Fabi steamrolled his opponent Andrey Esipenko in the final round with an extremely smooth Najdorf, complete with a rook sacrifice on c3.

Ain’t it buttery smooth?

Bluebaum - Giri

Much like Fabi, Giri got a nice win with the black pieces, thanks to Bluebaum castling into a very dangerous attack on the queenside. To me this choice was inexplicable, but Giri’s handling of the position was very nice.

Vaishali - Lagno

We got to see a Sicilian Dragon as Lagno tried to play with a win for Black. If Lagno were to win, she could potentially spoil Vaishali’s chances to win, and possibly be part of a five-way draw for first to force tiebreaks. Something happened which I think many players on either side of a Dragon have experienced before.

White has just played Bc4. The bishop is obviously verboten due to dxc4?? Qxd8! Rxd8 Rxd8+ and Black down the exchange with back rank problems. On move 11, Kateryna spent about 30 minutes thinking of what to do, because White is threatening to chop on d5 and win a pawn. I think there is really only one option to prevent this: 11…e6; the other idea would be to go very active with Rb8, sacrificing a pawn in the process. The problem with e6 is psychological — Black would usually want their bishop to have access to e6 and not block it in with this pawn; it takes more time to get this bishop via the move a5 and Ba6, or Black could play Bb7, which would give it a strange impression. In any case, neither of these options were to Lagno’s liking, and she finally chose her next move:

11...Be6?!

Losing a pawn in the process, with no real compensation for it. Vaishali went on to win and run away with victory, making her the sole leader in the tournament; which means Vaishali is the next challenger for the women’s world champion title and will face five-time champion Ju Wenjun later this year.

Divya - Assaubayeva

Bibisara was the Vaishali’s co-leader, but she got lucky and escaped from an impending loss against Divya.

25…Nxf2??

A faulty combination, based on the threat of Rxd1 followed by a threat on the queen. Divya found the critical intermezzo:

26.Rd7!

The rook moves to a protected square and threatens Black’s queen and the b7-bishop at the same time.

26…Qf6 27.Rxb7?

Low in time, Divya misses the critical continuation, and it’s just back to equality. Instead, 27.Nd6! was necessary — but it’s hard to find this in the middle of a game that isn’t close to ending. 27…Bxg2 28.Ndf7! Kg8 (28…Rxf7 29.Rxf7 Qxe5 30.Rf8+! Bxf8 31.Qxe5+) 29.Nh6+ Kh8 30.Nef7+ Rxf7+ 31.Nxf7+ Kg8 32.Kxg2; the dust is settling and White is up a piece and completely winning. There are other winning continuations but this is the most straightforward one to me.

Back to the game; after 27.Rxb7??

Bibisara is now able to survive, thanks to a perpetual that saves a half point from a desperate position: 27…Qxe5 28.Qxe5 Bxe5 29.Nc7 Ng4 30.Nxe6 Rf6 31.Ng5

White’s king is subjected to a torrent of checks to end the game by threefold repetition:

31…Bd4+ 32.Kh1 Nf2+ 33.Kh2 Ng4+ 34.Kh1 Nf2+ 35.Kh2 Ng4 36.Kh1 Nf2+ 1/2-1/2

That’s it — the end of the tournaments.

Sindarov won with 10 and never lost a game. It was a disappointing few weeks for the Fabi fans, myself included; but I’ve really enjoyed looking at all the games and am sure that the upcoming World Championship match against Gukesh will be amazing to watch.

Vaishali won with 8.5, barely edging out Bibisara by just a half-point. Vaishali felt like a bit of an underdog with a slow start to the tournament as well as being the tournament’s lowest rated player, but her grit and tactical prowess was extremely impressive, and her errors were compensated for with play that transcended that of her opponents; all-in-all a worthy challenger to Ju Wenjun’s throne.

If you made it through all 14 posts (or even if you read just this one), thank you for reading. And I’ll see you guys at the World and Women’s World Championships. (metaphorically, of course).

Giri - Sindarov

First, off; Sindarov played a virtually perfect game as Black to draw Giri for the final half-point he needed to secure the Candidate’s Tournament with a round to spare. From this point on, everybody is playing for second place.

Wei - Esipenko

This game featured a really interesting tactic that could have kept the balance, but the fact that it was delayed by one move meant completely changed the evaluation.

Black is in good shape: castled position, safer king, nice outpost for the knight on e4. Well, it was a nice outpost, but it was just threatened with the move f3.

18…Rac8!?

An interesting piece sacrifice with a tactical point. 19.fxe4? fxe4! wins back a piece with a power attack. Because of this, Esipenko uses this time to put a rook on a good square.

19.h4!

Wei spots the tactic and creates luft for his king.

19…Ndc5?

A second sacrifice, but one that Esipenko should have played one move earlier.

Let’s look at that real quick:

Here Black is fine in all lines, but following a line analogous to game continuation with the move h4 shows us the importance of the move orders:

19.h4 Nxd3 20.Qxd3 and now Black can trade on d2 and is fine in every line.

Back to the game:

Because White was given time to play h4, the following faulty combination by Black leaves Wei up a piece:

20.dxc5 Qxc5 21.Kh2 Qf2 22.Kh3 Qd4 23.Bxe4 fxe4 24.Bg3

It’s incredible what a single tempo (giving White the chance to play h4!) does, and how it can make or break a tactical combination. While Black is still the one attacking, the piece sacrifice is close to running out of steam, and the compensation is lacking. Wei would go on to win a slightly touch-and-go game.

Caruana - Praggnanandhaa

This endgame ended up being a near-miss. Fabi enjoyed an advantage all game, and was able to achieve this position. The material imbalance creates a very sticky strategical situation for both sides. It’s not an easy win — even though Fabi is up an extra point of material, Black has significant counterplay thanks to his centralized passed pawn duo. Additionally, the g3-pawn is a major problem for white, as soon also will be the g2-pawn. Both players burned most of their time to get to this position, so there isn’t a lot of time to think. There is one more move before they reach the time control.

40.Qxe6

In exchange for thirty extra minutes, Fabi has lost the tempo needed to play for a win. After 40.a4! White is threatening Qb5, followed by Qxb6. While the likely outcome would probably still be a draw, White would have cleared the way for his a-pawn to become a pain in Black’s queenside, and this pawn would roll much more quickly than Black’s central passers.

As it was, Pragg played 40…Rcxg3, and after 41.Rf5+ Kc6 42.Rf2 Kc7 43.Rf7+, the players agreed to a draw, as there was nothing left to play for.

Lagno - Divya

An interesting mutual blunder occurred on the 15.5th and 16th move of the game.

Here Divya played the move 15…Be5, making a threat on the b-pawn. Lagno decided to defend it with 16.Qb3, but she had a much better idea available:

16.f4!

But doesn’t this just encourage the bishop to take on b2, which was the idea in the first place? Sure; but White wins a piece after 16…Bxb2 17.Ra2!

and after 16…Bd6, White has 17.c5!, also winning a piece

The spiteful counter threat Bf5 amounts to nothing in either case, because White can simply slide the queen to d2 or b3 while maintaining the unstoppable piece-winning threat.

In any case, Lagno eventually won this game by keeping up the tactical pressure.

Zhu - Goryachkina

This game featured a fascinating blunder by Zhu, but the follow-up by Goryachkina was a nice prophylaxis:

Black’s pawn-minus is counterbalanced by the very advanced a-pawn and the very weak White King position. Black has created a really powerful threat of Qh2+, and White has a few ways to respond. For instance 51.Kg2 bluntly prevents this check directly. Also, the move 51.Ne5 cannot be impeached. Alas, Zhu blocked the queen with a different piece:

51.Re5??

When you thought about this position, what did you think Black should play? Goryachkina very quickly chose a brilliant “waiting” move.

51…Kh8!!

The whole point is to prevent the move c4-c5 from coming with check. Despite the Black king being so far displaced from the attack in question, its sally to h8 is the inaugural battlecry of Black’s position.

52.Ke3?

52.Kg2 was still preferable

52…Bd7 53.Re4

Making room for a defending move; this move underscores why the earlier move to e5 was such a terrible blunder.

53…Bxc6!

More brutal prophylaxis. Black prevents the move Ne5, which would defend the f-pawn.

54.bxc6 Qg3 55.Qf2 Qxg6 56.d5 Qf6 57.Qe2 a2 0-1

White’s queen is overloaded and must give up her rook to stop the pawn (58.Qxa2 Qc3+! 59.Ke2 Qxf3+ 60.Kd2 Qxe4) , so she resigned.

Sindarov becomes the new world champion challenger with a round to spare; but it’s still up in the air for the Women. Bibisara and Vaishali lead with 7.5 each, but Zhu is behind by only a half-point. Muzychuk, Goryachkina, and Lagno could also possibly tie for first. There could be a five-way tie for first place tomorrow. Stranger things have happened, you know.

This was a bummer for Giri. He had a slight edge in the opening and middlegame, at at some point was completely winning in the endgame, but, low on time, could not find the winning continuation. Credit to Wei for defending so well in a worse position (one standout feature of his games this tournament).

Muzychuk - Goryachkina

Rook endgames are cruel — even when you’re the only one with the rook.

Here Black is completely lost. White can win both of the pawns, because her rook is positioned to attack the pawns from behind or check the king from the side. After Kg4, Black can resign. However, Muzychuk chose 65.Ra2??, and Goryachkina’s 65…Kh3! underscored the importance of keeping that square under control.

Now, White can’t ever get the king separated from the pawns in a way that she can capture both; Black has time and sufficient cover by pawns to keep the game drawn. White also can’t keep the rook on the second rank because of stalemate. The game continued 66.Ra3 Kh2 67.Kg4 g2 68.Rh3+ Kg1 69.Kxh4 Kf2 70.Rh2 Kf3

White has only one move that stops this pawn from promoting. 71.Rxg2 Kxg2 1/2-1/2

Vaishali - Zhu

I think this game’s story is about Black’s d-pawn.

We’ve got a more-or-less typical Caro-Kann where White chose to recapture a bishop on d3 with a pawn rather than queen. On move 12, Black has played Qc8, seeking play on the queenside (perhaps Qa6 threatening Qxd3; or otherwise supporting the c-pawn). Vaishali chose to change the structure with 13.dxc5!?; after 13…bxc5 14.Qa4 Qb7 15.O-O O-O:

I think the position looks comfortable for Black, because of the queenside pawn presence, the semi-open b-file, and a more solid position. However, White has some annoying plans on the kingside because of the expanded pawn on h5; and in general, her attack would come first if black ever castled, because her pieces are closer to the black kingside. Accordingly, Zhu forewent castling this game, and a few moves later it was black to move here:

White has some development issues, but this isn’t exclusive; Black’s king in the center, while safe, also stands in the way of the b8-rook, which would certainly like to find a place on the g-file and barrel its cannons towards the enemy white king. But Zhu has some initiative on the queenside and decides to go for it

22…c4!?

This move makes some sense, because in some cases it can lead to a passed pawn for Black; however, it requires White’s compliance. White could play Qh2, giving a threat to the h6 pawn which is short a defender; Nh4 also makes some sense, to induce a trade of Black’s good bishop or move the rook away from the defense of the h-pawn.

Vaishali took with 23.bxc4. After 23…dxc4 Black now has a significant queenside initiative, and this pawn is well-placed to cause problems, as it dominates the c1-knight and requires blockaders to stop its impending advance. White isn’t lost, but Blake has the more comfortable game for sure.

Later down the road, we see this old d-turned-c-pawn make its way to the b-file too:

Black has made progress on both sides of the board; the situation in terms of center is mostly closed up, and White has tried to cause a problem on the kingside where Black’s King was a little exposed; but now she’s forcing the issue on the queenside with this kick against the rook. Zhu replied:

34…Rb3 35.Rxb3 cxb3

This pawn is becoming more dangerous by the second. Vaishali attacks it directly:

36.Nc1??

However, there’s a tactical problem with this move:

36..h3!

Now White’s kingside is under serious attack.

37.Nxb3

The d-to-c-to-b-pawn has served its purpose and is sacrificed for the greater good. It’s fascinating how Zhu’s pressure on the queenside leads to victory on the kingside.

If White now tries to take this pawn, Black moves in for the kill with 37.Qxh3? Nf4!, and the g2-pawn is falling. Next, Black can maneuver the queen via the newly vacated e4-square, and due to White’s loosely positioned pieces, devastating material losses and/or checkmate will eventually come.

37…hxg2+ 38.Kh2 g1=Q+ 39.Nxg1 Nc3 0-1

Black wins. Qg2# is threatened, and so is Nxb1. Vaishali resigned, and this brings Zhu back into shared first-place with her with 7 points.

Divya - Tan

After an interesting opening phase, the middlegame entered a protracted maneuvering phase in a closed position where White had a weak e-pawn that would eventually tell. Tan’s handling of this phase of the game was elegant and her attack would eventually crash through.

Assaubayeva - Lagno

Bibisara escaped from a dangerous situation against Kateryna, and was able to turn around a lost game into a win in a very sharp way.

Already here, White had lost her advantage, and Black was within range of a draw, but it required the calculation of the move 40…g6, which is a difficult move to make when an enemy queen is ready to take control of the two ranks your king is going to be at and you’ve only got a couple minutes on the dial. Kateryna chose 40…Kg8 instead, and eventually faced heavy material loss and an impending mate.

There was a nice tactical sequence by the Women’s Candidates tournament leader who extended her lead by another win over the field today.

Black is more comfortable in this position, thanks to her better pawn structure; but otherwise the material balance and mutual potential passed pawns (White’s a-pawn, Black’s c-pawn) means that this position should be holdable for White, provided she finds the right plan. Her first priority should be freeing her rook.

30.Bc4??

A typical idea that has some strategic merit; trade off the bishop that could control the a8-promotion square for the potential passed pawn. It also aims to get rid of Black’s potential passed pawn on c5. But there’s a tactical problem with it, and Vaishali spots it very quickly.

30…Bc6!

31.Rxc5 b6

And now it’s clear why Bc4 was so bad: it blocks the rook’s path to safety. Goryachkina was forced to sacrifice the exchange with 32.Rxc6, and Vaishali won the ensuing endgame.

He can’t keep getting away with it…

What a fascinating position. Sindarov has a massive three-passed pawn majority on the kingside, but the structure isn’t particularly helpful as of right now. Pragg has a bishop for his two missing pawns, and it is unopposed, though not yet developed. One can imagine its sphere of influence gaining if the move Bc8-c6 were possible, but alas it is not, and must be made in a two move maneuver.

22…Bd7?? Pragg played in twenty seconds.

Sindarov spent about 9 minutes longer, and played 23.Rf7! in response, having spotted a successive series of double attacks that wins the game. Pragg had little choice: 23…Qxf7 24.Rxf7 Kxf7 25.Qf4!

The first deadly double attack. Black must defend the rook.

25…Kg7 26.Qg5+

Another double-attack. The rook is hanging so the king sticks close by.

26…Kh7 27.Qe7+!

The final double attack. White will pick up the bishop, and use the superior mobility of the queen and the exposed position of Black’s king and rooks to guide all of the passed pawns forward to victory. This was only the half-way point of the game; Pragg did not resign until move 53.

Divya - Goryachkina

In a minor piece endgame that was being held strong by both sides, Divya finally faltered on the 56th move of the game.

The position has a couple imbalances worth pointing out: The knight vs bishop, the pawns aret 2-on-1 on the queenside and 2-on-3 on the kingside. One pawn is passed, but Black has stopped its advance, making the knight on c4 feel a bit frozen in place. All in all everything is held in equilibrium. I think Black has a slightly more comfortable game, because bishops are usually better than knights when there are pawns on both sides of the board; but this position is a draw; it’s hard to imagine either side making more progress without the position breaking down with captures.

56.g3?

By making contact with Black’s position first, White is allowing Black to create a passed pawn in a more advantageous circumstance. Instead, 56.h4! kept the game going, as after 56…gxh4 Black has no hope of creating a passed pawn.

56…fxg3+ 57.Kxg3

57…Bb3?

Missing an opportunity to threaten the creation of the passed pawn with 57…h5! However, Divya was painfully low on time.

58.Nb2??

Missing Ne5+ followed by h4, successfully breaking up Black’s last resource in her connected pawns.

After Goryachkina played 58…h5, White’s position was finally doomed and Aleksandra was able to pick up a point five moves later after Divya resigned on her own

Assaubayeva - Zhu

Zhu had a comfortable position for most of the middlegame, having saddled White with an IQP that could never advance. But in a series of strange events and very slight inaccuracies, Bibisara was able to create a passed pawn on the queenside, and then another, as Black’s position became more tangled. As soon as the passers were on the board, the game became extremely sharp, and Bibisara eventually picked up a full point thanks to an extra queen. GIF:

Giri got the better of Caruana in a rather heartbreaking ending for the American.

Black has just played 37…c5, potentially freeing up White’s position for some counterplay. After 38.dxc6, White is able to put pressure on the d6 pawn. However, Caruana chose 38.Kg3, and it’s not really clear to me why this move was chosen, though I suspect he was trying to support the e4-pawn. In any case, Giri’s dismantling of the position thereafter is extremely instructive.

38…Qa7! hit the knight on a1 with tempo, so White now has to further discoordinate his army.

39.Qb1 h5! Giri continues to flush the king out away from all protections

40.Kf3 h4 41.Kg4 Qe7

Fabi’s attempt to attack the h4-pawn is failing.

42.Qd3??

42…f5+! 43.exf5 Kh6!

White resigns due to the following:

• 44.e4 Bh5#

• 44..fxg6 e4 loses the queen due to Qe5+ and/or Qg5#

• 44.Kf3 (evading Qg5+ and Bh5) e4+ 45.Qxe4 Bh5+ loses the queen and White will be mated regardless.

Great win for Giri, who has now arisen as the most likely person to stop Sindarov’s rampage. This really hurts as a Fabi fan, though.

Praggnanandhaa - Wei

Wei put on an absolutely monstrous defense effort from a positionally poor position where it looked like Pragg was definitely going to win. Both sides found great tactics, but Wei’s dogged unwillingness to lose the game was the star. The gif of the game shows how frenetic and frantic things got.

Bluebaum - Sindarov

Here’s another game where a player got away with a near-miss.

Sindarov’s attack was rolling quite powerfully, but a miscalculation ended up costing him half a point in a position where he otherwise probably would have won the way he normally has this entire tournament.

24…Bxa4?

A very unfortunate choice, considering that Sindarov had 55 minutes in this comfortable position and spent a mere 11 seconds allowing this queen trade to allow White to escape the worst with 25.Qxb6!, at which point the endgame was quite drawn.

Tan - Muzychuk

In this game Muzychuk spent most of her time with a nice advantage over Tan, whose main form of counterplay was her clock plus. The timestamp here is 26:11 Tan, 1:50 Muzychuk. And while this is a technical advantage for Black on the board, the choices are not equal nor easy to figure out without time on the buzzer.

38…Kxg5

This is the obvious move, and it feels so unfair that it’s also the one that led to a draw after a subsequent rook trade, as the opposite color-bishop endgame held no potential for Black. Being under time pressure, it makes sense to make the game as least complicated as possible, and so eliminating a potential future problem like this is the more immediate idea. Anna had a chance to create a protected passed pawn with the urgent 38…f5! and avoiding any rook trades, to try to nurse this pawn plus into a full point; but to do this on demand with two minutes on the clock is a task I don’t think any human could figure out.

Zhu - Lagno

Zhu won a very nice endgame against Lagno, being able to go up a pawn and consolidate very handily with some rook maneuvers.

White is playing according to the normal principle of moving the king toward the center. Kateryna goes for a trade.

23…Rxd1? A far better and more natural choice was the simple 23…Rd4. White is still pressing, but Black’s plan to get rid of her only active piece in the game was dubious. Perhaps she feared losing the pawn on c5, but the rook on d1 is hanging with check if such a thing were to occur.

24.Rxd1 a5 25.Rd5

Now it’s clear White is going up a pawn.

25…a4 26.Rxe5 axb3 27.axb3 Rb8

Now Black is threatening to win this pawn.

28.Rg5+! Kh8 29.Rg3

Perfect coordination. Zhu went on to win with a clinical treatment until her opponent’s resignation.

Vaishali - Divya

Vaishali found a nice series of moves to crush Divya in a very oppressive middlegame.

Divya’s knight has found some juicy targets: the c1-rook and b2-bishop. The DSB would be great trade, because then White has no pressure on the g7 square. And of course, an exchange of knight for rook isn’t bad either. However, this idea is tactically flawed, and the shakiness in her position is about to be completely exposed.

23.Rxd3!

Vaishali gives up an exchange on her terms, which includes opening up the long diagonal for her light square bishop further; it also means the destruction of Black’s most active piece in the game, leaving White in the driver’s seat with no hope of rest for Divya.

23…exd3 24.c5!

Already, Black is compelled to give back the rook.

24…Rxc6 25.dxc6

Thanks to the open diagonal, White’s bishop reigns absolutely supreme and the passed pawn on c6 is already cutting Black’s position in half.

25…Bc7 26.Qd7! Qb8

Black can’t accept the queen trade: 26…Qxd7? 27.cxd7 Bd8 28.c6!

The threat is c7, and there’s not much Black can do about it. Even after 28…d2, White can still play 29.c7! Bxc7 30.Rxc7!

White can even allow Black their queen first. 30…d1=Q 31.Bd4! This interference tactic seals the win. Black has no meaningful threats, the d-pawn is going to queen, and escape attempts by Black run into problems on the h-file, the f8-square, and the 7th and 8th ranks.

Back to the game:

27.Be5 Bxe5

28.Rb1!!

Offering a whole rook. Divya cannot accept the gift due to 28…Qxb1?? 29.Qe8#

28…Qf8 29.fxe5 h5 30.Qd6 Qf7 31.Rb7 1-0

Here was an instructive opening moment in this Vienna. It took me a few minutes to think of how I would play here. White has just recaptured on c3 after Black took a knight to mess up the pawn structure. Bluebaum chose 8…Bg4 here. But how would you respond if instead he decided to take the pawn with 8…Nxc3? Leave a comment below with your move(s) and/or idea(s).

Giri - Praggnanandhaa

I find the game of chess unique in that even relatively mundane ideas can still be so aesthetically pleasing.

This is the kind of position you might see in a positional chess handbook because of how Giri plays it. Pragg’s 18…h6 is threatening to take the knight, but Giri finds a nice zwischenzug before retreating: 19.dxc5! Qxc5 20.Nf3

White’s plan is very simple: having just given Black a passed pawn, he’s now going to blockade it permanently and show that it is only a weakling. 20…Nc6 21.Ncd4! Nxd4 22.Nxd4

While this is a rather straightforward idea, the fact that it occurs at the top level tells us that if it’s good enough for a master, it should be good enough for a club player — pay attention. White is obviously for choice: Giri has isolated Black’s central pawn and permanently blocked it, making Pragg’s bishop on b7 a disastrously-placed piece. Additionally, Giri has traded off a redundant piece in his army for one that would otherwise be an important counter-blockader of the e5 pawn. The knight is beautifully placed on d4 as it radiates control of the e6 square, for which the e-pawn is eventually destined. In fact, in this configuration, White controls c6, e6, d6, and f6 — massive control for two short-range pieces especially considering one is a pawn. Fast forward another 13 moves:

Progress has been made, but we see that the knight has held itself on d4, safe from Black’s only bishop, who has struggled to find a target the entire game. To boot, the core of the position (Nd4, Re1, e5) has not changed, but Giri’s position is finally ready to explode in Pragg’s face. The promise of move 22 finally unfolds: 36.e6! Qg6 37.Rf2 Rc4 38.Rf4 h5

White’s pawn, owing to its status as a weakling, pushes around the enemy queen and becomes as strong as a rook on the sixth rank. Giri’s plan is to push it all the way to e7, attack f8, and make Black give up a rook for it. Pragg’s last move shows the desperation of Black’s position, as it does nothing to improve his chances, but there is hardly any way to stop Giri’s plan.

39.Qf2 Bc2 40.e7

White’s position reaches critical mass.

40.Be4 41.Rf8+ Kh7 42.Rxe8 Qxe8 43.Rxe4! dxe4 44.Qf5+ 1-0

Prag has no good moves:

• 44…Kg8 45.Qd5+ Qf7 (or 45…Kh7 46.Qxc5) 46.e8=Q+!;

• 44…Kh6 45.Qe6+;

• 44…Kh8 45.Qf8+;

• 44…Qg6 45.Qxg6+ Kxg6 46.e8=Q+

Nakamura - Caruana

“It’s not so easy to resign. It’s not easy to resign in such a situation. It’s not only a game. It’s a crucial game. And they are rivals... It’s a very painful moment at this part of the tournament.” - Judit Polgar, chess24 live stream

After a toughly-fought middlegame, the Americans found themselves in a double-rook endgame. The saying goes that “all rook endgames are drawn”, but you still have to find the right move.

28…h5??

The only real mistake of the game for Fabi, and it happens to lose. Nakamura played 29.Rd1, securing control of the seventh rank, and Fabi’s position died a slow but sure death.

Black had to play 28…Rab2!, sacrificing the passed pawn on a5 in order to defend the seventh rank: 29.Rxa5 Rb7!

Now White can’t get the “pigs on the seventh”, and the endgame draw is a matter of technique. Alas.

Thus did Giri and Nakamura avenge themselves.

Muzychuk - Divya

Up until now, Muzychuk’s chess has been unimpeachable; but something happened in her game as White against Divya and a severe trend-change exhibited itself in multiple stages in the endgame phase. First, Muzychuk was winning. Then she was drawing. Then she was losing. Divya played with incredible grit and came back to win in a wild queen endgame, which is probably the worst possible endgame to have if you’re low on time, as Muzychuk experienced herself. GIF time:

Lagno - Goryachkina

Kateryna won rather smoothly in a hyper-sharp Scotch where one bad pawn move by Black created critical light-square weaknesses led to the trade of her consequently extremely important light-square bishop. From here White’s bishop pair became increasingly powerful as pieces were traded off until White was left with three passers on both sides of the board and a long-range bishop vs Black’s blockaded passer and short-range knight.

Tan - Zhu

While I myself enjoy the bishop pair immensely, it isn’t always best. In an equal-ish endgame position I found Zhu’s central presence to be quite pleasing to the eye and well-coordinated:

White has a tough trial ahead, because of the connected and passed e6-pawn. Her light square bishop doesn’t seem to do much for the position, and the advanced g- and h-pawns are also looking a bit weak. Her only consolation at the moment is that her rook x-rays Black’s which as of yet has no defender, thus pinning the knight on d5. The game was in within drawing bounds from here, but the weakness of the kingside pawns painted big target signposts on them and Zhu found a way to destroy the g-pawn and make her f-pawn passed as well. Later in this endgame, Zhu danced her knights around White’s position with the coordination of the passed e- and f-pawns to get here:

A knight has traded off for a bishop, and at this point, there is no reason for White not to resign here. Zhu could allow some drama with the move 68…e3 69.hxg7; but instead she goes for the simplest and straightforward idea, because her two passed pawns are better than a piece. 68…gxh6!? 69.Rxf6+ Kc5!? 70.Kf1 Rxb2 71.Bf7 Kd4 72.Rf5 Ke3

Black’s king is shielded from checks, and threatens mate with Rb1.

73.Kg1 Rg2+ 74.Kh1 Rg5 75.Rf6 Kf2 76.Rxh6 e3

77.Rh2+ Rg2! 0-1

Esipenko - Wei

Wei outplayed Esipenko handily in a rather messy Petrov Defense where White never got to castle to safety.

Black is obviously for choice here. The open c-file serves his purposes, and despite the nearly symmetrical pawn configuration, the fact that White’s King is on the wrong side of the queen’s rook spells long-term doom for Esipenko. Wei found a really nice multi-purpose move here that I found really pleasing to the eye.

22…Rc4!

Pointing out the problem with White’s d-pawn, further pushing him into inactivity to defend it. This exchange sacrifice cannot be accepted, because after 23.Bxc4 23…dxc4, White has to play the very weakening 24.a3 to prevent cracking the position open further with b5-b4 and c4-c3. Black could then follow up with any number of moves and continue to enjoy a torturous advantage over White due to his extreme lack of activity.

But Black also has good play after 23…bxc4, when the open b-file and semi-open c-file would facilitate a rook sally. Rc8 threatens c4-c3, clearing the file, so that Black’s knight can move out of the way for a check on the b1-h7 diagonal via Bf5, and Rb8 would also threaten c4-c3 and/or a sacrifice on b2 where Black’s bishops and queen could coordinate to finish the job.

After 23.Ne2, Wei continued his attack in a combinatorial style and picked up his first win in the tournament. The final position leaves a very pitiful impression for White’s King:

Sindarov - Giri

Giri did what only Bluebuam was also able to do, which was draw Sindarov in the first half of the tournament and stop the rest of the field’s bleeding. This game was played down to the metal of king vs king as Giri fiercely and accurately defended a bishop vs rook endgame against the Uzbek phenom.

Divya - Lagno

Here’s a position and engine evaluation that goes over my head. A few notes: White is up a pawn, but Black’s position is much more active, so this is dynamically equal. Fair enough, I can accept Stockfish’s 0.0 evaluation here. But after 21…Qh6? Black is now in a losing position (nearly +2.0 in White’s favor), and I still don’t understand why after looking at it. My best guess is that after 22.Bxe4 Rxe4 23.h3 Bxf4 24.hxg4 Bd6 25.Qd5:

White’s position maybe has superior activity after Black retakes the pawn on g4. For what it’s worth, Kateryna played 25…Rce8 instead — another move I don’t quite understand. For what it’s worth, this game later petered out into a draw, so I don’t feel so bad about not feeling confident in my own evaluation of the position. Sometimes computer chess is just too much to actually understand!

Vaishali - Tan

This game had a very interesting opening and ending. While the debate about “hypermodern” opening theory has for the most part subsided, the actual practice thereof can be quite instructive, especially when one side succeeds in provoking the other into over-aggressive play. Thus is the case in this position:

Tan has played the Pirc Defense with d6 and Nf6 against e4 and d4, and as far as I can tell this is a completely unique position on move 8. A strange impression: Black has strong pointed the e-pawn with d6 and Nbd7; she also put both of her bishops on strong diagonals, where they shoot through the center like snipers. This has all come at the cost of a cramped position. Black’s rooks have no open lines whatsoever, and Black’s queen has only the e7 square to move to — it’s not so clear this is the best place for it, but it’s the only potential place right now.

Meanwhile, Vaishali’s position is very clearly geared for an attack. The king’s knight is on e2, ready to support an aggressive pawn push to the f4 square. Her bishop on c2 is waiting for when the g6 pawn loses a bit more defense, or when the h7 square becomes a target. Most long-range pieces in Vaishali’s position are anticipating a kingside castling position by Black.

9.f4?!

Tan’s provocative play reaps a positional reward.

9…O-O (9…exf4 10.Nxf4 would be giving her opponent what she wants) 10.Ng3 Ba6?! (driving Vaishali’s rook to a better square) 11.Rf3 exd4 12.cxd4 c5!

Black is showing White that her center has been over-extended, and the dark squares around her king are weakening move-by-move. All-in-all, this is a very successful foray for Tan.

Tan enjoyed a lot of pressure against Vaishali’s position for a long time, and things were looking to be going her way for most of the game. However, she dropped the ball in her attack (because chess is hard and some positions are very difficult to keep the advantage in), and in a pawn-up endgame, fortunes finally completely reversed.

In this position, Tan played 37.Ra1??, allowing an elementary tactic that Vaishali used to win the game. Were you able to find the right move?

Answer: 38.Rxf6!

Black has fallen victim to a double-attack that will leave White up a bishop with an easily won endgame.

38…Rf1+ 39.Ke2 Kxf6 40.Kxf1.

11 moves later Tan resigned. Had she not been winning for most of the game, I think she would have resigned on Rxf6; but it’s hard to let go of a game you should have won earlier. The especially unfortunate thing about the proceeding move is that Tan had a lot of time on her clock when making this error. Sometimes it happens to the best of us.

Giri - Bluebuam

Giri’s knights danced so much this game it’s almost comical. I have to share. I don’t know if he was being cheeky, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

Wei - Sindarov

Long think, wrong think.

Sindarov’s narrative this entire tournament is like clockwork: Plays the position, gets something with dynamic chances that isn’t risky for himself, watches the opponent drain their clock. Rinse, repeat, win.

Here Wei spent 35 minutes before choosing the dynamic 13.b4, insodoing burning all of his 25-minute time advantage; the position remains equal. The players kept up with one another, and the position was perhaps just slightly more comfortable for White.

But trouble began for Wei on move 18.

Almost any rook move makes sense. Rad1 or Ra2 are good options. But Wei, after 47 minutes, chose 18.Bxf6?. After 18...Qd7 (played in under a minute) 19.Rad1 Qe6 20.h3 Qxc4, the position is equal, but the clock situation (17 minutes for Wei, 67 minutes for Sindarov) tells a different story. The inevitable time-induced blunder arrived on move 30:

The position is nice for Black, who is up two pawns and has strong control over the e-file and a more active position; but it’s not quite desperate for White yet. White should capture the pawn on c5, followed by piling up on the f4-pawn with Rf3 and Rf1, and opportunely open the f-file and attack the f7-pawn, which gives probably sufficient counterplay to stay in the game. But the central passer d6 looks dangerous too, so Wei took with 30.Rxd6??, missing that after 30…Rxd6 31.Rxd6 Black has the elegant 31…Qe3!, a queen trade that is fatal to accept due to 32.Qxe3?? fxe3, when the passed pawn is too strong.

Therefore Wei played 32.Qf3 c4! 33.Qg4+ Kf8 34.Rd1 c3 35.Qg5? f3! 36.Qxe3 Rxe3 0-1

Zhu - Muzychuk

This game was headed toward a draw, but an inconsistent pawn move in front of White’s king followed by a decentralizing knight maneuver began to spell disaster for Zhu Jiner as Muzychuk took the invitation to crack open White’s position. Watch how idle play can lead to catastrophe. While Muzychuk was a little too compliant with the move 32…c6 (preventing Ne5), this wasn’t enough for Zhu to push back against the pressure.

Tan - Goryachkina

In a very sharp Two Knights Defense line, Goryachkina had found her way into a winning position — even going up a queen against a bishop and rook; but this kind of endgame is hard to win, and Tan’s steely nerves kept up to successfully defend in what must have been a really frustrating missed opportunity for her opponent. Show vs tell is easy to do when I don’t understand the nuances of all these endgames!

Lagno - Vaishali

Time pressure got the best of Kateryna this time, and Vaishali was able to pick off a win by making White’s queen the only defense against checkmate, and everyone knows that a queen is the worst defender.

Both players low on time, White, currently up a piece for a pawn, went for a natural plan to trade off the queens and stop the attack, but Vaishali’s instincts were sound: 38…Rxg3+ 39.fxg3 Qxg3+ 40.Qg2 Qe3+ 41.Kh2 Rg5

The rook threatens the queen and severely restricts the king to the h-file. Mate should come soon. 42.Qh3 Qf4+ 43.Kh1 Rg3 44.Qe6 Kg7 45.Qe7+ Kh6 46.Be4

We are back to the position I gave at the top of the post.

Solution: 46.Rg5! A nice interference tactic to set up Qh4, threatening mate. 47.Bg2 Qh4 0-1. Kateryna resigned in light of 48.Kg1 Rxg2+! 49.Kxg2 Qxe7 with an easy victory to follow.

Assaubayeva - Divya

Bibisara pressed too hard for a win with White and Divya was able to counter and win.

The position is more comfortable for Black, but not in a way that, at least to me, is obviously winning. Qf3 seems like a solid choice, hitting the rook on c6 and defending the pawn on f5. But Bibisara went for it with 40.f6? and suddenly Black has great chances now that White is about to lose all counterplay after this back rank ruse.

I don’t know if Divya smelled blood or danger first, but her follow-up move 40…Rc8! is extremely instructive. Bibisara continued with 41.Rd1, announcing her intention to sacrifice her queen on d8, but Divya followed up again with the very strong 41…Kh8!, completely putting to bed any conceit of a back rank mate by Black. (Alas, the prosaic 41…Rf8 also works, but isn’t nearly as cool).

Now that Black’s position has solidified, the g-file is ready be exploited by Black’s major pieces and the extra h-pawn. 42.Kg2 h5! 43.Qd2 (a slow-paced resignation, as the endgame would be doomed for White) Qg4! 44.Re1 h4 45.Re3 Rg8 46.Qd7 Qf4 0-1

“What’s the matter Yasha? It’s just a game.”

“I hate chess.” Yasha said.

“You don’t hate chess,” Semyon said. “You hate losing.”

Spy’s Mate by Brad Buchanan is an enjoyable and briskly-paced spy novel set in the USSR. It follows the story of Armenian chess prodigy Yasha Basmanjian, as he seeks to become the best chess player in the world. Along the way, he is caught up in the politics of a fractured Soviet Union, and many players, over the board and elsewhere, seek to use him for their own motivations. I don’t want to give away the story, but I found it both entertaining and thought-provoking.

Rather, I want to highlight a couple features about it that I think makes it a unique book. To start, this novel has actual chess diagrams in it. Any well-equipped student of chess history will recognize certain positions given in the book. In many cases these are classics (Rotlewi-Rubinsten’s incredible queen sacrifice; Nimzowitsch’s immortal zugzwang with Black against Samisch). And if you’re a serious player, you might even take a chance or two to solve the position yourself before continuing to read, as if it were tactical puzzle.

But besides the chess games, there are also certain aspects of historical figures, and here is where I think people may be surprised to find that one character’s nonchalance about playing a correspondence game with the ghost of deceased masters is actually inspired by a real-life, legendarily foul-tempered grandmaster (we are, of course, speaking of Viktor Korchnoi). Korchnoi also receives a later nod (as far as I can tell) in reference to a fictional player wearing tinted glasses. Short history lesson: In Korchnoi’s case he was trying to ward off the effects of a suspected hypnotist who was hired to stare at him unceasingly during his match for the championship against Karpoov in 1978.

All of which is to say, chess here is the center stage of the novel. The story is fictional, but the inspirations are real: The political intrigue of Soviet Chess was real. The government oversight, punishment and espionage by and against chess players was real. The use of chess as a diplomatic tool, and an ideological weapon against the West — all real. The idea of developing electronic chess computers to analyze and eventually dominate the game of chess; the premature bemoaning of chess experiencing a draw death:

There were also some alarmists who theorized that chess, as practiced by its two most able exponents, was moving toward a sterile equilibrium in which draws were the result of correct play by both sides, and outright victory would be impossible unless someone committed an outrageous blunder.

If nothing else, this novel tells a page-turning story that is shockingly plausible based on its setting, and that excites me because it can be an entertaining introduction to one of the most fascinating era of chess: The Soviet era.

The author is himself a chess player and enthusiast, and his enjoyment of the game and its history oozes in each story beat as he effectively draws from it to create a new narrative. Every win, every loss, every obsessive thought about the game we find in the protagonist Yasha, I think many chess players will feel “seen” because of it. And anybody who enjoys a quick-paced spy novel should check it out too, especially if they have even a passing interest in the game.

Question: It’s an extremely sharp position in the Marshall Gambit. White has sacrificed two pawns for an irrational position, the bishop pair, and attacking chances. What move would you play? We’ll see what Nakamura chose at the end of the article.

Caruana - Bluebaum

We got a rare mate on the board in Fabi’s round 5 game against Bluebuam.

In a position not very stereotypical of the Petrov Defense, Bluebaum allowed his opponent to crown his mating attack with a cheeky pawn mate: 27.Qe8+ Kg7 28.h6#

Zhu - Vaishali

This game would take a long time to explain, so I’d rather show than try to tell. Long story short, I really enjoy the way that Zhu Jiner simply suffocated the life out of Vaishali’s position — it’s one of those squeezes where one side is able to absolutely prevent counterplay by the other side, and then take their sweet time maneuvering applying torturous pressure until the other side finally falls. Note how White attacks the backward g6-pawn in the major piece endgame to sufficiently distract Black from the c-file, at which point positional dominance wins the game for her. Great play by Zhu.

Nakamura - Sindarov

Answer: Instead of Nakamura’s 13.h4?, 13.Ne4! was the only move, and for a rather complicated reason, which is probably why Nakamura spent nearly 70(!) minutes on this position. The game continuation was 13…Qa5+ 14.b4 Nxb4 15.O-O Re8 16.Qd2 c5 17.Rad1 Nf5

With the h-pawn hanging, White is virtually forced to open the position up for Black’s bishop and e8-rook with 18.Nxf5 exf5. While there are other considerations, what Hikaru chose here was more-or-less the correct line (16.Qd2 made things a bit worse, but not desperately so); so what happens if White plays Ne4 and play continues the same way instead of h4?

13…Qa5 14.b4 Nxb4 15.O-O Re8 16.Qd2 c5 17.Rad1 Nf5

Compared to the game position after h4, here the h-pawn is not hanging, and White can smoothly reply with Kh1 or Qg5 without helping Black activate their position more; things are dynamically balanced: White’s position is hyper-active to compensate for the three missing pawns. Of course, the game could have branched out many more times, but I think what Hikaru either did not see or under-estimated probably had to do with the impact of Nf5 and the threat of losing the h-pawn.

Alas, after 13.h4? Hikaru suffered as Sindarov’s position easily unfurled into a win in an opposite color bishop endgame, extending Sindarov’s absolutely epic Candidates run by another win, for an unprecedented 4.5/5 start.

In this English position, White is feeling a lot of discomfort. A missing pawn, a fianchetto knight and some poor piece coordination, and Black is threatening to play …a4. However, Black has just gifted her an opportunity to wrest back some dynamic equality. White to play and find a way out. Answer at the bottom of the article.

Esipenko - Giri

Giri got his first win in the Najdorf. I guess he knows a thing or two about that opening, so it makes sense. To be honest, this game’s course is very hard to follow, and probably ranks among the more bewildering in this tournament thus far, but shows the theoretical danger of the Sicilian for White.

Apparently Giri worked out that this position is OK for Black. To me it is slightly frightening to think of placing my king on the d7-square in a position like this, and on first glance I would rather attack with White than defend with Black; but then again Giri is a GM and I am not. By move 19, with a little help from Esipenko, Giri was able to transform the above position into this:

Open files for both rooks, the bishop pair, an extra pawn, and an unassailable center. One could not ask for more from a Sicilian Defense. Giri enjoyed a nice positional advantage for the rest of the game, and the conversion to a win was shockingly smooth from here due to some further inaccuracies by his opponent. The GIF tells the story nicely:

Wei Yi - Hikaru Nakamura

Naka also played an interesting Sicilian in the form of a Dragondorf; Wei was up to the challenge, and after a slight opening inaccuracy by White, both players kept up with one another until Wei blundered heavily in a drawn 2-rook endgame:

Almost any normal move holds here; the h4-pawn is dropping but White shouldn’t panic. Low on time, Wei played 40.Kh2?? which allows 40…Rxh4+ with a crucial tempo that allows Black to get on the back rank after 41.Kg1 Rb1+ 42.Kf2 Rhh1

Black is able to push the h-pawn and dream of advancing the others patiently, and White’s king is a liability being flushed out of its cover on the back rank. Unfortunately, a few moves later Naka missed a winning continuation and the game petered out to a draw. This feels unfortunate for Nakamura — one of his best chances by far to gain a point in this tournament. It was a nice save for Wei though.

Sindarov - Caruana

In a QGA, Caruana played highly provocatively, got a pretty active position, but with a loose king stuck in the center and a busted pawn structure. 16 moves in, he had burned more than half his time against Sindarov’s preparation (Sindarov used barely 7 minutes up to this moment)

After a long thought, Sindarov went for the most fighting move 17.g3! Other options here included Be4 (virtually a draw offer) and f3, blunting Black’s bishop. Fabi’s reply after a 15-minute tank was 17…f5?! From here it went downhill, due to a combination of (you guessed it) time trouble and a difficult position to play as Sindarov did what he’s done all tournament and played a devastating attack. Another GIF is due:

Muzychuk - Lagno

Hard blunder

Anna Muzychuk has played ice-cold perfect chess this entire tournament and finally got a win with it against Kateryna Lagno. Kateryna’s troubles started on move 28:

Black just blundered with 28…exd4. After 29.Qxd4, White threatens c5 with a fork against the minors and it turns out Black just has no good way to respond to this move. If 29…Nd7, White wins a piece or mates; if the bishop moves, White either gains the move 30.Ne7+ with c5 to follow; or mates on the back rank. After 29…Kb7 Lagno simply gave up the piece, and shortly thereafter the rest of the game: 30.c5 Ra8 31.cxd6 Qxd6 32.Rxa8! 1-0

Divya - Zhu

Divya missed an interesting tactic here:

Solution: Instead of Divya’s 22.a4? simply allowing Black a passed pawn after 22…Bxd4 (Zhu later won with a crushing attack), she had the exchange sacrifice 22.Rxe6!

After 22…a4, White has the desperado 23.Rxh6+! gxh6 and 24.Qd3 would keep the game going. While I think that Black’s position is still slightly more comfortable overall, White no longer has light square problems, and Black’s breezy king position means that White has dynamic counterplay to balance the game.

How does Black crown her attack against the White King? Solution given at the end of the article.

Caruana - Wei

Wei Yi uncorked a theoretical novelty on move 8 in a symmetrical English. At 8.Ng5, Fabi had about 90 minutes on his clock; Wei had 116; Wei was drawing his opponent into his preparation.

The only move Lichess lists that masters play here is 8…e6, simply defending the knight. But Wei had a more ambitious idea in mind with 8…Nb6!?, a sacrificial sequence involving the giving up of two pawns for a lead in development and control over White’s light squares. Fabi accepted: 9.Bxc6+ bxc6 10.Qxc6+ Bd7 11.Qxc5 h6 12.Nf3 Rc8 13.Qa5 Bh3.

Finally the position has a reached a bit of quiescence, and here Fabi had to sit and think about how to proceed. To my eyes, this is an extremely uncomfortable position for White: castling is entirely off the table due to Bh3; any attempt to develop the queenside leads to further weakening, and even if White could castle, Rc8 and Bg7 are applying immense pressure to the c3 knight. In other words, White is trapped in the center. Black has very active piece play on the queenside, and is about to castle and try to exploit the centralized White king. Over 15 minutes of thought later, Fabi replied with 14.Qb5+ Nd7 15.Rg1!

Probably Fabi foresaw that he would have to play this way, with his king in the center, and was checking how he could use a tempo on the enemy king to reposition the queen somewhere better. The position is dynamically equal; Black’s light-square domination is offset by the missing pawns on the queenside.

Wei continued with 15…O-O and Fabi replied with 16.g4.

This move comes with some obvious poison: Black’s bishop is trapped and White is threatening Rg3. This was also a move that Wei evidently hadn’t expected; he spent 30 minutes on his next move and ended up playing 16…Rc5?! (16…Nf6 preparing …Bxg4 keeps things equal). After 17.Qb3, the trend shift continued with the 20-minute blunder 17…Ne5 (still Nf6 was best); After 18.Nxe5! Rxe5 19.Nd1 Yi resigned.

Pragg - Sindarov

Wei Yi sacrificed a couple pawns in his game against Caruana; Sindarov gave up a piece against Pragg:

Some opening complications in the Queen’s Gambit Declined led to this position where White has some threats, most obviously to remove Black’s bishop pair with Nxc5; however, Javokhir played 12…Qf5 to prevent this (up to now, in the Lichess masters database Black would play Qg6 with a similar idea to pin the knight against the queen). Prag struck out with the move 13.b4!?

I think the idea is to remove pressure from the e3 pawn. For instance, White could have played 13.Bd3, but then Black responds with 13…dxe3, and in any case White’s kingside would feel weak against Black’s kingside majority: 14.O-O exf2+ 15.Kh1! (15.Nxf2? Qh5 and Black is simply up a clean pawn). Evidently displeased with this future, Pragg tried to kick the bishop instead.

After 15 minutes of thought, Sindarov decided it was time to sacrifice a piece for some pawns with 13.Nxb4!? 14.axb4 Bxb4+ 15.Kd1 dxe3:

Full compensation for the piece is found in Black’s preponderance of pawns and White’s missing cover around his king. And people say the QGD is boring! Sindarov would go on to win the game with a nice attack, helped by time pressure as Pragg tried to wade through the complications. The final position is quite the picture of success for Black, where Sindarov was able to win back the piece and an additional pawn with a guaranteed endgame win:

Goryachkina - Divya

This was an equal game where Black defended well up until the time control, when Divya made a game-losing blunder by taking a knight on d2 due to a miscalculated tactic. Aleksandra recaptured 42.Qxd2 e4 43.Qa5, where it became clear that White had a winning rook endgame. Things continued in her favor for a long time as she pressed her advantage and was ready to take the full point. However, a strange sequence of events occurred, to which we may once again attribute time trouble:

With less than a minute on her clock, Goryachkina played 64.Ra6, jeopardizing the win. Divya played 64…Kh7, missing 64…Rxf3 65.Rxg6 Kh7! when Black holds. But Goryachkina returned the favor again with 65.Kf7??, missing the winning 65.Ra7+!. The idea is to trap Black’s king with the move f4 and march the a-pawn up the board while threatening Kf7 followed by Ra8+. After Rxf3, the aforementioned mating attack is gone, and Black has sufficient counter to hold the draw; the game ended on move 81.

Zhu - Assaubayeva

A Rossolimo with a lot of fireworks:

Zhu played a theoretical pawn sacrifice on move 9.b4 cxb4 10.a3 b3 and deviated with 11.Nbd2!? (11.c4 is the normal move in the Lichess master’s database).

As an amateur, I don’t really know what’s going on in this position, but White has a huge development advantage, and that Black’s king being stuck in the center is a long-term liability. Because of this, White’s best plan is to active all her pieces. Rb1 is coming soon; the Knight can move from d2-c4-e3. And if Black wants to keep her pawn plus permanently, she does so at the cost of time, and helping White develop further. Play continued: 11…g5 12.d4 g4 13.hxg3 Bxg4 14.Bb2 d5

Black is clearly trying to pressure White’s center, but now White can return the favor. Zhu played 15.c4!

The e4 pawn will die, but White maintains massive control over d5. After 15…dxe4 16.Nxe4 Nxe4 17.Rxe4 Bf5 18.Re3 Bc2

Black is holding on to her trump in the passed pawn on b3 but White is for choice due to the strong hanging pawns on c4 and d4 and far more active position. Zhu made her first inaccuracy after 19.Qc1?! (Qd2 evading the pin) Rc8 20.d5?! (Qd2 stepping out of the pin). From here the trend continued to change, as Bibisara did everything to keep this pawn alive on the queenside, and was able to force a lot of piece trades.

With a seven minute think, Zhu played 29.Bh2?? I think her idea was to prevent f6 coming with tempo followed by the move e5 at which point the d6 pawn is lost, but this allows Black to begin a devastating attack. 29…Qg5! suddenly comes with a lot of venom, because Rc4 also coordinates against c1; …Be4 would threaten Qxg2# and White can’t take it via Rxe4 due to Rc1+, and Black could always threaten a mate via d1 with the move Qd5. After 30.Be5 Be4 31.f4 Rc1+!, Bibisara traded off all the major pieces due to a cacophony of mate threats, and solidified her position with two passed pawns on both wings to end the game.

Tan - Lagno

A crazy back-and-forth in the Italian:

Things are in a slightly atypical Italian where White lost castling rights, but has active pieces posted almost everywhere. Seeking to relieve her development issues, Kateryna went for a trade with 15…Ba6? but after 16.Bxa6 Nxa6, Black’s knight is further removed from the game and needs time to be brought back in allowing White a freer hand in the center and kingside. Tan set up a strong position against the kingside by pressing her g-pawn forward with the help of Rg1, but then made a critical miscalculation by allowing some tempi which would activate Black’s queen and give it time to coordinate against the weak White king position.

20.Rg4?? Qd7! 21.h3 Qf5! 22.Qd3 Ne3+! 23.fxe3 Qxf3+ 24.Bf2 Qxh3+ 25.Rg2 hxg5

Black’s fortunes have reversed; Kateryna is in the driver’s seat. The most impressive element of this combination is that Lagno’s clock held at 6 minutes thanks to the increment; Tan’s dropped by 20 minutes due to the pressure of defending.

The continuation after this point got really messy though, due to time pressure, though it was clear that Black had the advantage and the easier game regardless. Nevertheless, fortune’s favor turned around again on move 35, when White had done an excellent job of defending and consolidating the position to protect the king.

Low on time, Lagno missed with 35…Qe4??, allowing the combination 36.Rxc7! Rxc7 37.Qb8+ Kh7 38.Qxc7 with a decisive material advantage.

The game wasn’t over. After 38…Rb6 39.b3 Qb1+ 40.Kh2 f5!? (opening the third rank so Black has access to the move Rh6) 41.Qf7? Rf6! Tan made the final blunder with 42.Qxd5??

Kateryna found an extremely pretty sequence: 42…Nf4!! 43.exf4 Rh6+ 44.Kg3 Qd3+ 45.Qf3

Solution: 45…g4!! wins the queen. (Qxd3 is impossible due to Rh3#).

Tan finally gave up her resistance on move 54. 0-1

At the end of Round 3, the standings for the candidates are as follows:

Candidates:

1-2: Caruana, Sindarov with 2.5

3-4 Pragg, Bluebaum with 1.5

5-8, Giri, Wei, Esipenko, Nakamura with 1

Women’s Candidates:

1-2: Assaubayeva, Lagno with 2.

3-6: Goryachkina, Vaishali, Divya, Muzychuk with 1.5

7-8: Zhu, Tan with 1.

Personally, I’m rooting for Caruana, but Sindarov seems like the most dangerous opponent and is performing just as well. On the Women’s candidates, I have been very impressed with Assaubayeva, Divya, and Zhu’s games, despite some disappointing results, the games have been rather enjoyable to watch. I didn’t have a favorite going in, but I felt that the Chinese players would be the ones to beat. We’re only three rounds in; time will tell, but it’s already been a very exciting series. Tomorrow is the last round before a rest day; I’m curious if we’ll see another set of draws or more fireworks over the board (or perhaps even both).

Divya - Vaishali

White is threatening a queen capture or mate in 1. How to continue? I’ll give the answer at the bottom of the article.

Lagno - Jiner

The curse of time trouble.

Zhu got a very nice French position against Kateryna who played several inaccuracies in middlegame under time pressure.

Black is technically dominant in this position, and after 27.Qxg5, has many moves (27…Rd7, Rb8, Ra8, or even Rxd1) that would keep the game going in Black’s favor. The g-file is a long-term problem for White, and the light squares are extremely weak, not to mention the two-pawn minus; unfortunately, Zhu only has two minutes on her clock when this position arrives. However, White has the initiative due to some tactical ideas on the back rank, making powerful use of the dark squares around Black’s king, and Zhu has to play carefully to get out with the advantage. However, two minutes is not a lot of time to check all your calculations, and she responded with 27…Rc8?, losing all her advantage, but White has to find the correct followup.

Kateryna was also short on time, and played 28.Rd2. It would be hard to find the move 28.Nb5!, threatening a huge knight fork on d6 and/or a skewer via Rc1 (this is why Rb8 or Ra8 were superior moves to Rc8). However, Rd2 allowed, and Zhu missed, 28…Qg4!, forcing White’s queen away from control of g8, and allowing Black to finally consolidate via castling with a huge material advantage. Alas, with only a few seconds on her clock, Zhu resorted to 28…Qb4, which allowed Kateryna the draw with 29.Rxe6!! and a perpetual shortly thereafter.

Vaishali - Divya

The curse of time trouble… again.

The two Indian players in the Women’s Candidates had a very fiery game. Divya came out with an aggressive start to get this position on the 34th move of the game.

Both players burned a lot of time, and with a minute on her clock, Vaishali had flinched first with 34...Ne4, allowing 35.Rxb7 Rxb7 36.Rxb7 Ng5.

Being up a comfortable pawn, Divya could offer a queen trade with 37.Qg4 and have a nice rook endgame ahead of her. However, this is hard to work out low on time (is the rook endgame drawn?), so she played 37.Qg3? which allows Black back into the game.

Vaishali found the way: 37…Rxc5!! 38.Qe5+ Kh7 39.Rb8. Now we come back to a position that will surely find its way into a modern tactics book — were you able to find the idea?

Solution: Vaishali calmly played 39…Rc1+ 40.Kh2 Qxh3+!! 41.gxh3 Nf3+ 42.Kg2 Nxe5 43.dxe5 Ra1 44.Ra8 and the players agreed to a draw. Another incredible save by Vaishali, and an unfortunate miss for Divya.

All draws today for both the Open and Women’s Candidates tournaments, but the chess was not boring at all.

Goryachkina - Lagno

Goryachkina missed a tactic that would have lead to a dead-won position. Can you find the move? Answer at the bottom of the article.

Sindarov - Esipenko

How not stopping a trend can can lose a winning game:

Up to move 26, Black was playing excellently and for choice in this position. The move 27…Bb6 comes to mind, putting pressure on the weak d4 pawn; the bishop on h5 performs an excellent job controlling the light squares, and has a strong pin against the knight on f3. Black has every reason to play for a win here.

Somehow Esipenko chose 27…Bxf3, an inscrutable move to me. Seeking a human understanding of this move, I checked the chess.com, Chess Dojo, and FIDE streams, and only commentator GM Peter Svidler on FIDE’s official YouTube channel had anything to say about this, and so stated with pain:

“Very unusual choice by Andrey there. I have no idea why he felt he needed to give up that bishop. And now White is just fine.”

It is tragicomical that after White’s 28.Qxf3, Esipenko played the move 28…Bb6 one opportunity later than he should have, and insodoing lost all of his 14-minute time advantage over Sindarov despite the position being equal. I think this was a huge contributor to his later blunder after 29.Ra6 Nxd4 30.Qh5 Rxe5 31.Rxe5:

In this position, Black is very uncomfortable and has to do something about the hanging bishop on b6. 31…Bc7 comes with a slight tempo against Re5, but perhaps Black foresaw 32.Ra7 with a pin, which doesn’t look dangerous but adds complications, which feel dangerous when you are low on time. Esipenko only had three minutes on his clock and chose 31…Qc6?? After 32.bxc4 bxc4 33.Ba4, White’s bishop is activated with tempo on the enemy queen, ready to start raking Black on the light squares. Indeed the end result was White’s win with a crushing attack after reconfiguring the pieces and utilizing the e-file to trade off Black’s last rook, with a mating attack to come soon after. After 41.Re6 threatening Re8+, Esipenko resigned.

Pragganandhaa - Giri

MVP DSB

Pragg played a really interesting Grand Prix against Giri’s d6-Sicilian, and I found the journey of the c1-bishop most compelling:

This position is essentially equal. White can press for a small advantage due to the passed h-pawn, but it’s by no means lost for Black yet. From here the bishop doesn’t move for the rest of the game, and 11 moves later is captured by one of Black’s knights, but by the time this has happened, it has done its job to escort the h2 pawn so that it can get to h6, at which point White is completely winning. It was the MVP of the game and did its best work on the first rank by controlling a flank square — not a typical Bishop. Pragg picked up a point later when he was finally prepared to advance this pawn to h7, but he couldn’t have done it without Be1.

Caruana - Nakamura

Fabi grinds out a win for a huge start in the Candidates

It’s no small feat to beat the rating favorite in any tournament, but to defeat Hikaru Nakamura is another level. Most of the game is an excellent example of how to play an attack against an opposite color bishop.

For the first 24 moves of the game, things were equal; but Hikaru started to slip soon in an opposite-colors bishop endgame. Fabi applied a lot of pressure with a superior light-squared bishop and on move 32 things went from bad to worse as Nakamura searched for counterplay:

The unpleasantness of the position is palpable, because of the long-term pressure against Black’s kingside thanks to Bd5 and h5. White continued to grind things out until Black cracked further:

Here Naka had played 48…Qc7? and Fabi uncorked a nice combination to win a pawn with 49.Rxf7 Qxf7 50.Bd5 Re6 51.Qg4 Kf8 52.Bxe6. From here the win was a further matter of technique, but the increment was short and both players made inaccuracies.

Here White jeopardized the win with 79.f6?? and Nakamura was suddenly within distance of a draw after 79.gxf6 80.e6+

80.Kc7 draws easily: 81.e7 Kd7 82.e8=Q+ Kxe8 83.Kc6 f5! (getting critical control of the c7-square to prevent promotion) 84.Bxf5 Bd8. But, Chess is cruel; under time pressure and the haze of a 6-hour struggle that mostly consisted of being in a poor position, Nakamura played 80.Ke7??, and after 81.Kc6 Kxe6 82.Kxb6 Be1 83.c5, resigned. Huge win for Fabi in what might be his last and best chance to win the championship.

Vaishali - Assaubayeva

Vaishali escapes by the skin of her teeth

Bibisara’s debut in the Women’s Candidates was strong, and she had a comfortable advantage as Black in the Sicilian Defense, but she slipped slightly in trying to defend against a tactic that Vaishali was counting on to equalize in this complicated position.

Under harsh time pressure, Vaishali played extremely accurately after Bibisara’s 28…Bd7; after 29.Nxd6! Bxd6?! (29.Bxc6) 30.Rdxd6 Rxd6 31.Qxc6! Bxc6 32.Rxd8+ Rf8 33.Rxf8 Kxf8, Vaishali sufficiently liquidated and clinched a draw 8 moves later — a huge save in the first round.

Goryachkina - Lagno solution:

24.Rxe5! Bxe5 25.Bc5 (the point: White gets two minors for the rook) Qd3 26.Qxd3 Rxd3 27.Rxe5 with a completely winning position.

• You stop compulsively diagnosing your problems based on a bad loss or losing streak.

I feel like every player who ever had a bad loss or losing streak has been tempted to, and perhaps even made a drastic change to their study routine or opening repertoire to fix a problem that they diagnosed in the heat of the moment after a poor game result. I certainly have! Instead, I should have realized that this was not my most objective moment, and instead use that momentum to analyze my games deeply and then think about the next steps after the pain had subsided. At some point I realized that most of my issues in Chess are skill issues, not knowledge or metagame issues. This change in my thinking can be tracked most primarily through my Chessable opening course purchase history, which has drastically decreased over the last three or so years.

• You begin to enjoy the game primarily for the game’s sake.

This is obviously a point that I can only reasonably apply to amateur players, but, man, isn’t it great when you play Chess and you enjoy playing it and you feel no obligation to turn it into something productive? Don’t get me wrong; I think that Chess can be a great tool for self-improvement, and that it is capable of teaching you lessons about life and decision-making under pressure. I think these benefits can go a long way to improving your life and making it happier. The internal excellence you can acquire and enjoy from playing Chess is one of the best and deepest hooks of the game. But Chess is at its most fun when you’re not thinking about the rating, or about who is the better player, or about how useful it has to be in order to justify it. You can just play the game and enjoy it. And that is Chess at its best.

• You quit attaching your identity to your rating.

This one’s hard. Especially if you’re a self-identified “improver”. Especially if, like me, you’re one of those people who started playing Chess seriously as an adult and made it part of your identity to be an “adult improver.” Chess comes with an identity, and I think that’s alright — our lives are filled with things that constitute parts of our identity and there is no shame in it. But one of the recent accretions to Chess that is inescapable is the Chess rating: the three or four-digit number that quantifies just how good you are at Chess. And that is an entirely terrible thing to attach to your identity. To start, your rating is not just a function of your choices, but also those of your opponents. In a certain sense it doesn’t matter how good you are; if your opponent has the theoretical power to draw the game by force through perfect play from the opening to threefold repetition or a completely dead endgame, this means you only have relative control over your rating, and therefore you should weigh very carefully how much power you’d like to give an algorithmic numeric output over your life and happiness. The happiest and most mature Chess players I have met simply do not give a single fig about their rating because seeking it for its own sake is a striving after the wind. For the rest of us, we will have to do by not letting negative changes get to us so badly. You win some, you lose some — that’s Chess. And Chess can still be good.

• You begin to know enough to know what you don’t know.

Chess is a game that has almost unlimited potential in the things that can be learned and known about it. But it’s really hard to know what you don’t know, when you don’t know much to begin with. The more you know, the more you know that you don’t know. One sign of a mature player is one of epistemic humility about the game. The quicker you are to admit your lack of knowledge in an area, the quicker your potential is to fill that hole in your knowledge. Mature players recognize these moments and take advantage of these opportunities as much as possible.

• You no longer allow someone else’s opening or play style to unduly annoy you.

Ugh. They’re playing the London again. Ugh, they’re pinning my bishop again. Ugh, they’re pushing all their pawns again. Time to go on /r/chessbeginners and complain to people about it, right?

I don’t know about other people, but I have definitely struggled with a negative attitude toward specific moves or ideas, for rather arbitrary reasons, or even certain player behaviors and personalities. In Chess, as long as a rule (in the game, or etiquette) isn’t being broken, it’s best not to become attached to behavioral convention. The power to annoy another player can only be given by that player. Don’t be that player. All that energy spent being annoyed is energy wasted on thoughts and ideas that cannot concretely affect the course of the game — energy that might otherwise save you from making a blunder or some other rash decision. As much as possible, learn to enjoy the player you’re playing against. And on the flipside of this, I think mature players also know how to properly annoy their own opponents and make them uncomfortable over the board for a practical and/or competitive advantage.

• You make choices about your opening repertoire based entirely on your own interests and desires.

One of the strangest phenomena I see in the online Chess world is the fear of random stranger disapproval over their opening repertoire, a very strange insecurity that can cause you to play something you don’t like, for YEARS. Most teachers will tell you to play 1.e4 or 1.d4, and play 1…e5 and 1…d5 against those openings. And they’re right. But if you hate what you play, you’re just gonna hate the game. So play what you want to play, without regard to what others think. Play what you want to play, without worrying if it’s classical, hypermodern, modern, romantic, or any other number of cliches about openings. What matters most is, do you enjoy it? And because Chess is a game, it shouldn’t matter what other people think about your opening repertoire. If it works for you, keep it. If it doesn’t work for you, change it. Asking strangers for advice on Chess openings isn’t a bad thing; but seeking approval from everyone is a losing strategy, especially since they’re not the ones who have to play your games — you are!

• You start to know your weaknesses and strengths, and admit to them.

This comes back to the point of knowing what you don’t know. But more specifically, it is very often true that our ideal self-image as a player embarrasses who we actually are. And therefore, if you want to become better at the game, you have to admit when and where you’re bad at the game. Every loss that you have experienced is ultimately due to your mistakes — take ownership of those losses and admit your weaknesses. Then they can turn to strengths, if you seek to address them. Additionally, when you have a strength, own it. So you’ve got a predilection for the bishop pair? Don’t give it up just because you feel the need to get better playing with knights. You do well with attacking but need to work on your strategy? Well, good strategy leads to attacks — keep attacking! But shore up the strategy. You cannot have an excess of strength in your skillset, so don’t give up the good things you have in the process of trying to improve other areas of your game.

• You stop feeling negative envy toward players who are improving faster than you are.

Can we admit this feeling? Comparison is the thief of joy. And lots of us struggle with comparing ourselves to other players. It was like this for me: Some noob posts an absolutely insane one-year rating graph that shows how they got from 800 to 2000. They did it by playing the London and Caro-Kann. And they never read a book. And they don’t go to tournaments. They just play all day. And suddenly I’m asking myself: “What is wrong with me?” “Why are they so superior?” “Are they so superior?” “I’m probably a better person off the board at least.” “I’m probably more likeable.” “I probably care more about the game than they actually do.” And on-and-on the moralization would continue. And it never made me happy. It took away something that I should have been able to enjoy and celebrate, and made me an ugly person instead. Why? Because I was insecure and misplacing my identity into something that ended up threatening it. Maturing as a player means being able to share in and celebrate other players’ wins and gains without reference or thought at all to your own.

• You stop internally accusing players of cheating, especially when there are no signs of cheating in the game.

Alright, personal pet peeve of mine incoming. And it’s all thanks to /r/chessbeginners, where frequently people are absolutely convinced that their opponent cheated, but instead of reporting the game to chess.com, they posted about it on Reddit instead. If they were better players, they would recognize that their opponents didn’t cheat, right? But, man I have been guilty of this many tens of times during tilted blitz sessions myself! Even to the extent that in my own thoughts I was suspicious of a player cheating, simply because, what, they played the Caro-Kann and got an equal position just like that?? Players who constantly complain about cheating usually don’t have leftover energy to become better players themselves and they let it steal the joy of the game from them. It’s possible people cheat. But it’s much better for you mentally if you simply control the impulse and not jump to negative conclusions — even if it turns out they were. Mature players accept this risk and play anyways and don’t let it bother them. Maybe my opponent is cheating. But the likelihood, 99.5% of the time, is that they simply are better than me. So I might as well take my beatings and learn something while I’m at it.

• You recognize when you’re starting to tilt, and you stop playing.

You set a timer to limit your play time. You recognize the moment you stopped analyzing your losses and instead went straight for “new game”. You talk to yourself and say “no, that’s enough.” You recognize your own negative self-talk and silence your internal monologue, because you know it’s wrong and that you’re just having a case of the Chess Mondays. You know your limits, and you set up systems and restraints to control them until you have the self-control to stop it yourself. For some people this might never happen to the fullest extent, but the better you get at this, the better it is for you. The sunk-cost fallacy matters. Those rating points you lost aren’t yours anymore, and you don’t have to win them back. You’re definitely not going to win them back right now, so be kind to yourself and others, maybe take a nap or a day off, or otherwise quit for a while. The game will be there when you’re ready, and your rating will re-adjust to where it should be. Besides, if you dropped 200 points in a single night, you probably eventually will have an entire week of easy wins as the rating system re-compensates to your actual skill.

• You recognize when you’re not enjoying the game like you used to, and you change the way you relate to the game.

Chess is a hobby, and the winds and seasons of life will dictate to lesser or greater degrees exactly how much time you can commit to it, how sustainable it is, and what reasonable expectations you may have for yourself. Otherwise, you may grow to resent the game and that’s not how any hobby should be. You don’t have to quit Chess (well, I guess some of us might have to). But a mature player learns to recognize when something has to change: the study routine, the time commitments, the tournament schedule, the rating goals. What does it take to make it a game that you love, enjoy, and want to continue playing? What do you need to stop doing? What do you need to start doing? What do you want to do? Keep Chess fun, and you’ll never stop playing it.

• You recognize that there is no killer-app to get better and that low-effort and long-term gains are illusory.

Chess, being worth doing, takes a long to get better at. I think a lot of newer and/or younger players try too hard to find a one-stop-shop to turn themselves into masters; whether it’s a new opening, a tactics course, or some other book, video or resource, we are constantly bombarded with marketing that tells us that we are just missing this one thing that will transform our game into something else entirely. On a rare occasion, this is true. Sometimes, you read a book and you gain 200 points in a month. But more often, things like that happen due to latent skill increases that are starting to surface — skill increases that were planted many new moons prior, and are only now starting to integrate into your game. The truth is, there is no universal rapid improvement formula for Chess. It comes down to playing and analyzing a lot of games, doing your daily and weekly “reps”, and taking care of your mind and body. Chess improvement comes one step at a time. Whatever else people are trying to sell you is snake oil.

What things do you think mark one as a mature Chess player? I’m interested in your thoughts, disagreements, and feedback, so please leave a comment below!

This one’s going to be a blitz book review. If you’re a club player and you’re ready to look into theoretical endgames and you want a book, buy this one. It’s that good. (unless you really need to learn the Bishop and Knight mate).

Silman’s Complete Endgame Course remains a surprisingly unique and cogent theoretical endgame book today. Silman sorts and orders endgames by rating class according to the USCF, starting with the early stalemate tricks and “overkill mates” (where you mate with a queen and/or rook [or 2]) that are more-than-sufficient for players <1000, on to Class E, and eventually to the 2200-2399 rating band. It is shocking to me that other endgame books still do not do this. Silman’s guesswork on what each rating band needs to know is slightly dated, so a wise reader will read and study a bit beyond their current USCF rating. Online ratings vary, but probably still fit into the book’s rubric just fine. Nevertheless, this is my favorite way any endgame book has had its material organized.

There are a lot of endgame books out there, and tons of books on endgame theory, including the very famous (or infamous) Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual. Nevertheless I’ve never found one quite like Silman’s Complete Endgame Course, which does its best to remain entirely practical and realistic about what a club player needs to know at their rating band. It may not suffice to be a master’s only theoretical endgame book, but I think the vast majority of amateur players can happily get away with just this one, and that they are better served here than, say, with 100 Endgames You Must Know.

I have a few suggestions for readers:

1. This book is available in print or on Chessable. I have both, and both are excellent; I think the Chessable version in particular is very good. The MoveTrainer version still has its endgame-specific frustrations since alternatives are soft-fails and you can only play whatever the mainline is in the course even when other moves are equally viable; but as a resource for drilling endgames, this is a great choice.

2. Whatever rating band you find yourself in, study up to your level and one level after that. IE if you’re a 1650 rated player, which slots you into Class B, you should also study the Class A (1800-1999) chapter. If you’re on your way up, you’re more likely to see these kinds of theoretical endgames. In any case this is a book that grows with you and will serve you for many years.

3. This is a theoretical endgame course, which means it focuses only on one aspect of the endgame that players need to study. Players should also look into endgame tactics and strategic endgames. The final chapter, Endgames for Pure Pleasure, focuses on some pretty combinations, study-like problems, and a handful of tactics as a bonus for all levels of readers, but this acts as a bit of a teaser — the other subjects are worth finding books or courses on too.

Silman’s Complete Endgame Course is deserving of the author’s legacy. It’s my favorite Silman book by far, because it is so simple to use and recommend for others, and cuts off any and all fat that theoretical endgame books often come loaded with. Ergo,

5/5

Other Endgame Resources I’ve Reviewed:

Thank you to Silman-James Press for a review copy of this book.

There’s a brief moment in the book Bobby Fischer and His World which recaps Fischer publishing some scathing criticism of the games played by Kasparov and Karpov, accusing them of prearranging the games. To support this critique, Fischer provides some analysis showing some errors in the games played. It was one of the more interesting parts of Fischer’s post-world championship story, and I wondered if author John Donaldson was going to leave this thread un-pulled or not. It was a fascinating teaser.

I don’t have to worry any more.

Inside the Mind of Bobby Fischer: Revisiting His Writings and Annotations is a massive collation of Bobby’s analyses and writings that didn’t appear in book form. This includes magazine articles in American Chess Quarterly, Chess Life, Boy’s Life (the Boy Scouts publication), the drafts for My 60 Memorable Games, and even appearances on 1970 Yugoslavian television. One really neat moment I enjoyed was reading Fischer’s article A Bust To The Kings Gambit, where he claimed that Black wins by force after 1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3.Nf3 d6!?. It was enjoyably enlightening to see this article published in its entirety (with some clarifying notes from Donaldson).

Beyond analysis, Fischer wrote many articles where he discussed other players, and these come together to give a fascinating impression of Fischer’s thoughts about his chess-playing contemporaries, as well as players as ancient as Staunton, Morphy, and Steinitz; and of course, Fischer talked about how to get better at chess. In the case of Steinitz, we get many analyses of his match games with Dubois, which shows to really evince Fischer’s love of the first American World Champion’s ideas about the royal game.

As Fischer had opportunity to write and speak through many different outlets, this means Donaldson is able to draw out the nuance of how Bobby talked about chess to audiences of various skill levels. From the perspective of anybody who desires to teach others about chess, I find this rather useful and inspiring. Fischer was known for his reclusive behavior, but in fact he was a very effective communicator regardless of who he spoke to. This is an ability everyone who desires to spread the love of chess should have.

Like his previous entry, Donaldson spends a lot of time filling in previously obscure gaps. To wit, the book boasts 116 annotated games, most of the analysis being Fischer’s, though a few other analysts show up as well. Donaldson sometimes brings his own analysis and commentary, in cases where the historic evaluations are over-ruled by the engine, but by and large he lets things stand on their own. There are hardly any conclusions that are based on or refer to centipawn evaluations — a welcome difference from the mounds of chess books published today that simply bow before Stockfish.

With its focus on his notes, the book reminds me somewhat of Alexander Alekhine’s analysis and the instructive nature contained therein, but Donaldson is quick to note in the introduction that, “unlike others, Alekhine for example, Fischer honestly admits when he missed something and doesn’t pretend to have seen things he didn’t.” In other words, for those wanting to learn the art of analysis more deeply, Fischer is one role model not to be missed, and this quality can be seen in his annotations from time to time.

It is well-known that Fischer’s strong personality earned him a lot of criticism from his grandmaster contemporaries, and he was not given a warm reception by players like Mikhail Botvinnik or Samuel Reshevsky. Yet, in Fischer’s writings about other players, including Botvinnik and Reshevsky, he maintains an admirable objectivity, appreciation and assessment of their skills and abilities. Reading through the whole book and his analyses of games and people, Fischer’s objectivity remains one of the most instructive aspects of his character, and it’s one that many improving players could learn from to imitate.

Because this collection of games is “accidental”, and not a curation of exemplary technique written by historians, we get to see Fischer make mistakes in his games and his own analysis. Additionally, because the sources themselves had distinct intended audiences, this means we get a more-or-less organic view of Fischer’s mind when it comes to chess — how he sees it in relation to other readers and himself. Donaldson fills in the details here and there at the beginning of chapters and in between analysis, but by-and-large this book is meaty with game scores and sometimes entire other games are quoted in analysis of the main entries. The opening theory isn’t what matters here, though Fischer sometimes shares a little of his internal book. Rather, playing through these games over time should expose the reader to a lot of good ideas that were normally executed rather well. Like its predecessor, it is not a best-games collection, and that’s part of what makes the book work so well especially for club-level players.

Ultimately, I must recommend this book for any club-level player looking to get a full-orbed picture of Fischer and the game of chess. His analysis is instructive, incisive, and, perhaps best-of-all, completely human. The book also fits in so nicely with Bobby Fischer and His World that I shouldn’t fail to recommend it to lovers of that prior book, with its hagiographic emphasis. This is a Bobby Fischer book for virtually anyone. So I think everyone should get it.

5/5

It happened again. Another post on /r/chessbeginners caught my eye.

The user has already deleted it, but it began with a very familiar story to many other posts I see on there, mostly from beginner players.

They talked to an LLM and asked it for advice on the opening, and now they’re wondering if the advice is good. Or, they looked up a video on YouTube and are wondering if the opening is good. Or, they saw something else about the opening and are wondering if it’s good. The poster is usually rated somewhere between 100 and 1000. They want to know what to do with the opening moves. Maybe there’s some fear of failure — they’re worried they’re going to lose the game out of the opening if they don’t make the right first moves. They’re worried their 100-1000-rated peers are going to figure them out and beat them down. They want an opening repertoire and they want it right now. And they need affirmation that the idea that someone else told them is fine.

The advice from stronger players is usually the same: “opening theory is not the issue.”

And they’re right.

Disclaimer: If you enjoy studying opening theory for its own sake, you should do it. Far be it from me to gatekeep something other people enjoy doing. This post is for beginner players who are trying to figure how to play the game and are teetering on the edge of jumping down the confusing and overwhelming rabbit-hole that is modern chess opening theory. I’m writing this with the under-1000 rated player, but this advice goes up to my level too. To a certain extent, I’m preaching to the choir.

There is little worth mastering that a human can master simply by following a rote algorithm, and this is very true about the opening in chess. It is possible for someone to dedicate a lot of time and commit to memorizing very specific lines in the opening, but this also doesn’t constitute the entirety of knowing how to open a chess game.

In any case, beginners should keep it simple. Heck, intermediate players should keep it simple. Heckin’ heck, advanced players should probably keep it simple too. Masters, we find, are the best at keeping things simple. Except when they’re not simple. I digress.

An opening repertoire can be outlined by spending a little bit of time reading a book, drilling opening lines on an online course, or watching a YouTube video, or talking to ChatGPT (I guess). But the actual building and formation of the thing outlined in your mental blueprint only comes from playing games. This is the simple thing that beginners often appear to neglect when seeking advice on the opening — they’re trying to avoid losing those games, when that’s the only way they’re really going to learn how to win the next game.

When you’re opening a chess game, you are given a number of principles to follow. These include:

Control the center. This usually means putting a pawn somewhere on one of the four central squares, on the fourth and fifth ranks. Less commonly, you control the same squares that those pawns would control, yet from a distance with pieces instead.

Develop pieces toward the center. This means, moving pieces toward the center to support the central pawns and/or control the squares upon which the opponent’s own pawns reside.

Keep the king safe. This means, castle early. This also means, don’t castle, if your opponent can immediately attack your king. Usually entailed in this is the idea of not moving the pawns in front of the king if at all possible, as these create weaknesses that your opponent can then exploit.

Every good and appropriate opening for an under-1000-rated player does this. It doesn't matter if it’s 1.d4, 1.e4, 1.Nf3, 1.c4, 1.f4, 1.g3, 1.b3, 1.b4; they’re all going to do this fine. You have to try them to see if you like them and understand them. Take your time. Pick one. Stick with it. Change if you hate it. You don’t really know if you hate it until you’ve tried it for a long time.

The most typical advice for beginners in the opening, and the advice I find the most cogent, is very old, and still works to this day.

Play 1.e4. It controls the center, prepares development of the kingside, which eventually leads to castling. White’s main plan from here is to get a pawn on d4 in the future.

Play 2.Nf3. Against almost every move Black can play, this move works fine.

Put your king bishop somewhere. The bishop gets out of the way, puts pressure on the black pieces, and allows White to castle on the very next move. Note: We don’t suggest Bd3, as this blocks the d-pawn, which would much rather go to d3 or d4, and if it doesn’t move, causes terminal cancer in the position because it cramps its own army. But that’s getting a bit ahead of ourselves (e.g. calculation trumps principles).

Alternatively, White can at some point play the move d4. On move 2, this might be preferable against certain defenses; against other defenses this is gambit-play. In both cases, White is usually completely fine.

The rules are similar to Black, but Black has an advantage in that White has given them a little extra information thanks to having the first move. Symmetrical defenses aren’t always the most popular, but they’re usually very resilient and allow you to play for a win without compromise. General advice:

1.e4 e5: Black wants to play d5 at some point. Defend your e5 pawn with Nc6 if White attacks it. Eventually you want to play Nf6 and get your bishop out so you can castle.

1.d4 d5: Black wants to play c5 at some point. Sometimes you can do this as soon as move 3 — sometimes even move 2(!). Otherwise, keep it solid. e6, Nf6, Be7, O-O.

Remember, I already said that any opening is fine. Queen’s Gambit. King’s Indian Defense. King’s Indian Attack. Sicilian. King’s pawn. Nimzo-Larsen. Whatever. The world is your oyster. If you want to play the London System, you should play the London System. If you want to play the English, you should play the English. If you want to play the Cow Opening If you want to play the Caro-Kann, you should play the French Defense. Etc. Any opening is fine. Promise!

After this, more principles come into play. Some sub-principles include:

Don’t make too many pawn moves. The reasons are relatively basic. Pawn moves always introduce some sort of weakness in the position. More pawn moves = more weaknesses. Additionally, pawns are not nearly as active or powerful as pieces. They move one square at a time, and can never retreat — they’re slowpokes. The player who moves more of their pieces than their opponent is often in a better position, because pieces are faster than pawns.

Don’t move a piece more than once. Usually, somewhere on the third or fourth rank, your pieces are the most effective while being relatively secure in their positions and moving your knight twice means your opponent gets ahead if they move their knight once and their bishop once. That’s a 2:1 advantage in their favor. No bueno.

Don’t bring your queen out too early. She’s a glass cannon and threats against her by virtually any other piece other than the enemy queen near-guarantees you must move her again. The most common example of this principle is a bit silly: 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3.

Black has to move the queen somewhere else or else she gets caught. It’s silly because in fact this opening is completely fine, because calculation trumps principles. But I’m trying to bury the lede.

Most of these principles have to do with the concept of time in chess. Or, as we like to call it, “tempo”. These moves represent a waste of time inasmuch as they allow your opponent to “get ahead” by having more of their pieces more developed than yours.

Here’s another set of principles:

Knights before bishops. For starters, usually the king’s knight belongs on the f3/f6 square. The queen’s knight will usually go to either c3/c6 or d2/d7. Since you usually know where the knight should go first, it should be moved first before you move a bishop. Sometimes this is further clarified: knights before bishops per each side.

Connect your rooks. Once your knights and bishops and queen are off the back rank, your rooks “see” each other and work as a strong defense against back rank attacks. Two rooks are so powerful that, all other factors being equal, an enemy queen usually cannot make progress against them.

When a player begins to understand the advantage that sound opening principle usage brings, they also learn and grow deeper in the knowledge of the main positional attacking principle: A lead in development is a signal to attack the enemy position.

More advanced principles come after these, and they get really complicated and nuanced as you rise up the rating ladder, but the given above are the most common ones players are usually taught. And by-and-large, they’re also the principles that good players use. Good players who know more opening theory still follow these principles, because their roots in the theory they know are intertwined with those same opening principles.

But strong players don’t just follow principles; they are aware of many of the innumerable exceptions to opening principles, and that’s where I think newer players get frustrated with this advice. Not because it’s wrong, but because they treat principles as if they were laws.

You will need to see where principles fail to apply correctly in order to understand the limitations and exceptions to them. Once you understand these factors, it opens up more possibilities, and certain assumptions or preconceptions about the game are ready to be deconstructed and reformed into something that closer represents the reality that chess is in fact an extremely complicated game and that you cannot simply systematize every series of opening moves into a series of principles. You begin to pick up motifs, pawn structures, typical configurations, the subtleties that make the game both more frustrating and more beautiful than you had thought possible.

For instance, 1.e4 becomes not just about quick development and being tactical. It becomes about controlling the d5-square and preventing Black from making that break; now you begin to realize the power of preventing the move d5 from coming with tempo to free their game. But building this knowledge into something that changes everything that you do during the game and change why you do it takes many, many moons. And suddenly, other openings begin to make sense — openings that you’ve never played before, because you’re building up knowledge that actually extends beyond the games you have been playing.

Lastly, I want to say specifically regarding 1.e4, the idea that it represents an insurmountable amount of practice to maintain a working repertoire is grossly overstated; if you’re playing chess for the long haul, then over time you will naturally learn how to play against every defense Black uses. Psychologically, it’s a losing proposition to dread any defense by Black, when White’s position is sound. Besides, you will find that Black has annoying defenses against every line that White can play, regardless of the opening — regardless of your first move. But an annoyed player usually plays worse. In my opinion, it’s better to learn to enjoy each position equally.

Finally, there is at least one meta-principle that trumps general principles. It overrides every other consideration in the opening — this is actually true for each and every possible position in chess. It is:

Calculation trumps principles. This sounds very complicated, but in fact can be very simple. Consider the Ruy Lopez Opening:

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5

The most common defense against this opening is 3…a6.

Rote following of opening principles may lead a beginner to believe that castling is a good idea. However, if White plays 4.O-O, then Black will play 4...axb5 and have a winning position due to the extra piece, despite not having followed the obvious opening principle advice to continue developing with a move like Bc5, or Bb4, or Nf6. So, White by necessity of the position’s demands, calculates (or has already priorly evaluated based on past experience) that any move that doesn’t move the bishop leads to its capture by the a6-pawn. Ergo, the most common move here, and the one that masters play most often is 4.Ba4.

Now Black can continue development with a move like 4…Nf6 with a threat of 5…Nxe4.

It turns out that White need not defend this pawn at all, and the move 5.O-O continues the mainline, simply allowing Black to take the pawn on e4, either because White has calculated that they will eventually get the pawn back (for instance after 5…Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 d5 8.dxe5); or because White knows that Black will have some stability problems in their position due to the looseness of the Black queenside and the strong pawn on e5; or perhaps because White has played this position so much it has become like a beloved family member and positional intuition simply takes over any concerns about calculation — positional intuition that can only be built by playing this position over and over over.

In any case, 8 moves of theory is a lot to memorize, and the vast majority of players at the under-1000 level will never see nor play these deeper lines, and therefore studying them represents a gigantic waste of time. At this level, the expected value from studying the opening theory this deep is extremely minimal.

Hence why we preach the fallible yet useful opening principles instead. The principles, like the pirate code, are guidelines. We suggest these principles because asking people to memorize 3^15 (~14 million) half-moves to get to move 8 without losing is rather impractical, and in fact, not how human beings think about any game.

In a certain sense, it doesn’t matter what opening you choose (except the Cow), because both sides still have to play a game of chess. Changing the opening too frequently reduces your ability to get the same kinds of positions, which is the exact thing you need in order to grow in playing that opening. You can’t learn them all, but you can learn a couple. If you play 1.e4, you will eventually have to learn how to play against all of Black’s defenses against it. This will take time — years. But, if you’re in it for the long haul, that shouldn’t bother you, because chess is a worthwhile game, and it is not only OK, but necessary, to build up the skill to play against all kinds of openings by taking your time playing the game.

This means you are going to lose games. This is also the path to winning games. No amount of opening prep will be able to prevent a stronger player from muscling you out of your comfort zone and handing you a big fat L, whether they do it by grinding you down or a crackpot tactical finesse. They’re going to know more, but even when they don’t have the theory in their head, they will be able to out-calculate your prep, or find a way to cause problems. And your opening prep will fail. It must, so that you can revise it for the next game, and become a stronger player. You’ll have to do this thousands of times to get better. You will lose thousands of games. Maybe tens of thousands of games. This is how every strong player has ultimately improved.

And, when they’re being honest, they’ll tell you the truth: they don’t know what they’re doing either:

Chess Openings for Dummies, by James Eade, with Carsten Hansen, gets a second edition 15 years after the original came out. What can change in 15 years? Chess theory-wise, a whole lot. For one, the open source and free Stockfish exists; and neural-network engines have forever changed the way we evaluate and play chess positions. For two, so has the market for chess opening books, because of both free resources online and paid courses on platforms like Chessable, Chessly, Chessbook, and some other chess-thing. Sometimes, it seems chess opening books might go the way of the dinosaur, but perhaps a shift in the consumer mindset that is inching back towards physical (actual, real) ownership is pushing chess opening books back to the forefront. The tactility of a real book is unmatched.

In any case, the second edition of Chess Openings for Dummies comes at an interesting time where the market is saturated with online resources for opening repertoires. It also has an interesting premise.

The authors are quick to point out that any given starting variation could be, and often has been the entire subject of whole books, so it’s not only foolhardy but also practically impossible to create a universal resource for every single opening line. Instead, Chess Openings for Dummies acts as a sort of guidebook for what openings the reader might consider studying for themselves more deeply. Find an opening you might be interested in and check it out— the book doesn’t expect you to go through it front to cover.

After a bit of chess strategy advice (another subject on which much ink has been spilled), they content themselves with a quick look at the major openings: An explanation of each line, why one might choose it for their own repertoire (“If you’re looking for relatively easy development and are willing to defer a direct confrontation for a while, the Classical Variation [of the Caro-Kann] may be for you.”), and typically two example games, one where things go great for White, and one where they go great for Black. Notably, most of these games are recent examples from master play — the authors appear to have gone out of their way to avoid classical historical examples of how these openings were played.

This also means that for virtually all intents and purposes, the historical assessments of the openings are completely left out of the book, because for this purpose, it’s virtually irrelevant. I find this approach double-edged; you’re not going to see the main idea from which the opening was originally born, but at the very least it helps not to retread old ground, which is the usual course for so many opening resources. On the positive side, by-and-large, none of the selected games are slogs. Things end somewhere closer to the middlegame than the endgame — they try to keep the reader on track by focusing on the immediate results of the opening.

Most games are dedicated three or so pages, with some light analysis when deemed suitable to the purpose of explaining the opening. This makes the book accessible to any reader who has a chess board and wants to play through the game. I do wish there were more printed diagrams. Some games are given only a single diagram. With this book and its target audience, there should be many more diagrams.

The selection of opening lines is very good, even when it comes to the trickier and less-common tries. Sidelines and gambits aren’t ignored, and you’ll even see stuff like Bird’s Opening (1.f4!?) make an appearance. Since they’re not trying to provide a repertoire, one shouldn’t expect thorough coverage of the opening in the analysis. Rather, it’s a sampler: Play through the games. When you see a line you like, that’s a sign that you should research deeper with other resources. That’s the idea behind Chess Openings for Dummies. It helps point you where to go next. The final chapters detail the common pitfalls in the openings and some additional chess-improvement advice, including where to go next. The book seems well aware of its supplemental nature and this is to its credit.

With this book there is some good and some room for improvement. I like the premise. It’s a deeper version of what Jeremy Silman did with the openings in his Complete Book of Chess Strategy. It’s tailored, at least in the premise, towards the novice. However, I think depending on one’s level, the sample games might not be the best representation of how their games are likely to go, even if they represent a modern treatment of the opening. The general advice is good, though I wouldn’t take every recommendation about choosing lines at face-value without also trying it for yourself (I’m sure the authors agree). Overall, however, it’s a decent choice for someone looking for a beginner-level reference to all opening lines. If you’re a big fan of the “For Dummies” brand, that should make choosing this book a bit easier, as it seems like another solid entry in that huge corpus.

3.5/5