sites for online chess. You have to download the client software called Dasher (latest version here) through which the user can login to the ICC server. However the free trial is only for 30 days after which, serious users can pay the subscription for continued usage.

[b] Chess Cube - an excellent user interface; which however take a while to load due to Flash being used in the site. Also users who do not have the Flash components may need to install these from the Adobe website. Registration is free but you need to confirm the email. You can continue playing for free, but subscription will give you lot more features.

[c] Chess Here - a good site which requires free registration. Online playing for free is restricted to limited number of games.

[d] Gameknot - a good site which offers both online as well as turn-based chess. Registration (free) is required to login.

4. Turn-based chess
A good option for players who are not able to devote long hours to real time practise is turn-based chess. Here you have a certain number of days for each move. You can start several concurrent games at the same time and make your move when you are logged in. Even if you logout, your moves are saved, which your opponent can respond to, when he logs in. Some of the better sites are:

[a] Chessworld - one of the best sites with rich functionalities. Registration is free, however there are lot of restrictions on free usage. Subscription will unlock the full features.

[b] RedHotPawn - another very good site with several innovative features like leagues and clans. It also has a Blitz microsite to play online chess. Registration is free, again, there are restrictions on free usage. Subscription will unlock the full features.

Matthew Sadler

Matthew Sadler is one of the strongest Grandmasters from England.

Though he took up chess relatively late in life, he quickly proved his brilliance. His first best result was winning the British championship at the age of 21; thereafter he regularly figured among the top results in British and World Chess events.

He was also a successful writer and authored several famous books and magazine articles. His book 'Queens Gambit declined' won the Book of the Year award from British Chess Federation.

Matthew quit professional chess and opted for an IT career in Holland. After quite a gap, he again returned to chess this year to play in the Rapid tournament where he won with 7/7 over other prominent grandmasters.

Earlier this month, he won the ROC Nova College weekend tournament at Haarlem in Holland with a score of 5/6.

Click here for a report on the ROC Nova College tournament

Chessmen

Click here to view the Value of Pieces and Pawns

Date of Birth of Top 10 Greatest Chess Masters

Below are the Birthdays of the Top 10 Greatest Chess Masters.

Bobby Fischer: 9 March 1943
Garry Kasparov: 13 April 1963
Wilhelm Steinitz: 17 May 1836
Anatoly Karpov: 23 May 1951
Paul Morphy: 22 June 1837
Mikhail Botvinnik: 17 August 1911
Alexander Alekhine: 31 October 1892
Jose Capablanca: 19 November 1888
Vishy Anand: 11 December 1969
Emanuel Lasker: 24 December 1868

For my list of Top 10 Greatest Chess Masters, Click Here

July 2010 FIDE Ratings

The latest FIDE Rating list has been released.

Magnus Carlsen continues to be the top rated player in the world; in fact his lead over the second placed Veselin Topalov has increased.

With the help of his comprehensive victory in Medias, Magnus's position as the No. 1 player has only been strengthened. Also, Topalov losing to Anand has lost some points for him and Anand has now moved into third position.

Magnus Carlsen: 2826
Veselin Topalov: 2803
Vishy Anand: 2800

It is significant to see these 3 players with rating of 2800 and above. After Anand, the next highest rated Indian players ares Krishnan Sasikiran with 2679 and Surya Shekar Ganguly with 2655. The highest rated Indian woman player continues to be Koneru Humpy with 2600.

Note: There are 5578 FIDE rated Indian players!

FIDE Top Players lists
Top 100 Indian Players