| Intro
Grandmaster Karsten Müller takes a quarter of an hour to give you an overview of the various content on the DVD and presents one or two highlights. In this way you get a peek into either a Carlsen or Anand game from Wijk and selected articles on opening theory. The "new" strategy column, of course, cannot go without a mention, and to finish, the opening trap by Rainer Knaak is "raised". |
| Tournament Highlights Grandmaster Dorian Rogozenco also begins his video with a game from Wijk and he doesn't forget to give Magnus Carlsen a mention. With highlights of three games the exceptional strengths of the Norwegian are demonstrated. Of course, Rogozenco offers a little look at the uncrowned best game prize Aronian-Anand. Further game fragments come from the top tournaments Baden-Baden and Zurich. |
| Pure Training Here we have collected all games with training questions. By clicking at the icon you get by chance one position with a training question. |
23.02.-01.03.2013
Fabiano Caruana Fought ruthlessly
| Zürich Chess Challenge Only four participants but strong ones: Anand, Kramnik, Gelfand and Caruana. In the first round of the Zurich Chess Challenge all games were drawn but none under 40 moves. In the second-half Fabiano Caruana landed two victories making him the winner by some way. In the third tournament in a row (after Wijk and Baden-Baden) the Italian remained strong and ruthlessly fought every game to the end. |
Caruana,F - Kramnik,V ½-½ Position before 32.Nd6 | For ChessBase Magazine Fabiano Caruana has annotated his White game against Kramnik. The Russian opened with the Benoni - not exactly his main opening weapon. Caruana soon stood better but he allowed a liquation, which brought Kramnik a material advantage. However, the Russian had to park a knight on h3 where it also stood in the final position. The commentator is also very critical of his own play. In the diagram he played 32.Nd6 without realizing that the knight would be weak on f5 rather than strong. For this reason it later had to move to e3 where it could have landed in the diagram in one move. Nevertheless, on the whole the balance was kept and thus the game ended peacefully. |
12.01.-27.01.2013
Sure thing for Magnus Carlsen
| Wijk aan Zee It is hard to imagine the next WC challenger to Anand being anyone other than Magnus Carlsen. At the Tata-Steel tournament the world number one won overwhelmingly in Wijk aan Zee with a 10 out of 13 result and a record 2930 performance. As a result he has hiked his Elo-rating up to the never-before-seen 2872. Only the world champion himself was able to keep pace with Carlsen but then had to let him go. On the DVD you will find game analysis by Carlsen, Anand, Giri and van Wely among others. |
Carlsen,M - Sokolov,I
Position after 47...Kd7-e8 | An example of how Magnus Carlsen creates his dominance in the middle and endgame is offered in his decisive game against Sokolov in round 6, which the Norwegian himself annotates on the DVD. With the rare book move 9.Bg5 "I aimed for a little advantage", is how Carlsen explained his opening choice. However, after this, not much of an advantage was in evidence. No problem for the Norwegian though as long as his position still offers a "long-term potential". Load the game and let Carlsen explain how he first brought his pieces to optimum positions and then broke the Black position. The diagram shows the position before the last move. Can you spot the nice way in which the Norwegian brought the game to a finish? |
Wijk aan Zee 2013 Openings report | Based on a total of 39 annotated games grandmaster Mihail Marin again looks at the latest developments and trends in his Opening report. The Romanian is able to draw on analysis and comments by Anand, Breutigam, Carlsen, Ftacnik, Giri, Gormally, Krasenkow, L'Ami, Postny, Rogozenco, Sumets, Kr. Szabo and Van Wely. |
"One of the best games
of my life" | The game Aronian,L - Anand,V 0-1 from the fourth round was one of the real highlights of the tournament. Not just because it involved, in only 23 moves, an unusually short victory for Black in top-level chess. Anand referred to the game in the subsequent interview as one of the best games of his entire career. "To win a game like that against my dreaded opponent Levon is just great." |
Aronian,L - Anand,V 0-1 Position before 16...Nde5 | As preparation for his WC-match against Gelfand the world champion had taken a good look at the "astonishing move" 11...Rc8 and found it to be good. Now the time had come to put this to the test in practice against Aronian. The real blow however was unleashed when, after 16.Bd3-e2 in the diagram position, Anand unleashed 16...Nde5. "A brilliant move", which Anand was "really proud of". Play through the game and let the world champion demonstrate the Black attack to you. Also in the analysis is his new opening idea - "Black wants to push c5 without worrying about covering the b5 pawn" - definitely not to be missed!
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Anish Giri annotates Giri,A - Carlsen,M ½-½ | In the final round it almost looked like Carlsen could still falter and lose against Anish Giri. In an unorthodox King's Indian position the young Dutchman emerged from the opening with an advantage. Carlsen's position looked increasingly critical.In the analysis on the DVD, Giri explains exactly what he overlooked on move 23 and why, after a further careless move, he began to feel increasingly uncomfortable with his position. In the end both sides were not unhappy with a draw. Giris conclusion: "It's always fun with Magnus". |
07.02.-17.02.2013
Vishy Anand on the up
| Grenke Classic Baden-Baden For a long time the only question was: would Caruana or Naiditsch make the running? However, the top German player spoiled too many winning positions while the Italian pushed his luck. In the penultimate round it deserted him when he lost against Adams. It was thus Anand's big moment. The world champion had first won a game after eight rounds but with two good wins at the end he was still able to come out as the sole winner - this was his first tournament victory at the classical time control since Linares 2008. |
Anand,V - Fridman,D 1-0
Position after 22.Bg4! | During the WC match Anand-Gelfand, as everybody knows, the Russian game did not appear on the board. In his game against Fridman now we could see what the world champion had prepared against this tough opening - nothing spectacular but a long variation with a novelty on move 20. However the subtle move 22.Bg4! immediately put Black under so much pressure that he went wrong; Commentator Dmitry Andreikin explains that instead of the "human" 22...Rf8 it would have been better to play 22...Be6. According to his analysis, Black maintains a balanced game in all lines. By the way 22...Bxg4 loses immediately: 23.Nf6+! gxf6 24.Rxe8+ Rxe8 25.Qxg4+ Qxg4 26.Rxe8+ etc. |
22.01.-31.01.2013 Nikita Vitiugov
Tiebreak winner in Gibraltar
| Gibraltar Masters In the 11th edition of the Tradewise Gibraltar Chess Festival the two protagonists were in front, who were to contest an exciting play-off: For years Nigel Short has enjoyed playing in, and always very successfully, in this popular, first class open. And Nikita Vitiugov not only started with 5 out of 5 but also spoiled the Englishman's chances of repeating his tournament victory from the previous year with a 102 move victory over him in the play-off. |
Vitiugov,N - Swiercz,D 1-0 Position after 19...Na4-b6 | With his fifth victory in a row Niktiva Vitiugov demonstrated great strategic understanding and masterly prudence. In the diagram position he was a pawn down but had the bishop pair and a clear initiative for it. And not to mention the pawn on b7 is already hanging! Vitiugov played 20.Rfc1. "There's no hurry" to quote the young Russian in his analysis on the DVD. Load the game Vitiugov-Swiercz and play it through with annotation by the tournament winner!
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In the video Dorian Rogozenco explains his new ideas
| Strategy with Dorian Rogozenco The strategy column has a new author. The Romanian grandmaster Dorian Rogozenco takes up this particular challenge and has immediately come up with two new ideas for his first article. Firstly, he will start each column with a video introducing the topic in question and explaining the theory behind it. Secondly, his games are accompanied by training questions so you can get on with some practical training.
In this edition Rogozenco has recorded an additional video where he talks in general about strategy and discusses his ideas for the strategy column. |
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Caruana-Nakamura, Wijk
Position after 54.Kc2 How did Nakamura manage to break White’s position? Solution in Endgame
| From opening trap to studying the endgame Training in ChessBase Magazine starts with the very latest moves and includes all phases of the game of chess. The 12 current opening articles with lots of ideas and suggestions for your repertoire can be found at the top next to the links. This time Rainer Knaak’s Opening Trap (including Fritztrainer video) contains a trap from the Nimzo-Indian (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3 0-0 5.Bd3 d5 6.Nf3 c5 7.0-0 dxc4 8.Bxc4 cxd4 9.exd4 - E54). In video format there are also opening contributions by Leonid Kritz (Slav Chebanenko Variation) and Robert Ris (Caro-Kann 2.Ne2). These videos can be found under the heading Opening Videos. In Daniel King’s long-running success Move by Move a game in the Tarrasch Defence is on the training schedule. The subject of the Strategy column by Dorian Rogozenco is "Centralization". And under the heading Tactics (Subject: hanging pieces, picture-book attacks) and Endgame (Topic: Pearls from Wijk aan Zee) Oliver Reeh and Karsten Müller have again put together the best from current tournament practice. |