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Nationals 2018 Round 8: Vaibhav Suri's beautiful middlegame play

14/12/2018 -

The National Championship 2018 consists of such great players that there are beautiful games being played in each round. It's quite a difficult task to choose the best game of the day, but in the eighth round it was clearly GM Vaibhav Suri who took the honours with some fantastic middlegame play and showing great alertness to beat his strong opponent Swapnil Dhopade. We now have four players in the lead GM Vaibhav Suri, Aravindh Chithambaram, Stany GA and Deep Sengupta. They are followed by seven players on 6.0/8. Specially to note is the performance of veteran GM Pravin Thipsay. An illustrated report from Jammu on round 8 of the National Championship 2018.

It happens only with the Indian Tal

13/12/2018 -

Seven out of the thirteen rounds have been completed at the National Championship 2018 that is currently in progress at Jammu from 8th to 18th of December. We have two leaders Aravindh Chithambaram and Anurag Mhamal, both on 6.0/7. They are followed by a pack of players on 5.5/7 who include Deep Sengupta, Vaibhav Suri, Vishnu Prasanna, Stany G.A and Swapnil Dhopade. The two big surprise players of the tournament until now have been Sammed Shete and Harshavardhan G.B. who are on 5.5/7. Although there have been many beautiful games at this event, there was none as spectacular as the draw between Karthikeyan and Rathnakaran from the seventh round which we analyze in this report.  

Amonatov wins Triple C Chess Club November Online Blitz

12/12/2018 -

Farrukh Amonatov of Tajikistan won Triple C Chess Club November Online Blitz 2018 which was held on Playchess on 25th of November 2018. It was a strong Blitz tournament as it starred Idani Pouya, Haik Martirosyan, Lucas van Foreest, Nihal Sarin, R Praggnanandhaa, Debashis Das, Rakesh Kumar Jena, Anwesh Upadhyaya and Padmini Rout. Three players Amonatov, Idani and Praggnanandhaa ended up at 7.0/9. Due to Amonatov beating both Idani and Praggnanandhaa, he became champion. Padmini performed exceptionally well in the tournament and she had luck on her side too. Despite the tournament being a blitz event, we witnessed some fantastic games. Shahid Ahmed, the tournament director brings you a detailed report. Photo: Amruta Mokal

Indian grandmasters share Vishy Anand gems on his 49th birthday

12/12/2018 -

Everyone knows what a great player Vishy Anand is. Five-time World Champion, World Champion in all formats (knockout, round robin and match), India no.1 for over three decades, Madras Tiger, Lightning kid are some of the terms that we always append to Vishy Anand's name when we speak about him. But, the one thing that a chess player would definitely love to be remembered for are his games! And Vishy Anand has plenty of amazing games. On 11th of December 2018, Anand's 49th birthday we asked several GMs in Indian chess about their absolutely favourite Vishy Anand game. Through this article we hope that you are able to relive some of Anand's absolute gems and understand what a genius he is!  

Online blitz tournament to celebrate Vishy Anand's 49th birthday

12/12/2018 -

ChessBase India has organized many successful blitz events in the past. We are back with another one - this time to celebrate the 49th birthday of one of the greatest chess players that the chess world has ever seen - Viswanathan Anand. The total prize fund is Rs. 49,000 in cash and we have signed DVDs of Vishy Anand as prizes. Anand's birthday is on 11th of December 2018, but because the National Championship is in progress and also the Asian Championship 2018, we have decided to hold the tournament on 25th of December 2018. In this article you will get all the details about the tournament, and a special discount if you register today on Vishy Anand's birthday.

Asian Continental: Event opens with early upsets

11/12/2018 -

The Asian Continental Championship began with some startling results on the top boards. Top seeded GM Wang Hao and India's Vidit Gujrathi were both held to draws by much lower rated opponents on boards one and four respectively. But the biggest upset of the day was GM Le Quang Liem's loss to Paulo Bersamina. The 20-year-old Filipino IM found a brilliant queen sac towards the end of the game to bring down the Vietnamese number one. We have a report with games.

Saravanan is back with Part II of "Must Read books to become a better chess player"

11/12/2018 -

V. Saravanan is a strong chess player, an eloquent speaker and also a fine chess coach. He was also the commentator at the World Junior Championship 2014 and a journalist for many eminent tournaments like the World Championship 2012 and the Sinquefield Cup 2017 and 2018. However, there is one video which made the world see a completely different side of him. On 24th of January 2018 we released a video of Saravanan entitled "Must read books to become a better chess player". It was a one-hour video where the Chennai IM spoke about some of his favourite books of chess. The video became very popular and had over 32,000 views on our YouTube Channel. Now Saravanan is back, this time with part II of his "Must read books to become a better chess player" and this will be premiered LIVE on 11th of December 2018 at 8.30 p.m. Find out more.

Karthik Venkataraman and Sakshi Chitlange get crowned as National Junior (U-19) Champions

11/12/2018 -

The National Junior (U-19) Chess Championship came to an exciting close on Dec 6, 2018, at the Indira Gandhi Stadium in Delhi. In the open group, as many as five players went into the final round with the tournament lead. But after the dust of the battles had settled, only Karthik Venkataraman was able to emerge victorious and thus took home the title prize. In the women's group, Akanksha Hagawane had led the tournament all the way through but a final round loss cost her the championship as Sakshi Chitlange, who was only half a point behind, pulled out a win in the final round and clinched the champion's trophy.

The highest prize money National Championship in India has begun!

10/12/2018 -

From this year onwards we have scrapped the model of first the national challengers and then the national premier to determine the national champion. From now on Indian chess will witness only one national championship and this year it has begun in Jammu from the 8th to the 18th of December 2018. The strength of the tournament is excellent with 19 GMs and 24 IMs taking part in a pool of 161 players. 20 players have a rating of above 2450. The top seed of the tournament is GM Abhijeet Gupta. Apart from fighting for the first prize of Rs.5,00,000 and the honour of becoming the Indian national champion, the players are also vying for the World Cup spot that goes to the winner of the event. We bring you a report of the first three rounds from the event and a trivia. 

TCW and dpCA are the finalists in ACL Challengers League 2018

10/12/2018 -

Telugu Chess Warriors and d'pawn Chess Academy won emphatically against Intermezzo and Royal Knight Chess Academy in their respective semi-final match. dpCA won their match first with a score of 3-1 followed by TCW making their way to the final by defeating Intermezzo 2.5-0.5, Sarath Chandra missed the match due to illness. Captain Snehil Konatham held his nerve and defeated National under-17 champion, Vedant Panesar, in a crunch time pressure situation. Ravi of RKCA lost a drawn endgame and a missed win too against Rahul of dpCA. Pawan played another model game to outplay Abhinav of RKCA. We bring you the best games of the semi-finals and photographs. Photo: TCW/dpCA

Three Indian players cornered and attacked in Philippines

09/12/2018 -

The Asian Championships 2018 will begin from the 10th of December in Makati city in Philippines. Players have started arriving for this prestigious event. However, the conditions of stay seem to be very poor. Usually players do not report this publicly, but things went out of hand when along with poor conditions, three Indian players Vidit Gujrathi, Abhijit Kunte and Lalith Babu were attacked on the streets of Philippines, just 250 metres away from the hotel. India's top GM at the event Vidit Gujrathi has written about this harrowing experience on his Facebook page. We ask FIDE director general Emil Sutovsky and AICF Secretary Bharat Singh Chauhan about their views on this subject. 

Gukesh with 2 GM norms and 2490 Elo is on the verge of becoming world's youngest GM

09/12/2018 -

Around a year ago, all of us were waiting eagerly to see if Praggnanandhaa could beat Karjakin's record of becoming the youngest GM in the world. Pragg could not achieve that feat. However, here's another Indian prodigy who has a fair shot at breaking that record. He is D. Gukesh. Born on 29th of May 2006, Gukesh has until 29th of December 2018 to become a GM. While a few months ago, this looked highly improbable, Gukesh managed to score his 2nd GM norm, just yesterday at the Paracin closed GM Round Robin tournament in Serbia with a round to spare. He now has a live Elo of 2490 and he will be playing at the Sunway Sitges chess festival which begins on the 12th of December. If Gukesh can achieve his final GM norm there, he will become world's youngest GM beating Karjakin's record of 12 years and 7 months.

Bhakti Kulkarni - the national champion with an adorable smile and killer moves!

08/12/2018 -

She is most of the times smiling! A friendly, warm-hearted and kind person. These would be the right words to describe WGM Bhakti Kulkarni. But don't the good guys always finish last? Well, Bhakti is an exception. With her immense self belief and determination, she has been able to achieve some fantastic results in the year 2018, the biggest one being crowned as the National Champion of India. ChessBase India reached out to Bhakti for an exclusive interview in which she speaks about not only her National Championship but also her first World Championship appearance in Russia earlier this year. Interviews with Bhakti are always insightful and refreshing because she never holds anything back. This one is no exception! 

Kunal M. wins Ramco Open 2018

08/12/2018 -

Ramco was the first sponsor of our chess icon Viswanathan Anand and now it sponsors the third youngest grandmaster R. Praggnannandhaa and his sister R.Vaishali. Not to forget it also sponsored the Indian team at the Olympiad this year. Ramco Institute of Technology International FIDE Rated Open Chess Tournament 2018 was held from 29th November till 2nd December, 2018. The event was organised by RIT, a popular engineering college in Tamil Nadu, run by the Ramco Group of Industries. A total number of 313 players took part in the event from all over India including 1 GM, 4 IMs and 2 FMs. Kunal M. of Tamil Nadu who started as the 6th seed clinched the title by scoring 7.0/8 points. Chief Arbiter of the tournament IA R. Anantharam send us a detailed pictorial report of the event.

Lake City Open 2018 : IM R Balasubramaniam wins the grand festival in Udaipur!

07/12/2018 -

Udaipur is known as the city of lakes. With unparalleled beauty it is one of the most exciting places for tourists all across India and the world. The chess players are in for a treat as the "Chess in Lakecity" are making giant efforts to popularize the sport in their city. The 6th N.L. Pandiyar International FIDE Rating tournament was held from the 22nd to 25th of November 2018. With 353 participants, excellent prize fund and super star India no.3 Vidit Gujrathi visiting the venue, the event became the centre of attraction of chess fans all across the country. IM R. Balasubramaniam of Tamil Nadu won the championship. Atul Dahale, who was one of the participants in the tournament, sends us an elaborate report on his experience of playing in Udaipur.