A FIDE Arbiters’ Seminar is going to be organized from 5 to 9 December 2016 in Tangier, Morocco, by the Moroccan Chess Federation and under the auspices of FIDE. The Lecturer will be IA Mahdi Abdulrahim (UAE), Councilor of the FIDE Arbiters’ Commission and FIDE Lecturer and Assistant Lecturer will be IA Akkour Abdelfattah (MOR). [...]

Years ago, I was introduced to the concept of kaizen – Japanese for improvement. Simply put, kaizen is continuous refinement and improvement. This concept was introduced to business partly by the work of Dr. W. Edwards Deming – famous for his work after World War II in Japan. Essentially, Dr. Deming seeked to improve business by looking at […]

The 10th Mikhail Tal Memorial will be played in the Museum of Russian Impressionism (Moscow), one of the leading private museums in Russia, from 25th September to 6th October. Avtodor Group of Companies will be a co-organizer of the 10th Tal Memorial together with the Russian Chess Federation. The total prize fund is 200,000 USD. [...]

The members of the Denver Chess Club, all veterans of the movie focus group wars since “Pawn Sacrifice”,  have been invited to a preview of “Queen of Katwe”, a Disney biopic s the life of Phiona Mutesi, a Ugandan chess prodigy from Katwe who becomes a Woman Candidate Master after her performances at World Chess […]

A lead in development is an opening advantage which vanishes with time, so the side with this lead must act energetically. It is highly dependent on pawn structure as it has little or no importance in positions with a closed structure. On the other hand it can be hugely important in open positions. Often players […]

At the General Assembly held on 10th September in Baku, Azerbaijan, the European Chess Union voted with overwhelming majority to suspend the membership of the Bulgarian Chess Federation. The ECU Board motion against the Bulgarian Chess Federation membership was backed by 37 votes from 51 federations in attendance. 11 votes were against, 2 abstained (with [...]

A FIDE Seminar for International Organizers was held from 3-5th September at the“ Crystal Hall” in Baku during the 42nd Chess Olympiad. The objective of the Seminar was to educate and certify Organizers on an international basis. Topics in the seminar covered the latest regulations of Events Commission (Mission, Members, Events Regulations, Bid Procedure, Ratings [...]

The United States of America have won their first Olympic gold medals since 1976 after a grueling and exciting last round. Despite clearly outrating opponents and neighbors Canada, they could only manage a 2.5-1.5 win. This gave rivals Ukraine a chance to overtake them on tie-breaks; they did put in a spirited performance, culminating in [...]

It’s been nice to see how entertaining some of the Olympiad games have been which once again provides an argument for staging mixed strength tournaments like we used to do a few decades ago. Having a group of players with high Elo ratings trudge around in a Berlin is NOT entertaining, even if these games […]

1o  ΚΥΠΕΛΛΟ «ΖΑΠΠΑΣ» ΣΤΗ ΛΥΣΗ ΣΚΑΚΙΣΤΙΚΩΝ ΠΡΟΒΛΗΜΑΤΩΝΤην Κυριακή 25 Σεπτεμβρίου 2016 (ώρα 11.00-13.30) θα  πραγματοποιηθεί το 1ο Κύπελλο «Ζάππας» στη Λύση Σκακιστικών Προβλημάτων, το οποίο είναι αφιερωμένο στον κορυφαίο...

Την Κυριακή 18 Σεπτεμβρίου και ώρα 17:00 θα πραγματοποιηθεί η πρώτη συνάντηση για τα μαθήματα σκακιού παιδιών & ενηλίκων. Η συνάντηση θα γίνει στα γραφεία του Σκακιστικού Ομίλου Καλλιθέας, Λυκούργου 50. Ελάτε να...

In last Monday’s problem, White does best to play 1.d5. It gains more space in the centre. After 1…Nb4 White can play 2. Be2 and his plan is to follow up with e4, gaining space. This week’s problem illustrates one of the problems of being an ‘attacking’ player. Sometimes you have to come up with […]

Chess Federation of Serbia and Novi Sad Chess Union are organizing the 2016 Serbian Open Chess Championship from 6-13th November in Novi Sad, Serbia. The Championship is supported by the Novi Sad Department for Sport and Youth and the playing venue is SPENS small hall. SPENS takes a special place in the chess history as [...]

I’m very grateful to my Facebook friend Paul Swaney for directing me to a recent interview with Boris Gelfand on chess24.com. Paul, who is well aware of my views on junior chess, pointed out this extract: “Now almost everyone is focused on an immediate result – largely because there are too many championships and tournaments […]

Γράφει: Υδάτινος Σχεδόν κάθε σκακιστής έχει αφιερώσει λίγο χρόνο για να λύσει κάποια σκακιστική σύνθεση, συνήθως ματ σε δύο κινήσεις ή σπουδή. Σίγουρα αρκετοί σκακιστές δοκίμασαν έπειτα να αλλάξουν λίγο αυτή τη...