Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books on chess training and strategy. In the 172nd episode of his ChessBase show "Understanding before moving" Herman continues his series "Chess history in a nutshell" and takes a look at the chess legacy of Boris Spassky, World Champion from 1969 to 1972. | Photo: Pascal Simon
Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books about chess training and chess strategy. In the 72nd instalment of his ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving", Herman talks about pawn chains in the French Defense. | Photo: Pascal Simon
€29.90
As a junior player, I became mesmerized by the extraordinary play of former World Champion Tigran Petrosian. His pieces almost always seem to be in complete harmony and he almost always seems to know which piece to keep and which piece to exchange.
With White he was particularly successful when playing against the King s Indian. His ideas in these positions have been taken up by a large number of players and the Petrosian Variation of the King s Indian still makes life difficult for Black.
I am the proud owner of a copy of Petrosian s Best Games by Peter Hugh Clarke, who waxes all lyrical about the Armenian World Champion. Clarke notes that Petrosian managed to lock the kingside in quite a number of King s Indian games, thus nipping black s traditional plan in the bud. A pawn formation Petrosian often adopted was shaped like a V , which according to Clarke stands for Victory !