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25th Spring Chess Festival in Budapest
02.07.2009
– Hungary certainly does not lack in chess tournaments. The year starts with the traditional early January tournament organised by the Hungarian Chess Federation, soon afterwards, in March, the spring season starts with the Spring Chess Festival. This year was the 25th edition. The events in Budapest are fraught with cultural activities.
Illustrated report by Diana Mihajlova.
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Dortmund 01: Carlsen beats Jakovenko
02.07.2009
– The Sparkassen Chess-Meeting, the most important traditional chess tournament in Germany, started with a fine victory by top seed Magnus Carlsen. The 18-year-old Norwegian GM out-maneuvered his opponent, Russia's top GM Dmitry Jakovenko, in a knight vs bishop ending and took the full point after 49 moves. The other games were drawn.
Report with commentary.
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Your judgement, please
02.07.2009
– The bishop sac on h7 (h2) to rip open the enemy's king position is a
classical motif in chess. Sometimes it is good, sometimes it isn't - but one
always has to be aware of it. And what is the case after 13.Nxc4 here?
A) Black wins easily, after all he's not got only one bishop, has he?
B) The sac is correct, however, victory requires yet a 'silent hammer blow'.
C) As good as it might look, the strike backfires; with cool defence White gets
the advantage.
The solution is for replay here
or as
video sample from Kings
Powerplay 1 DVD. Hint: first ponder
over it with a
larger version of the diagram.
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Lviv – the chess capital of Ukraine
01.07.2009
– Chess was popular in the Ukrainian city of Lviv (or Lvov) before World War II, but it reached its golden age in the 1960s, when Leonid Stein gave inspiration to young young boys and girls. But it was the work of legendary trainer Viktor Kart that brought the country to the forefront of chess, producing some of the best players in the world.
Illustrated report by Vladimir Grabinsky.
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July 2009 FIDE ratings: Topalov leads, Anand second
01.07.2009
– Bulgarian GM Veselin Topalov has gained one point from ten games to retain his top ranking in the FIDE list, 25 point ahead of reigning World Champion Viswanathan Anand. In third place we find Magnus Carlsen, the 18-year-old GM from Norway. The biggest fall – once again – was by Vassily Ivanchuk, who shed 43 points.
Top rankings and statistics.
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Monokroussos on not winning a model game
01.07.2009
– Few things in chess are more satisfying than winning a model game. The opening
prep goes smoothly, one gains an advantage of some sort of another, and a series
of fine moves leads to the inexorable conclusion: we win! And then there's the
other 90% of the time. Lecture this Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET on
Playchess.
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Do men and women have different brains?
30.06.2009
– In a recent thought-provoking
article WGM Natalia Pogonina and Peter Zhdanov presented their views on
the topic of why women are worse at chess than men. A number of our readers
were unconviced: they think that efforts at "explaining"
differences between the sexes only from environmental factors are doomed at the
outset. Recent studies seem to support this.
Feedback and articles.
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More Fischer-Spassky memorabilia on sale
30.06.2009
– We recently reported
on a large Fischer collenction that was snapped up for US $61,000 by Rex and
Jeanne Sinquefield. Collectors – and especially philatelists – have
an opportunity to get some new items from the 1972 Fischer vs Spassky World Chess
Championship, with postcards, envelopes, a signed admittance ticket. They are
from a
private Icelandic collection.
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Tiger Lilov’s Chess Show: The Art of Defense
28.06.2009
– Bulgarian chess trainer Valeri Lilov, rated 2411, has a weekly show on Playchess.com.
On Mondays at 20:00h CEST (7 p.m. London, 2 p.m. New York) he presents practical
chess problems and interesting themes based on games taken from recent super-tournaments.
This time he will focus on the defence in chess, with live audio commentary.
Take a look, it’s free!
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Swedish ChessBoxing Sensation in London
28.06.2009
– London hasn’t been this crazy about a Swede since the heady days of Bjorn Borg at Wimbledon. This was undoubtedly the best chessboxing night yet seen in the UK; there was a superlative headline bout between two of the world's leading chessboxers, controversy involving an illegal move, the flamboyant Red Kite, and an England vs Germany match.
Pictorial report with annotated games.
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For the beginners
28.06.2009
– It's been quite a while since our ChessBase Workshop columnist had a look at Fritz features geared toward the beginning chess player. Novices take heart – a new ChessBase Workshop series for this group of novices and amateurs starts now with a column devoted to general advice. Learn more in the latest
Workshop.
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