Alatortsev!
Dear chess lovers, just a moment to share something, in my free-association way! GM David Bronstein wrote a wonderful book called "200 Open Games". These are all games that start with 1.e4 e5. The book is very well organized, and ...
Chess Quantum Entanglement (In My Brain)
First of all, this blog post will expose my ignorance in ways that I don't even know ("you don't know what you don't know"). Second of all, I just want to share with you, once again, a commonality of patterns.....I wanted to title this post "Bot...
Echoes-Patterns as Tools for Learning; the Beauty of Chess
What kids do now with engines, I did with blitz games with my friends, and weekly tournaments. My short journey in chess started in 1972, when the chess fever of the Spassky-Fischer WC Match caught on. In my country, Puerto Rico, we had that and...
Want to Win Big? Play When You're Sick!
Hi, everyone! The following game is from the 1925 Moscow International Tournament. It is found in page 214 of the following book: I highly recommend this book. It is rich in content. Will definitely help any of us to improve our game. As ...
Planinc Shows How to Play the Ruy Energetically with Black
In the following two games we will see a similar theme...sacrificing the Queen for an attack from the Black side of the Ruy. Both these games are featured in the book by Pablo Iglesias: Game 1- Ljubojevic-Planinc Game 2...
Chess is Art- This Position is Proof!
Today, leafing through Isaac Linder's wonderful book on Wilhelm Steinitz I came across a profile about Alexander Petrov, ALEXANDER PETROV(born Feb-12-1794, died Apr-22-1867, 73 years old) Russia PRONUNCIATION: "Alexande...
Chess as Art- Beyond Words!
Some positions in chess look like the ultimate chess fantasy....for example, the following final position (after ....Ng1#!) The position looks like a composition, not a practical game, yet it is one more example of Planinc's virtuosity in ...
Staunton and Portisch- Winning Against the Closed Sicilian
My good friend Simaginfan has introduced me to quite a few great chess players. One of these is Howard Staunton: HOWARD STAUNTON(1810-1874) United Kingdom "Howard Staunton was born in Westmorland, Northern England. Learning the game in 1830...
Mastery in the King's Indian- Albin Planinc; A Game From A True Genius
When the idea came for this blog, it was just about the game Barcza-Planinc.....but thinking about Planinc, and looking at the wonderful book by Pablo Iglesias, ....which I recommend highly, by the way, you come across quite a few jewels by t...
You Want Water? Go to a Lake or a Deep Well
Hello! I hope you are alright, that everyone is in good health and good spirits. Certain points about chess keep coming to me; certain points of wisdom or philosophical points about our game which have come to me over time. By time I mean 50 yea...
Tal and Rubinstein Deliver Again!
Hi, chess lovers.... Just found, by chance, another pattern in common between Rubinstein and Tal. It is uncanny how similar the particular maneuver is! The first game is from St. Petersburg, 1909, a tournament organized to honor the great Mi...
Tal and Rubinstein, Partners in Crime!
When you study the games of the Great Masters of the past, it becomes easier to understand what players are doing in the present. Two contradictory things are happening at the same time: The younger generation, deluded by the "intelligence" or "...
Chess Messages from the Multiverse
I am finding difficulty defining this post, and that is the main reason for the title. My first intention was to center the post around the Geller-Mikadze game, and its comparison to its predecessor, the Keres-Smyslov game. But then, as I was bu...
Karpov-Korchnoi 1974 Candidates' Final...Some Inner Workings (Part I)
In 1974 Karpov faced Korchnoi in the Candidates' Final, to decide who would play Bobby Fischer for the World Championship in 1975. Recently, in the comments section of one of my recent blog posts, https://www.chess.com/blog/kamalakanta/vidit-p...
Vidit-Pragg....f5 Against the Ruy!
Dear chess lovers, in the recent FIDE Candidates' Tournament 2024, Praggnanandhaa played the ....f5 variation against Vidit's Ruy Lopez. In the chessgames.com database, the first instance of this opening being played is a correspondence game from ...
The Flow of Creative Ideas....
Sergey Voronkov has published a three-volume set of books titled "Masterpieces and Dramas of the Soviet Championships". These books are masterpieces of chess literature and chess history. Each chapters has, before the actual games shown, stori...
A Shared Truth- The Light Shines for All (Clarity in a Variation)
Sometimes it takes generations to find the truth in a position. In his book, Issac Lipnitsky gives the following position: and writes: "In the diagram position White's pawn centre is more of a weakness than a strength, as it consta...
An Idea In Defeat Reflects Into Victory- From Chigorin to Bronstein to Geller
Sometimes an idea or pattern will strike your mind like lightning. You see it and do a double-take: "What was that?" And then you realize you saw it before, but in a different way. Position 1: Position 2: So, this is the m...
Rivers Flow Into the Ocean
Where do I start? So many thoughts to share on one simple theme....pushing the e-pawn! But of course, there is more to it than that. This article ties Keres and Euwe, Bronstein and Gukesh in one theme..... The funny thing is that I have been t...
Play Like a Girl!- Part 2
In 1994, Alexei Shirov was ranked #2 in the world. Yet Judit Polgar beat him in 21 moves! Polgar placed 3rd in Amsterdam 1995, ahead of various world-class players: Here is the game against Shirov: On page 361 of the 2nd volume in her ...
One More Contribution by Rauzer- Bxb5 Sacrifice vs. Sicilian
Hello, everyone. Wishes of peace and joy to all! Recently my dear friend Simaginfan published an article about the great Ukranian theoretician, Vsevolod Rauzer (1908-1941). https://www.chess.com/blog/simaginfan/rauzer-botvinnik-two-games...
Concatenation-Polgar and Bronstein Do An Uncanny Rook Maneuver.
Concatenation: a series of interconnected things or events. What is quantum entanglement? Quantum entanglement is a bizarre, counterintuitive phenomenon that explains how two subatomic particles can be intimately linked to each othe...
Einstein on Consciousness
Peace. I have been meaning to write a blog post, and while I am aware of the fact that all human activities should, in principle, continue during moments of conflict and strife, my heart hurts too much to dedicate my creative energy to a chess a...
Some Random Thoughts about Botvinnik-Tal, WC Match 1960
Hi, all. I hope you are alright, and having some semblance of peace and joy in your life. Recently I have been looking at the book Tal wrote about his World Championship Match with Botvinnik in 1960. It is considered by some to be ...
A King's Indian Lesson from Bronstein
Where to start? This game caught my attention; Ravinsky-Bronstein, Moscow Championship 1946. Now, one thing that Bronstein points out in his books is the fact that both the Moscow Championship and the Soviet Championships often featured t some ...
