ChessBase Magazine Online

Agon appoints Pentagram to reposition chess
02.07.2012 – As we recently reported, American media entrepreneur Andrew Paulson has founded a venture to host the World Chess Championships – with a prize fund of 5.4 million Euros! He has now appointed a leading design agency, Pentagram (in London) to rebrand the championships, which will be broadcast live on iPads, smartphones and cable TV channels. Press release (revised).
 

IV International Chess Festival Eforie Nord
01.07.2012 – The IV Chess Festival of Eforie Nord took place and enjoyed the participation of players such as GM Sergey Tiviakov, GM Viorel Iordachescu, GM Bela Badea, and WGM Adriana Nikolova. Sadly, due to an outright interdiction by the Romanian Federation and clubs, only eleven players showed up. Not giving up, the organizer formed a round-robin and still honored his prizes! Illustrated report.
 

CBM training: Caruana's king, activating the rook, pushing passed pawns
01.07.2012 – These are the subjects of this weekend's series of lessons that our endgame expert Dr Karsten Müller has pulled out for you from the 7th Tal Memorial and the 65th Russian Higher League Championships. This is extremely valuable material that will increase your practical strength. ChessBase Magazine has many more of them, but the selection on our newspage is free. Learn and enjoy.
 

FIDE July ratings – Carlsen at a record 2837
01.07.2012 – "The gap is narrowing," we wrote in May, when Armenian GM Levon Aronian was just ten points behind the Norwegian prodigy Magnus Carlsen. The difference has now grown to a whopping 21 points, with Magnus setting his sights on the all-time 2851 record set by Garry Kasparov. FIDE has announced that it will in future publish its ratings on a monthly basis and include Rapid and Blitz.
 

2012 "Yicheng cup" Chinese Chess League: Ding Liren shines
30.06.2012 – The mammoth Chinese Chess League Division A continued its run, and three more rounds were played out this week, reaching round seven of the full 22 to be completed. The top player of the event is reigning three-time Chinese champion, Ding Liren, whose performance exceeds 2800. One wonders merely when the 19-year-old will break into the 2700 club, not if. Report and pictures.
 

2012 'Yicheng cup' Chinese Chess League Division A
30.06.2012 – The mammoth Chinese Chess League Division A continued its run, and three more rounds were played out this week, reaching round seven of the full 22 to be completed. The top player of the event is reigning three-time Chinese champion, Ding Liren, whose performance exceeds 2800. One wonders merely when the 19-year-old will break into the 2700 club, not if. Report and pictures.
 

Daniel King: What happens next #2?
30.06.2012 – ChessBase and British GM Danny King's new YouTube format for chess training is resonating well with our readers ("Marvellous!! Thank you so much for such a wonderful and innovative idea. I thoroughly enjoyed episode #1."). Here is a second annotated game in which you are led to a key position and then asked to choose one of two strategical continuations. Have fun.
 

Daniel King: What happens next #2?
30.06.2012 – ChessBase and British GM Danny King's interactive YouTube format for chess training is resonating well with our readers ("Marvellous!! Thank you so much for such a wonderful idea. I thoroughly enjoyed episode #1."). Here is a second annotated game in which you are led to a key position and then asked to choose one of two strategical continuations. Have fun.
 

2012 Russian qualifier reveals new star: Daniil Dubov
29.06.2012 – Of all the national championships, the Russian has long been the strongest, and thus it is no surprise that many aspire to just play in it, much less win it. The Russian Higher League is a monster qualifier Swiss open with 28 GMs and several 2700 players. Though the winner on tiebreak was Dmitry Andreikin, the story was 16-year-old Daniil Dubov's domination throughout. Illustrated report.
 

Octopus
29.06.2012 – White possesses the infamous knight on d6, against which Black has just prepared the doubling of rooks on the d-file with 20...Rd7 (diagram). Backing up this piece with 21.Rf2 Rad8 22.Rfd2 now leads to ...
A)... a clear positional advantage for White;
B)... balanced chances;
C)... material gains for Black.

ChessBase Magazine, larger diagram and solution.
 

Mikhail Tal: Triumph and Tragedy (Part I)
28.06.2012 – Exactly 20 years ago, on June 28, 1992, one of the greatest and most popular champions of all time, Mikhail Tal, passed away. In a fitting conclusion to his own legacy of chess before all, the Magician from Riga had escaped from the hospital on May 28, where he was dying from kidney failure, to play in the Moscow Blitz championship where he faced Kasparov. A tribute by Prof. Nagesh Havanur.
 

Anand at Accenture: How memory works in chess
28.06.2012 – Accenture plc, the largest management consulting company in the world, recently staged a conference in Madrid, Spain and invited World Champion Viswanathan Anand to speak. Anand dealt with subjects like pattern recognition, decision-making, computers and the strategies used in World Championship matches. The lecture is three quarters of an hour long, but well worth watching.