Kramnik leading by a point

After a beautiful win today Kramnik is now leading by a point in Dortmund. De deeply calculated temporary piece sacrifice the Russian went for with 29.a4 was just fantastic. Leko won too today, which is not an easy thing to do with Black against Gelfand, and the Hungarian once again confirmed that opposite coloured bishops aren’t that drawish with rooks on the board. Mamedyarov-Carlsen wasn’t very interesting but the other draw, Anand-Alekseev, was. Anand got a strong kingside attack and the way Alekseev defended was impressive. full story »

Weekly Endgame Study (26)

Every Saturday an endgame study is published at ChessVibes, selected by Yochanan Afek: player, trainer, endgame study composer and writer. A week later the solution is published. full story »

Dortmund remains peaceful; Ivanchuk wint Foros

Again there wasn’t much thrilling going on in Dortmund yesterday, where the players kept on being very peaceful (although they did play some chess before scoring the half points). So why not have a look at that other very strong tournament that was going on. Yesterday the Aerosvit Tournament in Foros (Ukraine) ended; it was won by my favorite player of the moment: Vassily Ivanchuk. His victory over Shirov was amazing. full story »

Want to gain some easy points?

A couple of days ago our printers delivered Tactics in the Chess Openings, Part 5.

In this volume GM Sipke Ernst and IM Geert van der Stricht have explained, in 230 carefully selected games, all the tactical themes and the typical traps of the main lines in the Indian Defences, as well as in the Catalan and the Benoni.

We recommend this book to your attention, and would like to remind you of how Britsh Chess Magazine described Part 4 of this bestselling series:

“A large number of both subtle and unsubtle man-traps which can be used to gain easy points.”

Mihail Marin’s Ruy Lopez repertoire

Yesterday we received in our warehouse a brand new book written by Mihail Marin, the star author of our friends at Quality Chess.

A Spanish Repertoire for Black is Part 2 of Marin’s very succesful repertoire book against 1. e4: Beating the Open Games.

Here Marin provides ALL answers for Black after 4. Ba4. Explaining the concepts and variations in his usual lucid way, he makes the Ruy Lopez really accessible for amateur players.

Marin’ s great lessons will not only improve your ability to handle positions in Spanish games, they will also make you a much better strategic player, generally.

White 1. e4 players cannot afford to miss this excellent book, either. Order it today, and we will send it off immediately.

Round 4 games + Carlsen-N.N.

This round report has been, perhaps surprisingly, written in Amsterdam. Because I will play the Nova College Tournament 2007 I returned for a week, to continue the tour in Paris. I’ll report on Dortmund till the end, including two more videos I still have. Twice Carlsen today: his round 4 game of yesterday and a game of his from Monday’s blitz exhibition. The world champion was too strong for him yesterday, the other one went somewhat better… full story »

Interview Vlastimil Hort

Yesterday ChessVibes had an interview with chess legend Vlastimil Hort, the Czechoslovakia-born player now living in Germany and former world champion candidate. He’s here in Dortmund to play a match against the no less legendary Heikki Westerinen from Finland, the first ever winner of the Dortmund tournament, in 1973. Hort won Dortmund a few years later and their short match, as from today played on the same stage as the 2700 guys, is to celebrate the 35th edition of the tournament. Enjoy the interview! full story »

Round 3 games & Anand-N.N.

After all games in round 3 have finished in unexciting draws, I don’t think Dortmund 2007 is the kind of tournament we will always gonna remember. Still, I was having fun today in the press room, editing more of yesterday’s blitz games and interviewing the legendary Vlastimil Hort in between (more of that later). full story »

Dortmund Blitz Exhibition

So while no round was scheduled for yesterday, the players weren’t resting at all. As has become traditional, I think, all participants of the Chess Meeting played blitz games against amateurs, in the Dortmund town hall. The super grandmasters had two minutes on the clock and the local artists had five minutes thinking time to spend. ChessVibes was there filming it all, and presents the first video today. Soon we will publish some longer fragments of games by Kramnik, Anand, Leko and Carlsen. full story »

Perfect your chess with…

Jan Timman, in his book On The Attack, describes young Ukranian super GM Andrei Volokitin as “a single minded player … with a head full of wild ideas”.

Now Volokitin has published Perfect Your Chess, a book with 369 training positions, which we got in our warehouse just yesterday.

The question is, of course: is someone with a “head full of wild ideas” the right teacher for you? Will he make you win more games, or will he just confuse and bewilder you?

I think Perfect Your Chess is indeed a very useful book. The thing is: Volokitin has not written the book all by himself. He did the job together with his famous coach Vladimir Grabinsky, the man who brought several young Ukranians chess players to the top.

The book is divided into three parts: Make a Move, Find a Win and Answer a Question. All in all there are more than 350 positions, most of them from (very) recent games.

Volokitin’s dynamic ideas, together with Grabinski’s training files have produced a book you will not regret as a brilliant summer holiday chess improvement tool.

Interview Vladimir Kramnik

After the blitz exhibition in Dortmund today (of which we did have shot some nice video material, which will be published soon) I got a chance to speak briefly with world champion Vladimir Kramnik, who today celebrates his 32nd birthday. Of course I asked him about Mexico and especially about the news that was brought yesterday. full story »

Mainz Chess Classic

From 13 till 19 August the annual chess festival in Mainz will take place. Especially the two rapid tournaments (of which one is played with Chess960) of the Chess Classic is renowned for their super strong participants. The elo average of the top 10 will be even higher than this year’s Dortmund, with amongst others Kamsky, Ivanchuk, Shirov, Grishuk, Mamedyarov, and Karjakin. As a GM with 2600 behind your name, you will find yourself as the number 30 on the starting list!

This year ChessVibes will be in Mainz too, providing on-the-spot video coverage.

>> to the official tournament website

Round 2 games + Post-mortem Carlsen-Leko

The second round of the Sparkassen Chess Meeting 2007 was slightly more exciting with two decisive games and two drawn. Kramnik-Gelfand has just finished; a great game in typical Kramnik-style, grinding down Gelfand from a slightly better position right out of the opening into an ending with a queenside majority that finally led to the win of a pawn. Gelfand tried hard but couldn’t hold it in the end. full story »

Games 1st round + short interview Boris Gelfand

In the first round not much exciting happened here in Dortmund. Carlsen avoided Leko’s Marshall with 8.d4!?, a move which can be dangerous if the opponent doesn’t know his theory. Black’s 15…Nb5 was a novelty (though 16…Bf6 would have transposed back to two games Polgar-Nunn and Nijboer-Sokolov) and White had a very slight edge for a while, until it was Magnus who had to be careful because of his 26.Rd3?!. full story »

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