Articles

WGM Raluca Sgircea, IM Renier Castellanos
05.14.2015

Worrall Attack of the Ruy Lopez: The popularity of 1…e5 has increased greatly in recent years. For a long time, this response against white’s move 1.e4 was considered a less ambitious option for black than, for example, The Sicilian Defense. However, times have changed, and so has the way we perceive 1…e5 nowadays.

Yury Markushin
05.13.2015
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Yury Markushin
05.13.2015

Vasily Smyslov was a World Chess Champion from 1957 to 1958. He was also a candidate for the World Championship Matches on 8 different occasions and has won 17 (!) Chess Olympiad medals (all time record). Smyslov was a strong positional chess player, and at the same time a very technical endgame expert. He made […]

WGM Raluca Sgircea, IM Renier Castellanos
05.11.2015

Queen and Knight vs Queen and Bishop: It is a well-known concept that the queen and knight team works better than the queen and bishop. All the experienced and strong players are well aware of this strategic nuance. However, at a lower level, even though this concept is told several times, the less experienced players […]

WGM Raluca Sgircea, IM Renier Castellanos
05.08.2015

In our previous article on this subject, we wrote about the characteristics of the exchange sacrifice, dividing them in two groups. Sacrifices are done in order to attack the opponent’s position and in order to defend from our opponent’s threats. Let’s review our list from our previous article.   ***

WGM Raluca Sgircea, IM Renier Castellanos
05.07.2015

It is quite difficult to write something about Kasparov that has not been written before. Without a doubt, he is one of the best players in the history of Chess, if not the best. It’s been more than ten years since Garry’s retirement and the chess world is yet to find a replacement.

Yury Markushin
05.06.2015
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Yury Markushin
05.06.2015

Boris Spassky was the 10th World Chess Champion, holding the title from 1969 to 1972. He has defeated Petrosian to become world champion. Spassky is known for his universal playing style, excelling in the middle-game and tactics, but inferior in the opening phase. He is known as one of the greatest living chess GMs and […]

Yury Markushin
05.04.2015
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Yury Markushin
05.04.2015

Mikhail Tal was the 8th World Chess Champion and widely recognized as a creative genius and one of the best attacking players of all time. “Misha” was known for his unpredictability and superb improvisation. Tal holds the records for the first and second longest unbeaten streaks in professional chess. There is a lot you can […]

Yury Markushin
05.01.2015
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Yury Markushin
05.01.2015

Most chess players believe that ability to adequately play blindfold chess is common only to elite players. What makes blindfold chess so hard to master for others? How do elite chess players remembering position of all pieces on the board, even playing on 10 or 20 boards simultaneously? Most importantly we will try to find […]

Yury Markushin
04.29.2015
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Yury Markushin
04.29.2015

Chess position visualization is a very important ability. This ability allows a chess player to calculate tactics precisely multiple moves ahead and most importantly it makes it possible to picture and evaluate the final position correctly. This is exactly what Magnus Carlsen was referring to when he was asked how many moves ahead he can […]

WGM Raluca Sgircea, IM Renier Castellanos
04.27.2015

This is a continuation of our interview series with strong chess players. Previously, we have asked players like GM Alexander Ipatov, WGM Natalia Pogonina and IM Sugar Shah about how to improve at chess. Today IM Renier Castellanos will suggest how to study chess and actually see progress. IM Castellanos worked as a professional chess […]