by scribe | Mar 19, 2016 | current news, openings, people, positions, ruminations, tournaments
Leave it to Hikaru Nakamura to give us another lesson in how not to play chess. That is, literally, how not to pick up the pieces and move them. Last year, he taught us not to castle with both hands. (You might remember that in an Armageddon playoff game with Ian...
by scribe | Mar 10, 2016 | games, openings, positions
Quick update on the go match: AlphaGo won game two and leads, 2-0. Lee Sedol sounds pretty discouraged. I think he may be beaten psychologically, which makes his chances of coming back to win the match slim to none. And now, back to chess and to my own struggles...
by scribe | Mar 8, 2016 | games, openings, positions
This weekend I met with Gjon Feinstein and Eric Montany and showed them some of my games from my most recent tournament, the U.S. Amateur Team West championship. One of my games was weird. The good news is that I beat a 2300 player, Steven Jacobi. Because I...
by scribe | Jan 20, 2016 | openings, positions
Recently Roman Parparov posted a comment here that was too important to remain buried in the comments. He asked: Dana, are you aware that your favorite Bird got destroyed twice on the very top level very recently, in the same Nxd4, exd4, Bc4 variation: Saric –...
by scribe | Dec 24, 2015 | openings, ruminations
Of course this is a rhetorical question, but really. Earlier this year I wrote a series of posts called Grading the Openings looked at the winning percentages of each of the ECO opening classifications in master play. There’s a small but undeniable difference...
by scribe | Dec 22, 2015 | openings, positions
You’re White in this position. What would you do? Position after 12. … Bf5. White to move. FEN:rn3rk1/ppp2ppp/8/3q1b2/1b3B2/2NP1NR1/PPP1Q2P/R3K3 w Q – 0 13 This wasn’t an actual game, but if I were playing White I would first look at 13. Bxc7,...
