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Interview with under-17 national champion Vedant Panesar

13/11/2018 -

The National under-17 was being held in Sonipat, Haryana from the 3rd to the 11th of September 2018. Many of the top Indian players had gathered to play in this championship. Some of the big names included Mitrabha Guha, Srijit Paul, Kushager Krishnater, Tarun Kanth, Vatsal Singhania. All of them had an Elo of 2200+. But the tournament was won by Vedant Panesar, who was the 8th seed in this tournament. While Vedant is very well known in the local Mumbai circles as a strong player, this was his first huge success at the national level. A thoroughly hard working boy, Vedant has able to maintain a good balance between chess and education. In this article we get to know the champion better thanks to an interview by Avathanshu Bhat and Vedant also sends us six of his annotated games from the tournament for the readers of ChessBase India to learn and enjoy. 

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6 major things that happened on the final day of Tata Steel Chess India Rapid 2018

12/11/2018 -

The Tata Steel Chess India 2018 Rapid came to an end on the 11th of November with American GM Hikaru Nakamura taking home the pole position with 6.0/9. Nakamura played the event as per the demands of the situation - calm on first and third days and three victories on day two! It was excellent news for Indian fans that Harikrishna managed to fight back with two wins against Levon Aronian and Vidit Gujrathi in last two rounds to finish second. Levon Aronian had to settle for the third spot. In this article we bring to you six things that happened on the last day of the tournament as well as information which sum up the first super tournament held in our country! Of course, one mustn't forget the big news - Vishy Anand was beaten by his former second Surya Sekhar Ganguly in the final round.

WWCh 2018 Round 3.2: Harika heads to the tie-breakers with a draw

11/11/2018 -

Harika made a quick draw in just 29 moves in French Defence Tarrasch variation against former Women's World Champion, Alexandra Kosteniuk. They will play tie-breaker matches to determine who will advance to the quarter-finals. Meanwhile, Ju Wenjun made a comfortable draw and Mariya Muzychuk ended Mobina Alinasab's dream run to advance to the quarter-finals. 12 players will have to play tie-breaker matches to determine which 8 players will move to the quarter-finals. Harika once again has to fire in the tiebreaks, something that she has been successful in the last two rounds against Khukhashvili and Khotenashvili. But Kosteniuk will not be an easy opponent to overcome. Photo: Official site

Tata Steel India Rapid Day 2: Nakamura sets the stage on fire!

11/11/2018 -

After a relatively sedate start on day one, things have begun to heat up at the Tata Steel Chess India Rapid 2018. On the second day we had eight decisive encounters out of the 15 games that were played. Hikaru Nakamura was on fire as he scored 3.0/3 beating Mamedyarov, Ganguly and Nihal. Levon Aronian has kept up the pace and with 4.5/6 is in joint lead with Nakamura. In this report we have the perfect balance of pictures, videos, and analysis. This article tells you how a tournament like Tata Steel Chess India 2018 is making such a big difference to chess culture of our country. We also bring you exclusive footage of Nihal Sarin battling out the big guys. After all, how often do you see a 14-year-old fighting it out against the big guys!

World Championship Game 2: Caruana's homework "scares" Carlsen

11/11/2018 -

In modern day chess it is always a question - what should you do when you are facing your opponent's opening preparation? And yes, your opponent is none other than Fabiano Caruana, who has an excellent teams of seconds, great computer hardware for accurate analysis and extremely high chess talent. Of course, you do not want to fight him in his own terrain and hence after Fabiano played 10...Rd8 in the second game of the World Championship Match 2018, Magnus Carlsen went into a less ambitious mode. This helped Caruana to equalize without any difficulty and be on the better side of the draw. After two games the score of the World Championship now stands at 1.0-1.0. We have an overview of the entire game with the help of diagrams and young talent Prithu Gupta has annotated the game.

World Championship Game 1: How did Carlsen miss that win?

10/11/2018 -

The World Championship 2018 kicked off in London on the 9th of November 2018. Usually World Championships start off slowly and pick up steam after a few games, but that was not the case in the Carlsen-Caruana match. Caruana started off with 1.e4 and Carlsen responded with the Sicilian. It was a full fledged struggle where Magnus showed his true skills. Slowly and steadily, move by move, he outplayed Caruana. It was such a clinical effort by Magnus that people started to feel that the match was already over! But all of a sudden on the last move before time control, Magnus erred in a big way. He took the pawn on c3, and Caruana resurrected his position. Miraculously the American GM escaped from the jaws of defeat. We have the key moments of the game to give you a gist of what happened and analysis by Jan-Krzysztof Duda. 

WWCh 2018 Round 3.1: Harika draws with Kosteniuk

10/11/2018 -

Harika drew with former Women's World Champion GM Alexandra Kosteniuk of Russia after a grueling battle of almost 5 hours in round 3.1 of FIDE Women's World Championship. The Indian GM started with Catalan opening which Kosteniuk equalized easily out of the opening. Until this game the head-to-head statistics was 3 draws and 3 wins a piece for each player. They are going to face each other in round 3.2. The player who wins that game will advance to the quarter finals. Ju Wenjun, Jolanta Zawadzka, Anna Muzychuk and Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova were victorious in round 3.1. In this report, we bring you the best games, photos and videos from Khanty-Mansiysk. Photo: Official site

Tata Steel India Round 1-3: Harikrishna, Mamedyarov and Aronian lead with 2.0/3

10/11/2018 -

The first day of the first super tournament in India was fascinating. Of course, having ten great chess players fighting it out always feels great, but what was even more heartening was the jam packed crowd. The ICCR auditorium which had a capacity of 200 people was filled to the brim with people waiting outside the auditorium to go inside and view the games. The players held nothing back to entertain the crowd and in the first round itself Vishy Anand had everyone on the edge of their seats as he fought for 145 moves against Wesley So. At the end of three rounds of rapid chess at the Tata Steel Chess India we have three players in joint lead with 2.0/3 - Harikrishna, Mamedyarov and Aronian. A detailed report from Kolkata. 

Live Games from Women's World Championship 2018, Khanty Mansiysk

09/11/2018 -

The FIDE Women's World Championship 2018 is being held from the 3rd to the 25th of November 2018 in Khanty Mansiysk, Russia. The top seed and the defending World Champion is Ju Wenjun from China. India has a strong representation in the form of Koneru Humpy, Harika Dronavalli, Padmini Rout and Bhakti Kulkarni. It is a 64-player knock out event. The one to win this tournament will become the FIDE Women's World Champion. In 2017 Harika won the Bronze medal. Can she better her performance? Can Humpy, who is the second seed, show her mettle and become the World Champion - a title that is missing in her list of achievements. Follow the games live with commentary on this page. All games begin at 15.30 hours IST.

The opening ceremony of the first super tournament on Indian soil

09/11/2018 -

And we are off! The opening ceremony of the first super tournament on Indian soil was held in the evening of 8th of November 2018. For chess fans across the country this was a big moment. At one place we had the absolute best chess players of the world which included our very own Vishy Anand, the man in form Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Sergey Karjakin, Levon Aronian, Hikaru Nakamura and Wesley So. This will be a great exposure for players like Harikrishna, Vidit Gujrathi, Surya Sekhar Ganguly, Nihal Sarin (rapid) and Praggnanandhaa (blitz). The short time control of 25'+10'' in rapid and 5'+3'' in blitz makes this an event to look forward to. It starts on the same day as the World Championship between Carlsen and Caruana. ChessBase India brings you pictures from the opening ceremony by Amruta Mokal and video interviews by Sagar Shah and Shahid Ahmed.

WWCh 2018 Round 2 TB: Harika advances to Pre-Quarter Finals

09/11/2018 -

Harika defeated Bela Khotenashvili of Georgia 2.5-1.5 in round 2 to advance to the pre-quarter finals of the FIDE Women's World Championship. She got an early advantage in round 2.3 after Bela was unable to find a good square for her light squared bishop and eventually lost some more tempi. Despite getting a winning endgame, Harika was not willing to take any risks and settled for a draw after 75 moves. In the second tie-break, Bela blundered a bishop on the 31st move and never got a chance to make a comeback in the game. Harika will face former Women's World Champion, Chess Queen Alexandra Kosteniuk in round 3. This report contains selected best games, photos and videos. Photo: Official site 

WWCh 2018 Round 2.2: Humpy gets humbled by Jolanta Zawadska

08/11/2018 -

Humpy made a shocking exit from FIDE Women's World Championship after suffering a loss against Jolanta Zawadzka of Poland in round 2.2. Humpy made a quick draw in round 2.1 with the black pieces. In the second game in the endgame she arrived at an inferior position, lost a pawn and eventually the battle. Harika made a quick draw against Bela Khotenashvili of Georgia in just 20 moves. Harika is the last Indian hope alive at the tournament. She will have to play tie-breaker matches against Bela in Rapid time control and Blitz too if required. In the report you will also find the key results of other players apart from the Indians. Photo: Official site

WWCh 2018 Round 2.1: Humpy and Harika draw their games with black pieces

07/11/2018 -

Both Humpy and Harika started round 2.1 with a draw. However Humpy's game was a tepid draw in Petroff's Defence in just 26 moves, while Harika kept fighting until the end. The Indian GM tried to force her opponent Bela Khotenashvili to commit a mistake, but the Georgian had no intentions to budge. After a 64-move long battle, a threefold repetition resulted in a draw. Humpy and Harika both had black pieces, so a draw is definitely a result they will be happy with as tomorrow in round 2.2 they are going to have white pieces where they will not hold any punches back. We bring you games, photos and videos from Khanty-Mansiysk. Photo: Official site

Tran Tuan Minh wins the 1st Pattaya Open 2018 in Thailand

07/11/2018 -

Vietnamese GM Tran Tuan Minh is the winner of the first edition of the Thailand Pattaya Open Chess Championship which took place from 20th to 31st of October 2018. A total number of 105 players from 24 different countries took part in the open section of the event. Tran scored an unbeaten solid 8.0/9 points, a one point lead from the 1st runner-up to become the champion of the tournament. The field included 6 GM, 3 IM, 1WGM, 10 FM/WFM and 8CM/WCM. In the first part we read about the winners in different categories and also the interview with the organizer and now in this 2nd and final part of the coverage Peter Long shares with us a detailed pictorial report of the event and also announces the dates for the 2nd edition.

The Aagaard challenge from Quality Chess Academy camp in Greece

06/11/2018 -

The first Quality Chess Academy Camp is being held in Lyttos Resort near Heraklion, Greece from the 4th to the 10th of November 2018. This camp is open only for players above the rating of 2300. A lot of strong players have taken part in the camp, including one of India's top GMs. The trainers for the camp are GM Jacob Aagaard and GM Boris Gelfand. In this article we show you the serene environment in which the camp is taking place and also present you a Jacob Aagaard challenge. Jacob shows us a position from the game of his student Sam Shankland and asks you to find the best move! Are you up for the challenge? If yes, check out the article for the position.

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