(Off Topic) Absurd and Adsurd

March 30, 2018

With apologies, I am going to go off topic today and talk about math. Some chess players like math, so I hope you’ll be interested in this post! Big news! Today, for the first time in 23 years, I’ve had an article published in a mathematical research journal. If you want to read it, go […]

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Why We’re Jubilant

March 28, 2018

This is a Facebook post I wrote today, and I decided to post it here too. (It’s very short!) One of my Facebook friends, Mike Zaloznyy, started a thread asking why there was so much rejoicing over Fabiano Caruana’s qualifying to play a match for the chess world championship with Magnus Carlsen. In particular, Mike […]

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It’s Official! American Challenger for World Championship

March 27, 2018

Congratulations to Fabiano Caruana, who won his game against Alexander Grischuk today and became the first U.S.-born challenger for the World Championship since Bobby Fischer in 1972. (*) For any readers who don’t know, Caruana was born in Miami and lived in the U.S. for his pre-teen years, but when it became clear that he […]

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Thirteen is lucky for Caruana!

March 26, 2018

So far I haven’t written anything in my blog about the ongoing Candidates Tournament to pick the next challenger to Magnus Carlsen. After all, what can I tell you that you can’t read on a thousand other websites? However, today’s round was too exciting not to write about. It was the 13th (second-to-last) round of […]

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Initiative, Initiative, Initiative

March 21, 2018

The three most important things in playing winning chess are initiative, initiative, and initiative! That has been my philosophy for many years. Although there are some exceptions and some other ways to play, I still believe that many chess games boil down to who can seize and keep the initiative. Three weeks ago, in the […]

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UMBC: Not Just a Chess School Any More

March 17, 2018

There’s no sporting event that I love more than the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, in part because it’s the one sporting event at which anything can happen. The famous teams have to step on the court and compete with the not-famous teams, and often the not-famous teams prove that there is more to basketball than […]

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PRO Chess League Playoffs

March 15, 2018

This week the PRO Chess League playoffs started with a rash of upsets. In five out of eight matches the team with the lower seeding beat the top-seeded team, and in one more match the favored team only managed to squeak through to the next round by virtue of their draw odds. That leaves only […]

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Feel Happy, Play Happy (part 2)

March 9, 2018

Continuing from last time… Position after 33. Rc2. Black to move. In my last post, we reached this position from my game with IM Ed Formanek in the 1994 Cardinal Open in Columbus, Ohio. The title of the post refers to the fact that I had a positive mental attitude throughout the game. Even though […]

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When You Feel Happy, You Play Happy

March 7, 2018

I’ve learned one thing from watching kids play chess: the result of a game often depends not so much on the position on the board as on the position in their minds. Often I’ll see a kid lose a piece or more, but still stay resolute and continue making threats, and eventually win. I’ll also […]

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Just a Reminder …

February 28, 2018

… of my favorite tactic. Position after 22. … Qd2. White to move. FEN: r2r2k1/2p2pp1/p6p/1p2R3/8/1PQ5/1PPq1PPP/R5K1 w – – 0 23 Black (Olav Sepp, 2436) has just played 22. … Qd2, obviously hoping for a queen trade with good drawing chances, or even better, hoping for 23. Qxc7? Rac8 followed by 24. … Rxc2. But White […]

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