All chess players aspire to create a lasting masterpiece over the board. And if sacrifices appeal to the artistic side of a chess player, what can be a better way than to sacrifice the most powerful of all pieces, the queen? GM Sundararajan Kidambi presents three games featuring remarkable (positional) queen sacrifices! | Pictured: Karthikeyan Murali | Photo: Niklesh Jain / ChessBase India
On 15 January 1930 one of the strongest chess tournaments of the time began in the Italian resort of San Remo. 16 players took part, including the reigning world champion Alexander Alekhine and chess legends such as Aron Nimzowitsch, Akiba Rubinstein and Efim Bogoljubow. Alekhine won comfortably with 14 points from 15 games, achieving one of the greatest successes of his career. His third wife, Nadasha Vasilyev, probably played a major role in this and other Alekhine successes. | Photo: Alekhine and Nadascha in San Remo 1930 | Photo: https://audiovis.nac.gov.pl/
Soon after Carl Schlechter's early death the wish arose to organise a memorial tournament in his honour. In 1923 several important chess masters met at the Café Universale and played such a tournament that ended on 4 December with a victory of Savielly Tartakower. Michael Ehn invites you to travel back in time to Vienna in the early 1920s. | Photo: The building with the former Café Universale | Photos: Archive Michael Ehn
In the recent 2023 World Championship Match, Ding Liren won Game 12 against Ian Nepomniachtchi using the Colle System to tie the score at six. The match remained tied after fourteen games, and Ding went on to beat Nepomniachti in the rapid tie-breaks to become the 17th World Champion. With the Colle System utilized in the World Championship Match, it is a fitting moment to remember the life and career Edgard Colle.
The name Erich Eliskases is familiar to only a few chess enthusiasts today. However, the Austrian was one of the best players in the world in the late 1930s. In 1941 he was supposed to play for the World Championship with Alexander Alekhine. But things turned out differently. 15 February 2023 is the 110th birthday of Eliskases, who was born in Innsbruck, Austria, and died in Cordoba, Argentina.