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ChessCult - How a Strong Indian GM Plans to Make Chess a Spectator Sport!

02/10/2020 -

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought forth a lot of change in the world. The advent of modern technology has ensured that people are more productive than ever before, and streaming has become more and more mainstream. With numerous chess players entering a new phase of their life, a young chess star decided it was time for a change of pace. GM Karthik Venkataraman, former National Junior Champion, has launched his own company Chess Cult in collaboration with his friend Hariharan S Pillai, to make a difference to chess players across the globe. Karthik has come with some very innovative content on ChessCult's YouTube channel, right from reintroducing the masters of the past, to the Secret to Success series, where he features stalwarts of Indian chess like GM Sasikiran and GM Murali Karthikeyan. Tanmay Srinath takes you through his experience navigating the ChessCult!

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A Scientific Inquiry on Combinations

01/10/2020 -

India's 33rd GM Vishnu Prasanna is a prolific trainer. He has trained World's second youngest GM in history, Gukesh D and also worked with GM Adhiban B, he is also training with GM Surya Sekhar Ganguly. He launched his new official couple of months. The website has all the information about Vishnu and it is rich with features. One of the feature of the site is blog where Vishnu himself discusses various themes about chess. In his fourth blog post, he does a scientific inquiry on Combinations using illustrative examples of Steinitz's game. Combinations are very important either to win or defend yourself from impending doom. How and when to spot one? How to improve combinational vision? Vishnu tells it all.

Getting the most out of ChessBase 15: a step-by-step guide #4 – The Board

30/09/2020 -

You are raring to get started with some of the amazing functions of ChessBase 15. But there is one last thing we need to consider before we dive into the substance – and that is style! ChessBase 15 is fantastically customisable and here Nick Murphy will show you step by step how to get the look you want. Because it helps to enjoy your chess! You can completely customize everything you want, from the board, type of the wooden board, piece design, square colors to the dimension of the board 2D or 3D, notation type and window size, forward, rewind buttons etc. Photo: ChessBase

Petrosian's beautiful queen sac against Pachman - Classics you must know Ep.02

29/09/2020 -

After Botvinnik vs Capablanca in episode one, we now move to Petrosian versus Pachman on day two of the Classics You must know series by IM Sagar Shah. The 9th World Champion is famed for his positional and prophylactic play. And until move 15 it seems as if the game is going in that direction. But something quite unbelievable happens in the last five moves of the game and the experienced Ludek Pachman resigns after White's 21st move blow! This game has a lot of little nuances that you can learn from. We dissect them for you, with the video analysis, PGN file and also 10 test positions.

Raja Ravi Sekhar - The man who played in 16 consecutive National 'A' from 1975 to 1990

29/09/2020 -

To make progress in anything, one must know the history of it. A sport is defined by the achievement of various sports persons. Some are known and some are not widely known. In an attempt to bring untold stories, achievements and journeys to a wider audience, Shahid Ahmed launched his Straight Talk with Shahid podcast where the idea is to bring out some untold inspiring stories. In the second episode, we get to know about IM Raja Ravi Sekhar, the man who played in 16 consecutive National 'A' events, won National Junior, National 'B' and National 'A' simultaneously. He has also played for team India at various Olympiads. Get to know about the journey of the man from himself along with some his best games annotated by himself. Photo: Raja Ravi Sekhar

How Velammal Education Trust created nine GMs in Indian chess

28/09/2020 -

From 66 GMs in India, a single educational trust is responsible for the creation of 9 grandmasters! Velammal Education Trust has done a yeoman service to the sport of chess. Adhiban, Sethuraman, Shyam Sundar, K. Priyadharshan, Karthik VAP, Karthikeyan Murali, Aravindh Chithambaram, Praggnanandhaa and D. Gukesh are nine GMs that have studied in Velammal school. Apart from them the school also boasts of having players like Leon Mendonca, Arjun Kalyan who will soon become GMs and also strong female players like Vaishali, Rakshitta, Savitha Shri, Varshini and many others. How is one single trust able to create so many chess champions? We decided to dig in a bit and reveal to you the secret of Velammal's success! 

Learn from the Classics Ep 01: Botvinnik vs Capablanca, 1938

28/09/2020 -

Chess Classics are an integral part for every young chess player's development. These are the building blocks which help you to develop your style of play. IM Sagar Shah has started a new series on the ChessBase India YouTube channel where he has taken on the challenging task of covering some of the most important classics in chess! The first one he begins with is his personal favourite - Botvinnik vs Capablanca AVRO tournament 1938. A young Botvinnik takes on an experienced Capablanca and outplays him both strategically as well as tactically. 10 positions to solve, an hour long video and detailed game analysis for you to understand this duel.

The Playchess club rooms, now with video function!

27/09/2020 -

Online chess is most fun when you know your opponents: less anonymity means less cheating! In the virtual club room on Playchess, clubs can meet and play blitz tournaments among themselves. To improve your playing experience we now present the video function! All players can log in with their webcam and you can hear and see each other! Suddenly you experience a blitz chess evening almost like in the old days: trash-talk, noises from the next board, cheering, frustration — it all feels more real because you see and hear each other. And everything starts with 2 mouse clicks. Just try it out: create a virtual room with one mouse click, activate the video function with another mouse click, and off you go! The only requirement: to have a premium account! 

The Harikrishna Master Class

26/09/2020 -

It is always a wonderful opportunity to interact and learn from someone like Harikrishna. The World no.20 is doing a webinar with World Chess on Wednesday 30th of September 2020 at 9.30 p.m. IST. The topic of the session is "How to win an equal endgame." You will be able to ask questions to Harikrishna and also get your doubts answered. In this article we tell you how to seize this opportunity, how Harikrishna explains his games, ideas and much more, so that you understand how detailed he is in explanations and get a preview of his Master Class. Photo: Biel Chess Festival

100 episodes of Improving Chess with Sagar Shah and the comedians

25/09/2020 -

One of the most loved and followed chess series in the lockdown has come to an end - "Improving Chess with Comedians" by IM Sagar Shah. Four of India's well-known and celebrated stand-up comedians Samay Raina, Biswa Kalyan Rath, Vaibhav Sethia and Anirban Dasgupta were trained for 100 episodes covering all the important tactical, positional and strategic themes that an improving chess player should know. This series led to the chess improvement of not just these comedians but also of the thousands of viewers following the shows. In this article we tell you about the journey and also publish the mails from the viewers that were sent to us!

Vugar Rasulov wins Play for Durgesh Fundraiser Open

25/09/2020 -

360 players from all over the world participated in Play for Durgesh Fundraiser Online Blitz Open. Over 11 lacs funds were raised which we have already mentioned a few days ago. Four players finished at 8.0/9, Vugar Rasulov, Terry Renato, Harsha Bharathakoti and Vugar Asadli. They were placed first to fourth according to their tie-breaks. The entire prize of ₹50000 was sponsored by Durgesh's good friend Sushrutha Reddy under the aegis of United Karnataka Chess Association. Lucky prizes were added to the donation as the tournament had to be truncated by one round due to technical issues. Photo: Azeri news

World no.9 Teimour Radjabov launches his online chess academy

25/09/2020 -

The Covid-19 situation has presented the world with a tough time. The chess world is also affected heavily with the over-the-board tournaments dwindling in number. But one thing that has received a tremendous boost is the level of chess education that has been made available in the last few months. As a prime example of this is the Chess Stars Academy launched by GM Teimour Radjabov a few days ago. The World no.9 Azeri GM has launched his online academy along with two of his trainers Chuchelov and Nataf who have been responsible for his rise to the top in the last few years! Get to know more about Raja's new venture and also the courses on offer.

IM Harshit Raja secures admission in the University of Missouri

24/09/2020 -

Towards the end of 2019 IM Harshit Raja from Pune shot into prominence after scoring two back to back GM norms in Spain. The first one was at the Elllobregat Open and the next one was at the Sunway Sitges 2019. En route to this achievement he beat several strong GMs like Karthikeyan Murali, Gukesh, Parham Maghsoodloo among others! So what's up with this 19-year-old youngster in 2020? What is Harshit Raja doing? Turns out that while all of the over the board tournaments have been cancelled due to Covid-19 situation, Harshit has managed to keep progressing - this time on the academic front. 

Talk of the Universe: Ganguly in conversation with Kramnik

23/09/2020 -

On 5th September, Surya Sekhar Ganguly invited the former World Champion, legend Vladimir Kramnik to his talk show 'In Conversation with'. It is well-known that Kramnik has contributed a lot to the theoretical aspect of chess. So it was right that on Teacher's Day someone who has taught a lot through his games talk about his journey. Kramnik also discusses about training young Indian talents and hopes he will get to come to India very soon. That's not all, he discusses various games of his and shares his thought process and one of the most important element - 'Prophylaxis'. Photo: Surya's youtube channel.

Getting the most out of ChessBase 15: a step-by-step guide #3 – Layout

22/09/2020 -

You've installed Chessbase 15, it's activated and updated. What next? How does a beginner to ChessBase 15 know where to start, or how to access the functions and features of the most sophisticated chess program on the planet. It's actually remarkably simple. Now is a very good time to learn the basic functions and features of ChessBase 15. It is a software which is used by everyone from beginners to World Class players. Definitely there is a reason behind. It is quintessential to all chess players of the entire universe. Here, Nick Murphy shows you how in a detailed pictorial tutorial.

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