It passed some time since the "Nimzovich's ideas were all rubbish" discussion with GM Yasser Seirawan took place. (In the end, Yaz retreated on all accounts by stating that Nimzovich's ideas — but one, over-protection, "simply garb...
How come we see men of hardly any intellect excel in chess and others of great talent scarcely show moderate ability, and get confused and bewildered when they have to move a pawn? Asked a long time ago, back in 1688, Jean de La Bruyè...
Chess is a perfect companion for all occasions. At weddings, for instance, Wedding in Little America Hotel, Cheyenne, WY . The Red October restaurant, Moscow . Hochzeit! Wedding German way. Who do you think is going to deliver...
After familiarizing yourself with it, together with some illustrative examples, the principle may become part of your toolbox of concepts that could add more power and give a boost to your chess. Your knowledge and acting at the chessboard is hi...
Well, they do NOT, actually. There only exist GENERAL chess principles! Let's take a closer look at it. Masters "construct" solutions from major principles. Yet, there are no universally agreed-upon general chess principles. Whatever principles ...
Full-contact, semi-contact, limited-contact, or non-contact? And if we agreed there's some sort of contact between chess pieces, in how many different kind of contact two opposing chessmen get during chess battles? In a full-contact sport like...
Strategy ForgottenLack of strategy is a common downfall everywhere. There is a mantra even Grandmasters of chess adhere to that chess is 99% tactics. Well, it is true, but tactics only manifest the building blocks of strategy. In reality, in chess...
There’s a massive, uncontrolled and unhealthy proliferation of chess opening experts of all kind and provenience. From ELO 1600 all the way up to the super GM circle (where, among others, is sitting a certain famous Twitter celebrity and acc...
Attack and defense, in chess, warfare, sports, or conflict of any sorts, are they two opposing things? or maybe just a manifestation of the same underlying reality, of a phenomenon that concepts of both attack and defense fail to capture in its en...
Intended level: Beginner/Early Intermediate I have never seen anything more terrible and dreadful than a Macedonian phalanx! — Aemilius Paullus, Roman general Two important concepts of pawn play, the ram and the lever, have been alre...
Chess composition is one of the most beautiful and mysterious aspects of the art of chess. For me chess is art. I am fond of solving chess problems and, particularly, chess studies. They are full of paradoxes and original ideas. — Gar...
What is the secret of taming such formidable chessmen as Rooks? Two roaring bishops proved stronger than two quiet and underachieving enemy rooks in a 2001 Georgia Open game where White mated in twenty-something moves . ARE ROOKS OVERRATED? Pa...
Often, the answer is yes. Almost all chess beginners are initially taught that a rook is worth five pawns, and a knight or bishop is only three. However, ask any grandmaster whether a rook is always worth two pawns more than a bishop or knight, he...
You already know that pawns are the main actors in our game. Don’t underestimate these deceptively weak soldiers. Without pawns there would be no game. They give life to pieces and, at the same time, form the backbone giving strength to enti...
Exactly two months ago, on the 13th of January, I received this message from the British (Scottish) coach Jim Stevenson. Hi Momir, Happy New Year to you and your family. Let’s hope 2021 is a good one for all of us.I just wanted to mentio...
(CHESS) DESIGN = FORM + FUNCTION + BEAUTY As a chess player, your job is like one of an architect. You deal with Form (Structure), Function (Purpose) and Beauty (Aesthetics). When you play a game of chess it is like designing something or co...
The idea for this blog came from Olya @MomOnaBreak and her Chess With Benefits post. There she visited Paris and took a chance to play some chess in the Luxembourg Gardens. From New York's Washington Park, via Belgrade, to Moscow chess players g...
My yesterday's Pawns Adventures: Always Play from the Position of Strength blog has never showed up on the Blogs page. It did show up on the Today page for a while, then disappeared. So I decided to create a shorty just to check the blog's ...
TRAIN YOUR INFANTRY FOR BOLD WAR-WINNING BREAKTHROUGHS BREAKTHROUGH (n) A pawn sacrifice whose purpose is to open lines and/or to create a passed (or free) pawn. Pawn breakthrough is very common tactical weapon in endgame that is normally asso...
In the previous post, top bloggers that had posted over the last 30 days were listed. Some prominent and popular bloggers seem to have worked less ardently during the holiday season. So, today I'm adding up all those who have been blogging in Engl...
By doing the statistics of chess nations recently, I somehow became overwhelmed by the "science of collecting, analyzing, presenting, and interpreting facts and figures." Everyone of us is just a set of numbers that the government and other i...
In a few recent posts, we have explored different ways of measuring how strong nations are in chess. First, the criterium was the number of all FIDE rated players per capita (in its database, FIDE maintains players with the 1000+ rating). Then, ...
"By-the-bye, Fred," said Mr. H___, you'll spend your Christmas with us, of course. We shall have a jolly party, and plenty of fun: the F.s and G.s, the B.s and the C.s will be there and I don't know how many besides." "I can scarcely promise," s...
The Chess World Made by Samuel Gareginyan. What makes chessmen move? What is the invisible hand behind? How does the constant movement of our ideas fly and evolve? How (un)predictable is our thinking? "I, Samuel G. was born in Armenia, where t...
I'm adding two more criteria that might better display the most chessian nations in the world by considering a broader pool of players as opposed to the elitist Super-Grandmasters-only approach showing only the tip of iceberg. There have c...
