In the preceding post I reviewed Informant 113 and mentioned a new column, "Garry's Choice". In the column's initial installment Kasparov features the game Paragua - Debashis, taking special note of a spectacular missed possibility: Black has enough extra material to win several games, but his king is in a world of trouble. In the game he played 24...Kf8, which allowed a forced mate, but what he...

When I first started reviewing issues of the Informant a few years ago, this once great publication was a dying dinosaur. For those unfamiliar with the informant concept, it is most fundamentally a periodical, presenting hundreds of annotated games from a recent time period. Generally the period in question was many months ago by the time of publication, and while that was fine in 1966 when it...

The 69th Georgian Women Championship was organized by the Georgian Chess Federation from 28th April to 9th May in Anaklia, Zugdidi. Twelve players competed in the round robin tournament. Top seeded IM Bela Khotenashvili convincingly won the title by collecting 8/11 points and leaving the nearest follower a full point behind. Khotenashvili recently participated in [...]

In a turn of the unexpected, the grandmasters in the U.S. Championship played more provocative chess than their female counterparts. Their early imbalanced positions meant the first three games to finish came from their event.

Game of the day from Sigeman & Co chess tournament

Με νίκη συνέχισε η ομάδα μας με 2,5-1,5 επι του Ρίου και παίζει την Κυριακή στην έδρα της επί της ΝΕΠ στα ημιτελικά του θεσμού. Για την Ιστορία κέρδισε ο Ντίρλης, ισοπαλία οι Μπαλόκας, Νικολακόπουλος, Δημόπουλος. Το άλλο...

ΣΟΠ - Προμηθέας και ΕΣ Αιγιαλείας - ΝΕΠ είναι τα δύο ζευγάρια που ανέδειξε η κλήρωση που πραγματοποιήθηκε χτες το βράδυ στα γραφεία της ΕΣΣΠ. Τα δύο παιχνίδια θα πραγματοποιηθούν την Κυριακή στις 11:00

Όποιου και αν κοιτάξει κάποιος εδώ στην Δυτική Ελλάδα παίζουν σκάκι! Έπειτα από το επίσημο τουρνουά των Ιωαννίνων ξεκίνησε το επίσημο τουρνουά Θεσπρωτίας. Τα αποτελέσματα από το πρώτο τουρνουά μπορείτε να τα δείτε...

Θετικά ανταποκρίθηκε και ο Σκακιστικός Σύλλογος Κεφαλονιάς στις προτάσεις και στις αλλαγές για μερικά πρακτικά ζητήματα που αφορούν τα τοπικά μας πρωταθλήματα. Η προσπάθεια τους δείχνει ότι ο Σύλλογος της Κεφαλονιάς...

With the opening ceremony of the Anand – Gelfand World Championship match due to take place tomorrow I thought I’d offer some thoughts as to what we might expect. First of all I should say that I think it’s going to be a really tough match and I’m unconvinced by those who make Vishwanathan Anand [...]

The Chess Informant crew has been busy putting out new products the last few years, and now they've turned their attention to the endgame - or rather, returned to it. They released the first edition of volume 1 of the Encyclopedia of Chess Endings back in 1982, so what we have now, 30 years along, is a revision. The original product presented 1610 pawn endings, divided into sections by the...

In round 5, the final round of the first cycle of the elite group at the 47th Capablanca Memorial, Vassily Ivanchuk defeated Viktor Laznicka to seize clear first. His score of 3.5/5 puts him half a point ahead of Leinier Dominguez and Ian Nepomniachtchi, who drew each other this round. Vladimir Potkin has two points, thanks to a win over Yuniesky Quesada, who is in last with a point and a...

Large photo report from the playing hall.

With the exception of a single draw between two closely rated opponents, the higher-rated player won every game in the first round of the 2012 U.S. Championship. Top seed Hikaru Nakamura blew the dust off his opening books, trotting out the hoary Evans Gambit against Robert Hess. In return, Hess sent the game even further into obscurity by employing the Stone-Ware Defense (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4...

Μαθητές τρέχουν δίπλα από το μεγαλύτερο σκακιστικό πιόνι του κόσμου που βρίσκεται στο Σεντ Λιούις των Ηνωμένων Πολιτειών. Έχει 5 μέτρα ύψος, 1,5 μέτρο πλάτος και ζυγίζει 500 κιλά.