UK's biggest chess shop. Visit us in London or shop chess.co.uk

The lowest prices on Chess DVDs and great books for $10!
chess4less.com

Books, boards, sets:
Chess Niggemann

Bilbao R5: All games drawn
06.09.2008 – After a furious round four, with all games decided, round five brought three draws – but none of them your unfought, GM agreements. Anand got into trouble against Magnus Carlsen, dropping an exchange, but escaped in the end; Ivanchuk-Topalov was a standard Nimzo-Indian and drawn in 44 moves; Radjabov played another Scotch, drawing with Aronian in 34 moves. Full pictorial report.
 

Nalchik R3: And then there were eight
06.09.2008 – Two Chinese girls, Hou and Shen, one Russian, one Ukrainian, an Armenian, Bulgarian, Swede and an Indian remain in the Women's World Championship in Nalchik. Both the high-rated Konsintseva sisters were eliminated in round three, the reigning junior world champion Harika is out as well, so is Svetlana Matveeva, who eliminated World Champion Xu Yuhua in round two. Pictorial report.
 

Bilbao R4: Topalov topples Anand, Carlsen #1 in the world
05.09.2008 – When was the last time we saw Anand resign a game in just 25 moves? It happened, in round four of the Chess Grand Slam Final in Spain against Veselin Topalov. Levon Aronian defeated Vassily Ivanchuk and Magnus Carlsen, still ailing from his Moscow bug, defeated Teimour Radjabov. Topalov leads in Bilbao, but Carlsen is now number one in the world live rankings. Full pictorial report.
 

Fritz11's engine parameters
05.09.2008 – There are numerous ways to tweak a chess engine's performance: hash tables, different time controls, endgame tablebases, handicap modes. But a little-used performance tweak for Fritz11 is its engine parameters. You can find out more about these variable settings in the new edition of ChessBase Workshop.
 

Bilbao R3: Topalov beats Carlsen with black
04.09.2008 – On move 21 a clearly out-of-sorts Magnus Carlsen – our Spanish colleagues tell us he brought a bug with him from the Moscow blitz – dropped a pawn, and then was ruthlessly punished for this inaccuracy by Veselin Topalov, never a player to let such an opportunity pass. Both the other games were drawn. Topalov leads in the tournament. Full illustrated report.
 

Nalchik R3: Four players score in first game of round three
04.09.2008 – "Hou do you think will win the Championship?" skyped Nigel Short after today's round. Indeed. The 14-year-old Chinese talent Hou Yifan has won all five games she has played so far and must be considered a hot favourite for the title. In other games Ushenina beat Matveeva, Stefanova crushed Gaponenko, Cramling beat Ruan Lufei, top seed Humpy was held by Hoang Thanh Trang. Full pictorial report.
 

Magnus Carlsen in the International Herald Tribune
04.09.2008 – The 17-year-old chess player Magnus Carlsen appears to spend his time after school much as any typical teenage boy would. He vanishes to his small, sparsely furnished bedroom at the top of a yellow clapboard house in this suburb of Oslo and settles in front of the computer. "Maybe I spend too much time chatting with people," he said with a smile. Interesting IHT story.
 

Bilbao R2: all games drawn, Carlsen leads
03.09.2008 – All three games were drawn today, and according to the Bilbao rules that gives each player one point (a win counts for three). The game of the day was the Dragon between Vassily Ivanchuk and Magnus Carlsen – it had spectators on the Playchess server enthralled. An exchange sacrifice, a piece sacrifice and in the end a perpetual. Carlsen continues to lead in Bilbao and regular points. Full report.
 

ChessBase Magazine 125 – with Foros and Dortmund
03.09.2008 – Two outstanding tournaments in the current issue of ChessBase Magazine are Foros in Ukraine, where the young star Magnus Carlsen progressed smoothly from start to finish, and Dortmund, where the tension was high and it looked like a sensation was in the making. Of course there is plenty of teaching and training on this electronic publication. Read about it and order it now.
 

Nalchik R2: World Champion Xu Yuhua knocked out
03.09.2008 – 4-3-2-1. No, it's not the latest scoring system, but the number of players of different nationalities to qualify for round three: four Russians, three Chinese, two Indians, two Ukrainians, and one player each from Armenia, Bulgaria, Hungary and Sweden. Reigning World Champion Xu Yuhua was knocked out by Svetlana Matveeva, 14-year-old Hou Yifan has won all four games. Full pictorial report.
 

Topalov brings life to a staid opening
03.09.2008 – One rarely associates the Queen's Indian Defense with sharp and lively play. But (together with his second, Ivan Cheparinov) Veselin Topalov, a dazzling player we have been neglecting of late, has detonated many dangerous novelties on the white side of this opening. In his Wednesday night Playchess lecture Dennis Monokroussos provides us with an example. See you on the server.
 

Bilbao R1: Carlsen beats Aronian with black
02.09.2008 – The Super-super-GM in Bilbao started with a bang. Radjabov's Scotch against Topalov simplified to a drawn ending which was played out to bare kings. Anand had one of his sweating-blood games against Ivanchuk but survived in the end. Magnus Carlsen, the incredible young man from Norway, simply blew away world-class GM Levon Aronian with the black pieces. Big illustrated report.