The 2015 Puerto Rico Men’s Chess Championship is taking place from October 9-18, in Universidad de Puerto Rico, Recinto de Bayamon. The event is a 9-round Swiss tournament with tempo of play 90′ + 30″. Top seed is IM Alejandro Montalvo Rosario. Tournament website/ Standings and statistics

This chess game was played in Tampa, Florida, USA back in 2013. The US Chess Federation (USCF) awarded the title of Life Master to my opponent, Corey Acor, some time prior to this chess game being played. This is one of three rated chess games that I played against Corey and I lost all three […]

The 41st Guernsey Chess Festival is taking place from October 18-24, 2015, at the Peninsula Hotel, Guernsey. The event is a 7-round Swiss open, sponsored by Intertrust Guernsey. The time control is 100′/40 moves + 30′ + 30″, while the prize is £1,200. Englishman GM Mark Hebden (2490) heads the field of 71 players from 11 [...]

Etna Chess Festival to be held from 4-8 December, 2015, at Hotel Biancaneve in Nicolosi

The 4th Memorial Gonzalez is taking place from October 10-18, 2015, in Madrid, Spain. The event is a 9-round Swiss open with tempo of play 90′ + 30″. 73 players from 16 different countries take part in the tournament, including 11 GMs, 1 WGM, 7 IMs, 13 FMs and 2 WFMs. Top seed is GM [...]

American chess is getting stronger and is on the rise. This fall, Grandmasters Hikaru Nakamura and Fabiano Caruana, the top two players in the United States, will visit the Chess Club and Scholastic Center of Saint Louis (CCSCSL) and compete in a series of games over four days: Thursday, November 12 through Sunday, November 15. “The Saint Louis [...]

The Final 6 of the Top Chess Engine Championship TCEC continue their quest for the coveted title of Season 8 of the premier computer chess championship. Komodo and Stockfish are the two favorites, having won convincingly their respective groups in the first stage, while leaving other engines far behind. However, Stage 3 is a completely [...]

The 90th Argentinian Absolute Final Chess Championship took place from September 30 to October 14, 2015, in Villa Martelli, Buenos Aires. The event was a 13-round closed tournament that gathered the strongest Argentinian chess players. 2015 American Continental champion GM Sandro Mareco added another trophy to his rich collection after finishing the Argentinian championship solely first with...

 At a tournament in Germany in the early 20th century, spectators were give a 60-page book entitled How to Watch a Chess Game. Each page contained only one sentence: Halt’s Maul! (Shut your mouth!). – Apocryphal As often happens, the round started and all was quiet at the Denver Chess Club. Almost. Our truly beloved […]

The Xtracon GM Tournament 2015 is taking place on October 12-18th, at the Asgård Skole, Norsvey 2 in Køge, a market town and seaport on the coast of Køge Bugt, Denmark. The event is a 9-round Swiss open tournament with prize fund in the amount of 25,000 DKK. Top seed is GM Alexandr Fier (2624) from Brazil. [...]

Third World Blitz title for Grischuk!

Today’s challenge: Find the typical pattern and react accordingly. White to Move A.Carmer against P. Zilverberg 1992 Q: Black’s last move was 15…Bg7, was it wise decision? A: It was not wise decision as game ended very quickly. It was better to play 15…Nc7 or 15…Qe7. 15…Bg7 16. Qxg7+!! This leads to checkmate in three […]

The 2015 FIDE World Blitz Chess Championship started Tuesday at the Bolle Meierei in Berlin, Germany, with 184 world’s top players competing for the prestigious title and 200,000 USD prize fund. After the first day and eleven rounds of play Maxime Vachier-Lagrave from France emerged sole leader with 9,5/11 points. He lost only to defending [...]

From 26 to 29 September 2015 a FIDE Arbiters’ Seminar was organized in Porec, Croatia, by the Croatian Chess Federation, in cooperation with the Croatian Association of Chess Arbiters and under the auspices of FIDE. The venue of the Seminar was the Valamar “Diamant” Hotel, in Porec. The lecturer was IA Almog Burstein (ISR), FIDE [...]

The 1st ECU Congress took place on 10th October in St. Nikola Castle in Bar/Montenegro. The opening ceremony was held with the presence of the ECU and FIDE officials, representatives of Montenegro Chess Federation, Montenegro Government institutions, European Chess Federations as well as the representatives of the media. After the presentation of chess tradition of [...]