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The ingredients that helped Raunak Sadhwani become the 65th GM of India

30/10/2019 -

Raunak Sadhwani became a GM at the age of 13 years, 9 months and 28 days on 19th of October 2019. Becoming a GM at such a tender age made him the ninth youngest GM in the history of chess! How did Raunak achieve this feat? What were the ingredients that came together to create GM Raunak Sadhwani? In this article we bring you Raunak's story towards the GM title. We also have quotes by his trainers, annotated wins of his encounters with Sjugirov, Motylev and Karjakin that helped him gain his third GM norm and 2500 Elo at the Grand Swiss 2019. After reading the article you will realize that a lot of ingredients had to be mixed in appropriate proportions for Raunak to reach where he is today. And as Vishy Anand rightly pointed out, "This is just the beginning!"

ChessBase 18 and Mega 2025 are here

ChessBase 18 is an all-new program that helps you manage all your databases as an ambitious player. Mega Database 2025 has 11 million games with over 113,000 games annotated by masters. The cost of ChessBase 18 is Rs.4499/- and the cost of Mega Database 2025 is Rs.6499/- However, if you go for the combo the total amount comes to Rs.8999 (instead of 10,998/-) helping you save Rs. 1999/-.

ChessBase 18 + Mega 2025 Combo

Antonio Viani wins double in France

30/10/2019 -

IM Antonio Viani D'cunha scored an unbeaten 7.0/9 to become champion in 5th Liffré International Open in France. He finished a half point ahead of the runner-up IM Pierre Bailet of France. IM P Konguvel also scored 6.5/9 and he finished shared second. GM Sundararajan Kidambi and IM Satyapragyan Swayangsu scored 6.0/9 each to finish at shared seventh position. All four Indians who participated in this tournament finished in top ten. Antonio also won the Blitz event by scoring 8.0/9 and suffering only one loss. He finished a full point ahead of the runner-up Raphael Lemasle of France. A brief report of the tournament with games and photos. Photo: Anne Ruhlmann / Liffré Open 2019

Karpov Trophy 2019: Nihal Sarin catches Hou Yifan in a mating net

29/10/2019 -

Nihal Sarin has a rapid rating of just 2285 but he is already performing at an Elo of 2639 in the 17th edition of Anatoly Karpov Trophy that is taking place in the beautiful mediterranean town of Cap d'agde in Southern France. After eleven rounds Nihal has an impressive score of 7.0/11 points (4 wins, 1 loss, 6 draws) and is placed overall second along with Amin Bassem and Alexey Sarana. In the eleventh round playing the black pieces he registered a fine win against Hou Yifan of China. Hou was the only one who had defeated Nihal earlier in the event. Thus, the Indian phenom not only consolidated his position in the tournament with his last victory but also levelled his score against the Woman World no.1. The top seeded Etienne Bacrot is at the moment the sole leader of the event and is half a point ahead of the rest of the field with 7.5/11 points, while Elisabeth Paehtz and Hou Yifan have slipped down the leaderboard with 5.0/11 each.

Is the Indonesia national team too strong?

29/10/2019 -

The Indonesia team travelled for nearly 12 hours to reach from Jakarta to Chennai on 27th night. They took some rest and were on the chess board on the 28th afternoon for the ChessBase India vs Indonesia friendly match taking place in Chess Gurukul. The 10-member Indonesian national team has a rating average of 2373.6, while the 10-member ChessBase India team has a rating average of 2361.6. It promised to be quite an evenly contested battle, at least on paper. And this was seen in the 1st round as India eked out a win by the nearest of margins 5.5-4.5 But in round two, Indonesians went ahead full throttle and beat the Indians by a whopping 7.5-2.5 score. At the end of day one the score is 24-16 in favour of Indonesia. A detailed report from Chennai. 

Nikolas Stanec dominates 1st Arberia Open 2019

29/10/2019 -

GM Nikolaus Stanec of Austria scored 6.0/7, remained undefeated to win 1st Arberia Open 2019. He received a beautiful trophy and €400 for his efforts. Stanec finished a half point ahead of the remaining podium finishers. Both FM Konstantin Peyrer and Johannes Steindl scored 5.5/7 and they were placed second and third respectively according to their tie-break score. The Blitz event was won by untitled Leopold F Wagner of Germany by scoring 8.5/11. Konstantin Peyrer also scored 8.5/11, however Leopold clinched the title based on his tie-break score. Total 57 players in open and 51 players in blitz participated form thirteen different nations. Photo: Arberia Open 2019

Analysing your openings repertoire with Fat Fritz

28/10/2019 -

While the idea of Fat Fritz as a self-taught chess AI is tantalizing, many players may wonder why this impacts them if they already have a good engine and they are not grandmasters seeking nearly ineffable edges in their preparation. In the following article, we let a strong amateur study with it for some hours and compare notes with analysis he had made from other engines. With the meteoric rise of usage of AI in chess, Fat Fritz is something undeniably useful for any professional chess player. Learning how to maximize its usage and reap benefits from it is definitely worth learning now than procrastinating it.

Nihal Sarin leads Karpov Trophy 2019 with three others

27/10/2019 -

Nihal Sarin is currently playing in the Anatoly Karpov Trophy 2019 which is taking place from the 25th of October to the 1st of November in Cap d'Agde, France. The tournament consists of two parts. It begins as an eight-player rapid double round-robin but after the completion of fourteen rounds the top four go on to play two-game knockout semi-finals and a final. Nihal is incidentally the last seed of the event with a rapid rating of just 2285. Obviously this figure doesn't reflect the true strength of the youngster as he has already displayed some very steady chess to emerge as one of the four leaders at the end of six rounds with 4.0/6 points. Etienne Bacrot, Hou Yifan, and Amin Bassem - all 2600+ rated strong rapid players - are others who share the lead with the same score. In this consolidated report on rounds one to six of the tournament we give you a comprehensive overview of Nihal's performance so far.

Metro Railway wins All India Inter Railway 2019

27/10/2019 -

Indian chess witnesses two secret tournaments - Inter Petroleum and Inter Railway tournament. Why are they secret tournaments? Because both tournaments generally happen off the radar, only the players who participate in this tournament are aware of it and rest of the world are oblivious of its happenings. Since these are not rating tournaments, players can play tension-free, experiment as much as they want, but one thing they fight for is - bragging rights. Metro Railway has never fielded more than two members in their team, however for the first time ever, they had all four members and they won it. Here is a pictorial report of the tournament. Photo: Joydeep Dutta

Evgeny Shtembuliak and Polina Shuvalova are World Junior Champions 2019

26/10/2019 -

The World Junior Championships officially came to an end on 26th of October 2019 when players from over 50 countries proceeded back to their home. Two new World Champions were crowned - Evgeny Shtembuliak in the open section and Polina Shuvalova in the girls section. The silver and the bronze medal in the open section went to Armenians Shant Sargsyan and Aram Hakobyan respectively. In the girls' section it was Mobina Alinasab from Iran who won the silver and Elizaveta Solozhenkina who won the bronze. We bring you all the pictures from the closing ceremony as well as photos of the 17 norm makers. We also take you to the moments of the final rounds where the six medals were decided. A huge report from New Delhi by Sagar Shah, Amruta Mokal, Niklesh Jain and Angela Franco.

Training with ChessBase 15: Creating interactive training tasks

26/10/2019 -

ChessBase 15 offers a lot of training tools. An effective and powerful training method is to work with interactive training tasks. Part 3 of our series with ChessBase tutorials shows how to create interactive training tasks, how to save them in training databases, and how to create work sheets with training tasks. As a trainer creating interactive tasks can help a player to boost their work rate as well as improve their strength. This is not just for trainers, but players can use it to their advantage too as it will help them identify patterns of various opponents, their strengths, weaknesses and trends as per the requirement.

Priyanka wins the biggest Smart Girl All India open

26/10/2019 -

Thirteenth seeded Priyanka Bhatt of Uttar Pradesh scored 7.0/9 and won the biggest Smart Girl All India open at Ernakulam, Kerala. Three other players also finished at the same score, due to a better tie-break score, Priyanka clinched the championship. Kerala's budding talent, multiple State champion and former Commonwealth under-10 Gold medalist, Anupam M Sreekumar scored an unbeaten 7.0/9 and she secured the runner-up position. Total ₹110000 prize fund was distributed among the prize winners, making it the biggest Smart All India open organized till date. Cognizance Chess Academy organized the tournament at Ernakulam, Kerala from 19th - 23rd October 2019. Photo: FA Subha Rakesh

World Juniors Rd.10: Who will win the World Juniors 2019?

25/10/2019 -

The sole leaders in both open and girls section Shtembuliak and Shuvalova maintained their lead. While Shtembuliak has half a point lead, Shuvalova is very close to the title with a full one point gap over rest of the players. Round 10 was an exciting one as we saw plenty of high voltage action. Wang Shixu and Volodar Murzin achieved their maiden GM norms. We also bring to you a beautiful game played by 13-year-old Leon Mendonca - symphony on the chess board. Who are the ones with a chance of winning a medal at the World Juniors? We analyze the chances of the players and present them in this article. 

Remembering György Bakcsi and his helpmates

25/10/2019 -

The great Hungarian composer and Grandmaster György Bakcsi passed away on the 11th of this month at the age of 86. Bakcsi was a true creative giant who felt equally at home in many different genres of problem chess. Indeed, he also held the title of International judge for fields as varied as directmates, selfmates, helpmates, and even fairy problems! His multifaceted proficiency together with his disposition for sharp and paradoxical ideas made him one of the most loved composers of twentieth century. In this article we pay the deceased master our heartfelt tribute and discuss a few of his ever entertaining creations which will continue to be cherished for years to come.

Thailand Pattaya Open 2019 begins

24/10/2019 -

The second edition of Thailand Pattaya Open 2019 was pawned off on 23rd October 2019. Four players - IM Haridas Pascua, GM Villamayor Buenaventura, IM Daniel Quizon and FM Naung Thet are in the lead at the conclusion of round 3. Top seed GM Saptarshi Roy was held to a draw by FM Thanadon Kulpruethanon in round 3. Total 261 players are taking part from 31 different countries in six different sections in this massive festival at Pattaya from 19th - 30th October 2019 at Bay Beach Resort. Photo: FM FT IA Peter Long

World Juniors Rd.09: Can anyone stop Shtembuliak and Shuvalova?

24/10/2019 -

He read the Zurich Interzonal 1953 book written by Bronstein and Gelfand's positional decision making to improve his positional understanding. He goes to the gym and swimming everyday to keep himself physically fit. He is the sole leader in the open section with a score of 7.5/9 and has a performance rating of 2783! He is Evgeny Shtembuliak. She won the under-18 world championship 2019, she played her 20th consecutive game. She ensures that she goes to the gym every day morning, and she enjoys each and every moment she spends on the chess board. She has an Elo performance of 2585 and is leading the girls section at the World Juniors with 8.0/9. That's Polina Shuvalova for you! These two youngsters are unstoppable at the World Juniors 2019.

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