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The 'Indian Chess Queen' Padmini Rout turns 25

05/01/2019 -

Padmini Rout started playing chess at the age of 9 years. However she rapidly improved her game and became National under-13 and Asian under-12 champion within 3 years after she learnt the game. She was introduced to the game by her father when she was in fourth standard. Padmini won National Women's Premier title four times consecutively from 2014-2017, she won Gold in Commonwealth in 2015 and she is the only Indian woman to have won individual Gold medal in Chess Olympiad history. She is always concerned about the environment. Padmini has been awarded with Biju Patnaik Sports Award for the year 2007 and she has also won Eklavya Award in 2009. Photo: Nongsha Angom 

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IIFLW 2018-19 Round 6: Varshney leads in juniors, Tran Tuan Minh and Visakh in GM section

05/01/2019 -

The IIFLW 2018-19 is heading towards an exciting finish. More than just the results and standings, we are fitness high quality chess with loads of decisive games. In the juniors (under-13 section) it's Aaryan Varshney who snatched the sole lead with 6.0/6 as he beat Kashish Jain in a pawn endgame. In the 2100+ GM section it was we now have two leaders - GM Tran Tuan Minh and IM Visakh N.R. with 5.5/6. The Vietnamese GM beat Sandipan Chanda from the White side of a Dutch and Visakh showed brilliant bit of opening preparation to get the better of Deepan Chakkravarthy. We have all the three games analyzed by IM Sagar Shah in this article.

Akshat Khamparia wins the December edition of First Saturday GM 2018

05/01/2019 -

Since 1992 the "First Saturday" monthly chess tournament is taking place in Budapest, Hungary without fail to give aspiring chess players opportunities to gain FIDE title norms. The best thing about this tournament is that you always know when it is going to be held - on the first Saturday of every month! The December 2018 edition was won by the only Indian in the GM category, IM Akshat Khamparia with 6.0/9 points. Akshat remained unbeaten throughout the event and finished ahead of three GMs to win the title. In this article we will look into some of the games played by Akshat and also learn more about this unique event which has been played once by almost every top elite GM.

The secrets of B. Adhiban's positive approach towards chess and life

04/01/2019 -

He will always greet you with a smile and warmth, he is always high on energy and in almost any conversation you will see him adding some of the famous quotes of great personalities! The natural question to ask is - how does Adhiban Baskaran remain so positive all the time? What is the secret of his positivity, huge ambitions and a pleasant personality? Sagar Shah and Amruta Mokal visited Adhiban's home in Chennai, immediately after Adhiban had won the tournament of Peace in Croatia in November 2018. Apart from doing an interview on the tournament, we also got an insight into Adhiban's workspace, Adhiban's parents and his support system. Also how does Adhiban keep the ambience at his place in a way that it perpetually motivates him to do well? In this article you get to know all the secrets. 

The dark knight of IIFLW under-13 - Kashish Jain

04/01/2019 -

The under-13 IIFLW is the highest prize money under-13 event in the world of chess. With the first prize of Rs.2,00,000 it has attracted some of the best under-13 players of our country. Two of the favourites of the tournament were Gukesh and V. Pranav. Both of them have been the past winners of the IIFLW Juniors. However, there is one boy from Hadapsar, Pune, who beat both of them rounds four and five of the IIFLW Juniors 2018-19 and that is Kashish Jain. In this article we tell you all about this young emerging talent and analyze both of his victories against Gukesh and Pranav. There have been some amazing games in the 2100+ open section as well, with great tactics and combinations. We present them to you as well.

K Rathnakaran wins the ChessBase India Bhopal Blitz

03/01/2019 -

Thus far, you might have only heard of Online Blitz Tournaments organised by ChessBase India. But this time, at the conclusion of the Bhopal International Grandmaster Chess Tournament, on the 27th of December 2018, ChessBase India conducted an over the board Blitz Tournament with the support of the organising team of the GM event. The prizes here included software like ChessBase 15 and Fritz 16, along with books and ChessBase Premium accounts. Moreover, the participation of a whopping 191 players which made the tournament a grand success. Mr Kapil Sharma, the Tournament Director of the GM event and his team made the event truly world class while players like RR Laxman, K Rathnakaran and S Nitin brought in the required excitement.

Interview with Aarthie Ramaswamy Part II: "Our whole life is completely about chess"

03/01/2019 -

Today, Aarthie Ramaswamy is one of the most renowned chess trainers and managers in the country. Along with her husband, GM RB Ramesh, she runs the Chess Gurukul, an academy known for producing some of the best Grandmasters in the country. In the first part of the interview Aarthie told us about her chess career and how she had become one of the best not just in India but in the world. In this second part of the interview conducted with Aarthie by IM Sagar Shah at the 2018 World Junior Championship in Gebze, Turkey, Aarthie talks about her role as Ramesh's wife, his manager and a coach and administrator at Chess Gurukul. She also looks back at how the idea of Chess Gurukul was brought to life and what it has become today.

Divcibare 2018: The tournament that never existed?

02/01/2019 -

During the months of September and October this year, GM Vassilios Kotronias was invited to play two tournaments at the Divcibare resort in Serbia. Since the tournament was held in a beautiful location and the playing venue was the same as the hotel of accommodation, it took GM Kotronias little persuasion to accept the invite. He finished the with flying colours, clinching the title in the second tournament and finishing second in the first. But to his shock, when he checked a month or so later, he realised that there was no record of the event on the FIDE website. The rating and norms gained at the tournament were gone in an instant! In this report, he gives a brief account of his experience and shares some lightly annotated games and pictures.

Tran Tuan Minh wins Bhopal GM International 2018

01/01/2019 -

The Bhopal International GM Open, which concluded last week on December 28, saw Vietnamese Grandmasters dominate the field. Scoring 9.0/10, a full point ahead of his nearest rival, GM Tran Tuan Minh clinched the title prize. In the final round, he only needed a draw but he spiritedly pushed for the win and scored a commanding win over GM Manik Mikulas of Slovakia. Meanwhile, another Vietnamese GM Nguyen Van Huy took second place, after securing a quick draw against Utkal Ranjan Sahoo. The draw was mutually beneficial as Sahoo secured his final IM norm with it. IM Shyaamnikhil P of the Railways took the third place. The closing ceremony of the event was conducted under the graceful presence of  Mr Rishi Shukla, Director General, Madhya Pradesh Police; Dr SL Thoasen, Director, Department of Sports and Youth Welfare, Madhya Pradesh; Mr SN Rupla, former Madhya Pradesh State Secretary; and Mr Kapil Saxena, Tournament Director and AICF Joint Secretary.

Carlsen and Lagno clinch blitz world titles; Nihal Sarin rakes 152 Elo points finishing 11th!

31/12/2018 -

Magnus Carlsen may have missed out on clinching the title in the Rapid event, but at the Blitz championship, he brought back his flair and won the event scoring an undefeated 17/21. However, he was closely chased by Jan Krzysztof Duda of Poland and had to come up with one win after another to keep his pole position. In the Women's group, Kateryna Lagno also achieved an unbeaten finish to clinch the title with a score of 13½/17. Meanwhile, Nihal Sarin, whose starting rank was 139, stunned all spectators -- except IM Sagar Shah, as he explains in this report -- with his 11th place finish. On the final day, Nihal defeated some world-class GMs like Gawain Jones, Nikita Vitiugov and Le Quang Liem and earned a whopping 152 rating points!

Seven Indians are members of FIDE commissions from 2018-2022

31/12/2018 -

FIDE - World Chess Federation functions on the basis of its different commissions. For the rules related to arbiters, we have the arbiters commission, for the rules related to norms and titles we have the qualification commission, for the rules related to trainer titles we have the trainers commission and so on. Out of the 16 different commissions that FIDE has, we have seven Indians in them. AICF Secretary Bharat Singh Chauhan is the Chairman of the Technical Commission. We then have the members in different commissions - Ravindra Dongre (ethics), Anantharam Rathinam (arbiters), Gopakumar Sudhakaran (fairplay), Atanu Lahiri (education) and Ramesh RB (trainers). FIDE President Arkadij Dvorkovich in a surprise move appointed five-time World Champion Vishy Anand as the councilor of planning and development commission of FIDE.

The highest prize money under-13 event and 2100+ GM tournament begins in Mumbai

31/12/2018 -

The quantum of grandmaster opens in India have been increasing but the number of norms haven't been proportionately growing. That's because a lot of lower rated players participate in the GM events and reaching the average rating for the norms becomes impossible. However, at the IIFLW 2018-2019 tournament in Mumbai, the organizers made a strict restriction for players below 2100. This resulted in only 120 entries, but we are sure that there will be quite a few norms coming out from this tournament. Simultaneously with the GM open you have the highest prize money under-13 tournament in the world with the first prize of Rs. 2,00,000 and a total prize fund of Rs.10,00,000. The favourite is 12-year-old D. Gukesh, who has a live rating of 2466!

14-year-old Nihal Sarin's blitzkrieg in Saint Petersburg!

30/12/2018 -

Nihal Sarin is well known for his blitz skills, but no one really gave him a chance at the World Blitz Championship. With a rating of 2506, the 14-year-old started as the 139th seed. With 4.0/8 Nihal's start was slow, but as the rounds progressed and players started blundering from the lack of stamina, Nihal was getting stronger with every passing game. When the 21st round of blitz ended, the youngster was hungry for more! He had already scored 13.5/21, beating seven opponents above the rating of 2600 and three above 2700! His Elo performance was 2777 and he gained 151 Elo points. He finished eleventh, way ahead of all Indian players including Vishy Anand. In this article we tell you all about Nihal's performance, analyze a few of his blitz games and also share with you an anecdote that reveals the secret of Nihal's success.

Live Games of World Rapid and Blitz 2018

30/12/2018 -

The best way to follow the games of Viswanathan Anand, Pentala Harikrishna, Koneru Humpy, Harika Dronavalli, Nihal Sarin, Vishnu Prasanna and D K Sharma from World Rapid and Blitz 2018 is to follow this page. We have live commentary by GM Evgenij Miroshnichenko and GM Peter Leko. Along with it, we also have all the live games, finished games of previous rounds, schedule and all the important links. As the rounds go by, we will keep posting important results which will help you to follow this grand event in the best possible manner. Rounds begin at 3 p.m. local time (5.30 p.m. IST). 26th, 27th, 28th December is the rapid matches and on 29th and 30th December we have the blitz. Photo: Amruta Mokal and Niklesh Jain

World Blitz Championship: Two leaders emerge in both groups

30/12/2018 -

The first day of the King Salman World Blitz Championship 2018 was a tumultuous affair. While tournament lead changed hands multiple times, at the end of the day, two players shared the lead in both groups. In the open, it was Magnus Carlsen and Vladislav Artemiev who came out on top while in the Women's Kateryna Lagno and Sarasadat Khademalsharieh shared the lead. Vishy Anand had a nice start to the event but two losses towards the end of the day pulled him down on the leaderboard. We have a report with pictures and games. 

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