English Chess Forum

Very bizarrely, I was looking for exactly this sort of position about 10 days ago, in the context of the game Swiercz-Jumabayev in the World Teams where they reached this position after Black's 40th. 5k2/2p2p2/5p1p/5P2/1P2RK2/1r3P1P/5P2/8 w - - 21 41 (see David Llada's picture ). The best one I foun...

Tweet from Malcolm Pein suggests there are:

https://twitter.com/telegraphchess/stat ... 87168?s=21

McShane board 2 Gold
Howell board 3 Bronze
Jones board 4 Silver

I don't have the position but I distinctly remember a game (though I may be slightly mis-remembering some of the exact details) that a county teammate of mine played in the British Championship (probably under 10 / 11). He'd been struggling after a dodgy opening, got back into it slightly in the mid...

So Giri won 58,000 Euros in prize money, and is ranked number 4 in the world? It seems so - though perhaps he was a bad example as for whatever reason, he didn’t play all that many tournaments last year. There are people lower down the rating list (eg Nakamura) who won much more prize money, even o...

Out of interest, I had a quick go at trying to work out what Giri won (ie prize money alone) in 2018 based on his FIDE profile and a bit of Googling. He actually wasn’t hugely active so the number’s a bit lower than I expected - but still about double what WorldChess have. Shenzhen: €16,000 World Ra...

Hhmm...there's more to it than this. To take one example, by no means at random: Mickey Adams. He's listed way down at €9,300 earnings last year. I'm sure that's true if they say so. But that's just Mickey's prize money . As big a cost for any tournament, possibly a bigger cost in many cases, is co...

Let me test out a theory. There were said to be 118 voters and I'm not suggesting that this isn't the strict truth. But, just as a matter of interest, did anyone on this forum cast any one of those 118 votes or does anyone know anyone who did? It was a Twitter poll. I voted for GameChanger on the b...

It's been pointed out on Twitter that board 35 sees IBCA take on ICCD - has that pairing come up many times before? I'm also genuinely interested to know how it works logistically as presumably announcing moves wouldn't work particularly well? From Facebook: Alex Holowczak 1 hr · An Olympiad first ...

It's been pointed out on Twitter that board 35 sees IBCA take on ICCD - has that pairing come up many times before? I'm also genuinely interested to know how it works logistically as presumably announcing moves wouldn't work particularly well?

Oh, 26...Bb1! (possibility in Howell's game). Threatening ...Rxf3 as well as promotion. Quelle computeresque. 26...Rxe6 27.Rxe6 Qxe6 was also possible and perhaps more human (28.Qxe6 Rae8 followed by Re1) EDIT: added position and variations [Event "Sutovsky-Howell"] [Result "*"] [Variant "From Posi...

Magnus wasn't impressed with 31.b4 in McShane's game, thought he should have played for two results with 31.Red1. (via Chess24 on Twitter)
Turned out well for Luke in the end though!

I had a couple of goes previously at working out a best (linear) fit converting actual ECF grades to FIDE ratings. In 2014, FIDE = 7.5xECF + 675 was (close to) the best fit In 2017, it was FIDE = 7.5xECF + 640 As you can see from the graph I put together in 2014, you do get oddities both ways, acros...

And here's game 2: Here is the second game (following comments on Manx Liberty, possible new overlords): Their games are online, of course. Here is, perhaps, an important novelty from GM Mircea-Emilian Parligras, or so I thought, until I later discovered that it had recently been played elsewhere: R...

Nice games! Here's game 1 with the position alongside the text - all you need to do is put the FEN for the relevant position inside <pos> tags (and you can get the FEN from the PGN by clicking on the b8 square) I have allowed myself to become distracted of late, writing on the 4NCL for CHESS. So muc...

Soheil Hooshdaran wrote: What does it mean for Black to rip open the White King ? It is not a normal chess term, but it probably means Black attacks the White King. To 'rip open' is also suggestive of the pawns in front of the King being taken away (perhaps, though not necessarily, via a sacrifice?...