BBC Factual announced a new competition format, “Chess Masters”, for BBC Two and iPlayer. Across eight episodes, passionate and highly skilled players from all backgrounds will battle it out across a series of rapid chess games before one will be crowned the title of Chess Master. The announcement comes a bit over 40 years after BBC2 aired “The Master Game”, a popular show that ran for seven series, from 1976 to 1983.
ChessBase Magazine offers a window to the world of professional chess. Our columnist Nagesh Havanur takes a look at our recent issue, CBM 218. 540 games from Tata Steel Chess and Chessable Masters 2024, 12 opening surveys, 3 opening videos, 6 demo lectures and several exercises for training. Annotators include Wei Yi, Anish Giri, Nordibek Abdusattorov, Alireza Firouzja, Vidit Gujrathi and Praggnanandhaa among others. The icing on the cake is a special feature on Richard Rapport, with 28 annotated games. | Pictured: Gukesh D playing white against Ding Liren in Wijk aan Zee | Photo: Jurriaan Hoefsmit / Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2024
Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books on chess training and strategy. In the 172nd episode of his ChessBase show "Understanding before moving" Herman continues his series "Chess history in a nutshell" and takes a look at the chess legacy of Boris Spassky, World Champion from 1969 to 1972. | Photo: Pascal Simon
Take a look at this picture. It is not a Hollywood star, but a chess celebrity. Can you recognize him? Capablanca, Nezhmetdinov, Frank Marshall? No, not any of them! The answer is Andor Lilienthal, an extraordinary chess grandmaster, born in Moscow, but moved to Hungary. In his career, he played against ten world champions, and defeated six of them. Retrospect by Himank Ghosh. | Photo: Edward Winter's Chess Notes archives.
Vasily Smyslov had this to say about beauty in chess: “Perhaps chess and music are drawn together by laws of harmony and beauty that are difficult to formulate and difficult to grasp”. This quote and a fascinating endgame from the Candidates Tournament in Yekaterinburg prompted GM Sundararajan Kidambi to consider new ways to approach a chess position. The endgame was played in the game between Wang Hao (pictured) and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. | Photo: FIDE / Lennart Ootes
The history of the Candidates Tournaments and Candidates Matches dates back to 1950. In its anniversary year, FIDE is looking forward to the Candidates Tournaments in Toronto in April 2024 and provides an overview of the history of these competitions. | Photos: Via FIDE
Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books on chess training and strategy. In the 159th episode of his ChessBase show "Understanding before moving" Herman continues his series "Chess history in a nutshell" and talks about the "Sorcerer's Apprentice", David Bronstein. | Photo: Pascal Simon
Today you get three puzzles that are simply enjoyable to solve. Very strong players should try to solve them in their minds, straight from the diagrams, mere mortals can move pieces. They may be surprised to see that our live diagrams will defend for the black side, stopping you from reaching the goal. Unless you find the unexpected solutions, which will be presented to you with instructive and entertaining videos in the new year.
Problemists love to construct problems in shapes that symbolize something auspicious. The great composer (and World Championship candidate) Pal Benkö sent us a problem shaped like a candle. Today we bring you two problems shaped like Christmas trees. They are not too hard, which we cannot say about the third problem, which taxes the brain.
Frank James Marshall and Dawid Janowski are two very memorable figures of chess history. Both were outstanding competitors who became title contenders. They are remembered as two of the finest attacking players from the late 19th to the early 20th century.