by scribe | Sep 11, 2022 | current news, endings, people, ruminations
The latest news that has blown up the chess Internet came in two waves last week. First, at the Sinquefield Cup in St. Louis, world champion Magnus Carlsen lost a game to a young but rapidly improving American grandmaster, Hans Niemann. Hans grew up in the San...
by scribe | Feb 1, 2022 | chess clubs, games, positions
As I mentioned before, I’ve been playing a training game each week with one of my students from the Aptos Library Chess Club, Atlee, who is about a 1500-strength player (I’m guessing). The games follow an interesting pattern. I win, I teach Atlee a lesson,...
by scribe | Jan 16, 2022 | chess clubs, games, openings
When you play the move 1. d4 as White, you’re generally saying that you want the game to be a sumo match rather than a sword fight. You’re tired of all the sharp tactics of 1. e4, whether it’s the Sicilian Defense or the open games. You want to just...
by scribe | Dec 10, 2021 | 2020 world championship, current news, endings, people, ruminations, tournaments
Magnus Carlsen won his fifth world championship in resounding fashion today, beating Ian Nepomniachtchi in the eleventh game to close him out by a score of 7 1/2 – 3 1/2. Congratulations to him on a really well-deserved victory! He is now turning in to one of...
by scribe | Oct 2, 2020 | 2012 world championship, people, ruminations
Chessbase had an interesting column yesterday about the ten highest-rated players of all time, in which they tracked down the exact games where they hit their rating peaks. It’s an interesting list, and I’ll give you the condensed version here (without the...
