Even though the progress of modern chess theory is truly amazing, we can still learn a lot from the old classical games. In the "Classic games" series of articles we analyze the games which were played long time ago but still could benefit modern ...
Last week you had the chance to compare your chess skills with the famous American GM Frank Marshall. This time your task is harder as the new benchmark you are supposed to keep up with is the legendary Paul Morphy. In one of my previous art...
I want to share my frustrations with you, my dear readers. I find it extremely annoying that these days you cannot turn on TV, read a newspaper or browse the Internet without being attacked by the Kardashians' news. Their weddings, divorces, fragr...
After reading your feedback for the Tactical Super-test that we had a couple of weeks ago (http://www.chess.com/article/view/classical-games-everybody-should-know-tactical-super-test), I learned 2 main things: 1) A majority of the readers enjoye...
While doing my research for the "Classical Games" series, I have discovered many interesting and exciting things. And I am not talking just about games. Today I want to talk about an intriguing chess personality from the past - Josef Cukierman. I...
Most chess players have probably heard the saying "Chess is 99% tactics". While it is an exaggeration, the goal of this saying is to emphasize the importance of calculation in chess. Indeed, the fastest and most efficient way to improve your ...
The most obvious and important benefit of working on classical games is that such a work significantly broadens your chess horizons. This is what just happened to me since I discovered something new and very important, at least from the historical...
The so-called Steinitz variation in the French Defense arises after the next sequence of moves: 1.e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7 5. f4 c5 where Black gives up space for an opportunity to attack White's center. When he succeeds, the results a...
In the previous instalments of this column we already discussed the importance of the knowledge of classical games and ideas. Today I'd like to discuss how to generate your own ideas. Again, sometimes it just means using somebody else'...
This is another game in which Bobby Fischer comes up with another ingenious idea. On his twenty-third move, he seemingly sacrifices his rook, and then reveals his point when he traps the black queen in his own territory. After that, he springs a f...
Many times in my articles I addressed a very important question "How to study chess openings?" You can find some of my suggestions here: http://www.chess.com/article/view/do-the-opposite and here: http://www.chess.com/article/view/how-to-lea...
There are not many games in the chess history as popular as the next one played by the great Emanuel Lasker. You'll be hard pressed to find a book on tactics that doesn't mention this game. The combination was even named after the second World Cha...
I am frequently asked if the classical games played by great champions should be memorized. In my opinion it is not necessary. But what you should do for sure is to understand and memorize the key ideas of those games. If you learn typical p...
Wilhelm Steinitz is widely known as the founder of a new positional school of chess, so you might expect to see long boring games played by the first official World Champion. In fact, Steinitz created many beautiful attacking gems, so we can lear...
In this game, Berkes' slightly passive opening allows Judit Polgar to establish a lead in development. Berkes decides to set a trap, which Polgar seems to fall into. However, a White's neat 14th move showed that Black was actually the one that had...
Last week we analyzed one of Morphy's games and you had a chance to see why Fischer once said that by the precision of his play Morphy was the best chess player of all time. In Part 4 we saw that Adolf Anderssen would give his opponent a chance be...
First of all, let me assure you that I am not discontinuing my 'classical games' series. As a matter of fact, this is a continuation of our journey through the classics. But the game I am going to present today is so beautiful and instructive that...
At the age of 15 I had the wonderful opportunity to work with International Master, and world renowned chess trainer, Mark Dvoretsky. He visited Arizona, courtesy of the sponsorship of my father and grandfather, to work with a group of me and my p...
Since we finished last week's article with "the Immortal Game" it is only fair to start today with its twin - "the Evergreen game". (Just like in most of my articles I give you a chance to test your chess skills, so the games are given as a Quiz....
We continue our exploration of classical chess games with the next immortal gem. It is a truly unique situation when a chess player became famous because of just one ultra short game he played (just 7 moves). Moreover, as far as I know, it is the...
Here is a game that shows the dangers of ignoring the threats against your castled king. After some inaccurate opening moves by Smirin, instead of exchanging off pieces, as Sutovsky is preparing an attack, he plays to solve his problems by force. ...
Last week we started our little journey into chess history. We want to look at the most important classical games. The ones that moved chess theory and broadened the general understanding of the game. In my opinion no chess player can call h...
Once I had a conversation with a very strong chess player and he casually mentioned that he was going to delete all the old games from his database because they were practically useless. I don't remember exactly his definition of 'old games', but ...
The World Chess community celebrated the 100th anniversary of Mikhail Moiseevich Botvinnik a couple of days ago (he was born on August 17, 1911). He was the founder of the famous Soviet School of Chess which explains his popula...
