When we first start playing chess, we often make the first move we see, good, bad or indifferent (usually the move falls under the heading of bad when you first start you chess career). Of course, we’re still learning the basics of the game so this is a natural part of the learning process. More […]

Wesley So emerged as the winner of the rapid portion of Your Next Move Grand Chess Tour. He is now headed to the blitz portion with a two point lead over the rest of the field. In the blitz, each win is worth one point, so his competitors are two wins away from catching him. [...]

After day two of the rapid, Wesley So increased his lead by a point. He is being closely chased by Magnus Carlsen and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave who are one move away from catching the leader. It is interesting to note that all three players recently completed the Paris leg of the Grand Chess Tour so it [...]

With the amount of opening theory around these days it’s tempting to look for short cuts. This certainly explains the popularity of unusual openings, but often they are unusual for a reason. Isn’t there a better way to reduce the amount of study time needed? Besides playing openings that lead to solid middle game positions […]

A launching promo event for the European Corporate Chess Championship took place in Paris on 28th of June. The 1st European Corporate Chess Championship 2017 will take place in the Town Hall of Honour of the City of Asnières, Paris, France, 24–25 November 2017. The tournament will be played as a Swiss Open in 9 [...]

The President of Russia Vladimir Putin sent a telegram of greetings to the members of the Russian national women’s team and their coaches on winning the World Team Chess Championship. The President said, in particular, in his message: “Dear Alexandra, Ekaterina, Valentina, Aleksandra, and Olga! I congratulate you on your triumph at the World Team [...]

Nigel’s analysis of this instructive Capablanca endgame is included in the Tiger Chess Endgame Course. It also appears in Shereshevsky’s excellent book – Endgame Strategy. Capablanca wrote “White’s plan is to prevent the advance of the c pawn (after which the b pawn could become weak) and to control the entire board up to the […]

After the grueling first leg of the Grand Chess Tour in Paris, which concluded just two days ago, Magnus Carlsen, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Wesley So continued on to Leuven, Belgium to play in the second leg of the Grand Chess Tour. They are joined by Viswanathan Anand, Levon Aronian, Ian Nepomniachtchi who skipped Paris and [...]

ΣΣε υψηλό αγωνιστικό επίπεδο διατηρήθηκε η Σκακιστική Άνοιξη και το 2017 , την προσπάθεια της οποίας ενίσχυσαν σημαντικά φέτος ο Fide Master Νίκος Αγγελής και ο FM Αναστάσης Τζούμπας , και οι δύο με υποσχετική μεταγραφή.Στον...

This article aims at beginners and intermediate players to provide basic strategy to play against Sicilian Dragon. The most dangerous attacking setup against Sicilian Dragon is the Yugoslav Attack where White’s plan is fairly simple but nonetheless very strong. Strategy: 1. White’s light square bishop usually exchange the Black’s knight on c4 (the knight attacks […]

The Canadian Closed Chess Championship is taking place in Montreal from June 27 to July 1st, 2017 at the Olympic Stadium. The tournament serves as a qualifier for the 2017 World Cup and the 2018 Continental Championship. It is also taken into account in determining the Canadian team at the 2018 Chess Olympiad. The tournament [...]

The 11th Silver Lake Chess Festival was held from 18-25th June in Silver Lake, Veliko Gradiste, Serbia, with 256 participants from 19 countries. The Festival consisted of Open A for players rated over 2000, Open B for players rated under 2200, Open C for players rated under 1600, Silver Star Blitz and Bughouse tournament. The [...]

The 45th Annual World Open will be held from June 29-July 4, 2017 at the Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, 1201 Market St., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The event has 9 sections: Open, Under 2200, Under 2000, Under 1800, Under 1600, Under 1400, Under 1200, Under 900 and Unrated. The Open Section is a 9-round Swiss, 5-day tournament (June [...]

FIDE Deputy President, Georgios Makropoulos, together with ECU President, Zurab Azmaiparashvili and ECU General Secretary, Theodoros Tsorbatzoglou, after an official invitation received, met with the Bulgarian Minister of Youth and Sports Krasen Kralev in Sofia to discuss the situation of the Bulgarian Chess Federation. The purpose of the meeting was to clarify the scale and [...]

The Education Commission of European Chess Union launched its activities in a need of an organization representing the growing movement of using chess as a pedagogic tool to develop social and intellectual skills to children. The ECU introduced a Certificate for school chess teachers with requisite for recognizing the high standard of knowledge and skills [...]