by scribe | Feb 28, 2015 | Chess Lecture, games, openings
My last post on the French Defense, a few days ago, attracted more comments than any post I’ve written for at least a couple years. So let’s continue the conversation. One of the commenters (Brian Wall, I’m looking at you) asked, “What...
by scribe | Jan 6, 2015 | current news, games, positions, ruminations, tournaments
It’s an age-old question: is chess truly just a game of skill, or is there luck involved too? Here is perhaps the most crucial position I faced in the New Year Championship tournament last weekend. It’s round five, and I’m playing back against Ivan...
by scribe | Jan 4, 2015 | current news, people, tournaments
The New Year Championship has just wrapped up, and the victor in a runaway was the Chinese grandmaster, Xiangzhi Bu, who beat IM Andrey Gorovets in the last round to finish with a score of 5½ out of 6. There was a four-way tie for second at 4½ points, including the...
by scribe | Dec 22, 2014 | chess clubs, games, positions
In a comment on my most recent post, Hal Bogner used the delightful sobriquet “high-class abacus” to describe chess computers. Quoth Hal: “What’s with this worship of high-class abacus evaluations of positions in which their evaluations are in...
by scribe | Nov 23, 2014 | current news, ruminations, tournaments
Today, as I expect most readers of this blog know already, Magnus Carlsen won the 11th game of his match with Viswanathan Anand to retain his world championship title. The final score of the match was 6½-4½ (+3 – 1 =7 for Carlsen). What can I say? I think the...
