4 free chess books for endgames

Hello to the chess community,

I am Regis Warisse, author of chess exercise books.

My 4 digital books in PDF format of 1000 chess exercises: special mate in x moves are now available for free download, for free and legally :

http://www.1000exercices.info/books/

4 exercise books to learn and refine chess tactics.

* 500 chess exercises: Special Mate in 1 move
* 1000 chess exercises: Special Mate in 2 moves
* 1000 chess exercises: Special Mate in 2 moves - Volume 2
* 1000 exercises and chess puzzles: Mate in 1, 2, 3 and 4 moves

A good way to progress for endgame and midgame capture.

Good exercises for everyone :)

Feel free to share!

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Okay, thank you :)

I found a tricky move order for black in French

Few day ago, I was watching French Defense video Section 5 about the rare move. GM Avetik was suggesting us to play 4.Nd2 after all 3...a6 3...h6 and 3...Be7. Then one question come into my mind, what if after 4.Nd2 black play 4...Nc6. Then we shall play 5.Nbc3 because after 5.c3 there is 5...e5 where we miss our knight on f3. Furthermore, after 3...a6 and 3...h6 then 4.Nd2 black can play 4...c5 which explained in the advance section, but we rarely placed the knight on d2. With 4.Nd2 c5, it will become a different setup compared to what we learned. In my analysis I found a interesting move after 3...a6 3...h6 and 3...Be7 which is 4.c4 taking the center. When I checked my database (Mega Database 2017) it was not been played yet. Therefore, I have doubt whether it is good or most strong player rejected this move due to some concrete problem in this move 4.c4. Hope to get reply from Chess Mood. Thank You.

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4.Nd2? or Ne2? 

Hi Wenstin,

I think that transposing to our positions is what makes sense, not playing c4 or Nbc3, in this case, I believe that after 4.Ne2 after all 3...a6 3...h6 and 3...Be7 we can just play exd5, then c3 and castle. This way we sill have the same structure and I do not see why this could be bad.

Hey Wenstin! 
Sorry, didn't get the question :) 

Did I recommend Nd2 or Ne2? 
Maybe I misspell something? 

2020 and our Goals

Hey Champions! 
The best way to achieve our main goal is to divide it into steps and make an action plan.
Let's write our goals list, the plan how we will do that and achieve our goals step-by-step. 

#COGRO (Constant Growth )
#Right Mood - Right Move! 

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Well, as a chess player my goal in 2020 gonna be to pass 2900 in chess.com 
Now it is 2765. 
Till June the goal gonna be 2850. And from June to January 2900.
Hopefully, I'll be an example, what kind of magic can do Right Mood. 

When my chess.com rating was floating between 2100+ I thought 2250 would be good target for this year , since I never set goal before I was sceptic. As I started to think about this stopped playing Bullet completely , slowly I was hovering close to 2200 and realized it is coming much sooner than I thought possible... now that I feel confident I feel 2300 is my target. Today I reached 2200 .

Well well. Even the old guys must improve. Today my lichess rating are around 1700. (1736 in blitz and 1698 in bullet). My first goal is stabilation around 1900 in the middle of the year. And second reach 2021 before 2021. ????????????

19th April: I am on my way ????????

Study plan:

1, Classics Section:

My goal is to study 1000 classics before december so from Jan 2021 I will play rated events and I wanna improve my positional play to the next level. I love Ulf Anderson's book which chessmood recommended soon I am gonna buy it and I also love Karpov's style. 

2. Tactics:

I also will solve daily 20 mins tactics.

3. Openings:

, I will finish all section of chessmood openings on my board and I will improve my openings too. So I will study 20 mins openings from openings files which I made during my study in past.

Total Study time for me is 3 hr classics and 40 mins in tactics and openings.

In case of online play

I want to reach 2000 in 3days per move games and maintain it too.

I want to reach 2200 in blitz chess.com and maintain it too.

I want to get 2000 in rapid chess.com and maintain it too.

While I have made a post on my 2020 goals here: https://chessmood.com/forum/main-channel/2020-vision it doesn't cover my online blitz rating goal, so I will give that here in this thread!

My rating in chess.com is currently 1750ish (give or take a few points) with my peak being 1876. I started last year at 1574 so had a peak gain of 302 points. Repeating that performance is supposed to be harder because your opponents get tougher as you go, but I say I am getting tougher as I go and not only will I increase another 302 points (2178) but will get the remaining points to hit 2200! 

OK I ramble, 2200 it is! Lets Go!

As a chess player, my goal is to raise my USCF rating from 1800 to 2000 by 12/31. Here is how I will do it.

Play and learn CM openings.  The challenge is my AADD (Adult Attention Deficit Disorder) that makes it hard for me to focus on the videos for more than a few minutes at a time.  For this reason I will take the videos in small doses and focus on the ones most relevant to the games I play.

I will not play blitz games, at which I am pretty bad, and focus on quality over quantity.  I will analyze all games played in the context of improving tactics, opening, middle, and endgame play.

I will solve tactical puzzles

I will study the classic games GM Grigoryan has analyzed for us

Of course, I will play USCF rated tournaments at every opportunity

JAVID SAFI

My goal is to get to 2000 USCF before I die. I am 1830 right now. Sounds easy but its like trying to date a 10 when your a 5. I am a friend of Matthew Hammons. Mostly come in the top 3 of local tournaments and I am better at tactics then strategy. No idea what I need to do to achieve my goal but I do work a few hours a day at chess. No plan right now, maybe later!

my goal is to improve my game understanding and rating.. I have decided to try my best this year.. it takes a lot of time to practice. I have started to solve more tactics and play more games to make my middle game and endgame strong

my goal is to solve 10000 puzzle by the end of this year and to prepare some strong openings from chessmood so i will shock my friend and opponents after the covid pandamic gets over.

My goal is to reach at 1800+ in rapid and 1700+ in blitz in 2020

My goal is to reach at 1800+ in rapid and 1700+ in blitz in 2020

I started 2020 with 2063 Fide Elo , and in the end of 2020 i want to be 2163 hopefully !

i want to reach 2000 on lichess before i finish my final year of medicine.. wish me luck

My goal is to become an IM within the next 9 years.

Goals for this year:

- Become more comfortable with the top 5 openings where I feel discomfort right now, lead by Scandi, the Dragon both sides, Caro Exchange-like positions, and Alekhine. Perhaps others.

- Reduce the middle game blunders like dropping queens and checkmates in 1

- Increase physical endurance to be able to survive a real, full OTB tournament

I believe rating will come when I start playing better chess. For reference, my lichess blitz rating is currently in the range 2100-2250, and blitz is what I enjoy playing.

I had a new thought! This year not only I will improve but will also encourage others and tell them about chessmood. For that, I edit my lichess profile. So, whoever will visit it, will get acknowledged about chessmood.

https://lichess.org/@/jyotisko06

That is a quite sensible and ambitious goal :)! Probably you may wanna start thinking about IM norms once your rating is around 2200, I'm sure you will get there pretty soon with that attitude!

my goal is to go into 2000 rating as fast as the world gets relief from covid 19

I just passed 1850 in lichess blitz and 1900 in bullet! My targets are 2200 for all time controls!

We should have about 100 more members each day

Here is a draft of my action plan. (I will evaluate the efficiency of  this plan monthly, and modify it if needed)

Name of the project: Chess improvement

Delivery of the Project: Reaching +2200 on Rapid and Blitz chess on Chess.com (or Lichess.com)

Duration of the project: 6 months; Start date: 01-06-2020, End date: 31-12-2020

Resources: Chessmood courses and streams, My Chess Books, Fritz17

Daily Action Plan : 

1- Solving chess positions at Chesstempo.com : 30 minutes per day

2- Playing 2 Rapid chess gamess (15' +10") OR  3 Blitz chess games (10' + 0 ") daily alternatively : 30 minutes per day

3-Watching Chessmood Opening Courses (I will skip advanced section first, when I finish all courses I will go back and watch  advanced section. I will start with Black repertoire first) : 30 minutes per day

4- Using Fritz 17 to develop my own opening repertoire, and to practice the opening move orders. (I will update everything according to Chessmood streams and GMs commentaries)  : 30 minutes per day

5- Watching Middlegame courses on Chessmood:  : 30 minutes per day

6- Reading Practical Endgame Books  : 30 minutes per day

I will work on he following endgame books first:

Endgame Strategy: Shereshevsky

Endgame Virtuoso: Smyslov

Exploring the endgame: Griffiths

My goal, we can win my chess competition in my country... Beating many strong rival opponent in National Competition in my country. 

Planning: 

PREPARE OURSELF:

1. Complete chess skill. 

2. Improve my chess skills, prioritize based on evaluation.

PREPARE OPPONENT:

1. Collect DATA all my opponent (real chess tournament data and online chess data from Lichess and chess.com)

2. Match my opponent data with my opening repertoire... 

3. Match CHESSMOOD opening repertoire with my opponent data.

4.Prepare and exlpore this match repertoires a lot.

5.Simulate games based this preparation and exploration. 

Thank You.

Nice good luck in helping kids 

My Goal is by the end of December 2020 to achieve 2000 rating 

Hi,

my goal is to improve the understanding of chess and to reach 2200 raiting on lichess by the end of this year.

I have divided my plan into 2 parts:

July-October , finish two Aggarrd´s books: Calculation and Positional play. and reach 2100 on Lichess

October-December, finish another of his two books: Endgame and Attacking chess, and reach 2200.  

My goal for 2020 is to increase rating by 400 points at the end of 31 December 2020

To learn new theoritical and practical endgames

To learn the openings against caro kann, sicilian and pirc with white and against all sidelines of d4

Hi!

My goal for the next 4 months is to train consistently everyday. I tend to get distracted easily and struggle to start working on some material until I finish it (for example, a book). I am keeping track of what I do daily so I am held accountable!

All the best!

Alex

I've been playing board 8 in the Lichess4545 league for over a year now, having increased my lichess classical from U1200 to mid-1500 in that time.  My 2020 (into Q1 2021) goal is to get onto board 7, which will require me to gain about 100 points.  I can put 30-60 minutes per day and will do whatever is recommended after I have my one-on-one with a ChessMood GM.

My goal is to train chess at least 1 h every day. I think that if I can achieve that my playing strength should increase (?)... 

My goal is to train/srudy chess 1 h per day! I guess that should help to improve my game... 

My goal is to get to 1900 on chess.com rapid my rating right now is 1620 by December 31

Hi, this is my study plan with my targets for the rest of this year:

Study plan from 10.10.2020 until 31.12.2020

Weekly framework:

·        1h Endgame

·        2h Middle game

·        4h Opening repertoire for White (without advanced)

·        45min Tactics

(After completing the repertoire “Anti-Sicilian” include steams and blitz/rapid games to practice repertoire).

Targets:

·        Complete 10 “Instructional Classical Endgames” until 31.12.2020

·        Complete 25 “Commented Classical Games” until 31.12.2020

·        Complete 35 “Happy Pieces” until 31.12.2020

·        Complete “Anti-Sicilian” (without advanced) until 01.11.2020

·        Complete “Scotch Game” (without advanced) until 29.11.2020

·        Complete “French” (without advanced) until 13.12.2020

·        Complete “Caro Kann” (without advanced) until 31.12.2020

·        Complete Tactics 2-8 from Beyond the basics/Chess evolution until 31.12.2020

·        Do 1.000 Puzzles from CT-ART until 31.12.2020

Continue like that. You are going pretty well. I personally want more puzzles

I reached 2125 on chess.com and 2201 on Lichess ! 

@ ChessMood Team: Hi could please open a new discussion "2021 and our Goals". Cheers, Nils

I agree that setting goals is important.  I'm new.  Prior to November, I had never played online chess.  It had been over 20 yrs of no chess prior to that, and never a tournament.   So my goal was to improve, and I embarked on the complete chess.com package, and several Daily U1000 tournaments.  I'm spending a few hrs per day at it all, and now I'm at 1050 Daily, 1250 Daily 960 - well below the standard PRO member, I realize.  I'm hoping adding ChessMood to the mix will keep me moving forward, as I continue to advance to the next rounds of those Beginner Tournaments.  Study + Practice + Games = movement towards goals.

NEW ARTICLE: How Effectively Are You Using Your Chess Time?

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Thanks for the article! It reminds me of the book "How to Live on 24 Hours a Day" by Arnold Bennett.

For a couple months I was sticking to a strict schedule of doing tactics, watching courses, etc. But got more and more into watching Twitch streams and participating in non-serious competitions using time controls too fast for me.

I want to go back to my normal, boring study schedule. This was good motivation. Thank you.

Thanks for another great article.

I am lazy like Svidler. The difference is that he won 8 times the very strong russian Superleague and I am an intermediate patzer. At least I don't waste my time playing bullet, puzzle rush or watching streams of beautiful 2000 women.

Commitment for 2021, put more hours studying chess. 

This is a really nice structured article. I like that you gave different examples. I am only 11 so I have a lot of things like school but I can always find time for chess.

I think I  was at a 6 or 7 last year at time management for chess. Earlier in the year maybe the first 5 months I was playing lots of blitz/bullet/rapid tournaments on lichess.

After June I started looking at books more and at tactics and in November I got Chess mood PRO membership and started watching courses and have learned a lot.

Thank You for all the hard work you guys put in to these courses.

I like this article very much. It is shorter than other but it richness is different level.

I tried to answer the question how i spent the last year regarding my chess? I think i did well but still i could do better.

This article is an absolute eye opener . Thanks to chess mood family

Hey Wil! 
I would highly recommend you the book "Peak performance". 
Be careful from burnout :) 

Intensive work in a flow + quality rest = growth 

Do you do that every day? In general one hour every day is better than only training one day and putting in 7 hours. 

Thumbnails spoils the positions in course "Happy Pieces: The Art of Keeping Your Army Happy"

Hello friends,

I have a small suggestion for the course (this may apply to other courses as well), sometimes the thumbnail of the video is spoiling the challenge presented by the coach, you can find an example attached. Is there are a way to prevent this?

Thanks!

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But why? I think it's nice 

Hey Hugo! 
I got your idea. 

Well, I'll ask our technical team, how the video is generating the thumbnail. 
Thanks for the advice! 

What's Wrong with this Game

I was browsing my YouTube Subs recently when I came across this stream https://youtu.be/_O6m6Yh5S5Y?t=1  and spotted something immediately that both these Chess titans somehow missed. Stunned and confused I tried to justify to myself how is it possible that players of this calibre can miss such things with plenty time on the clock.

The pgn is given below along with a screenshot from the game, can you spot without an engine what both these GM's overlooked: 

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Out of curiosity I fired up my database and was taken aback to find that GM Cheparinov also missed what Prag and So missed, although in Cheparinov's case it was a Titled Tuesday blitz game, but still it makes a strange impression.

The fact that even the best players sometimes have blind spots confirms how demanding chess can be, and provides some comfort to the rest of us aspiring students of the game. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and theories on how such aberrations occur in the games of top grandmasters. :-)   

The only 'crazy' idea that I see in this position is Bxf7+, which I believe it is not working:

1.Bxf7+ Rxf7 2.Ng5 Nb8 3.Nxf7 Kxf7 4.f4 Kg8 I think Black is just better here.

Your Top 3 Favorite Books

Mine is...

1.Nimzowitsch - My system

2.Dvorestsky - Endgame Manual

3.Gelfand-Positional decision making in chess

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Never end a single book :(

1. Nimzovitch My system

2. Petrosian Move by move

3. Dvoretsky Strategic play

Lasker's Manual of Chess

Brunia/van Wijgerden: The Steps Method

Yusupov's Chess Course (Beyond the Basics)

Wow quite surprised at how many my systems there are as #1

For me personally I think its one of the most over rated chess books actually. Not saying its bad or anything just not that great! Good that I am wrong and most people enjoy it!

One of my favourite books and very underrated is the little known sinple chess by micheal stean. I had it as a kid in descriptive notation and now again as a adult in algebraic. It remind me a lot of how the classical games course is laid out.

The games are not flashy at all and even quite mundane but you get to see the positional plans very clearly.

1- Zurich International Chess Tournament

2- Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual

3- Endgame Strategy by Mikhail Shereshevsky

I want to add one more :)

" The Soviet Chess Primer - Ilya Maizelis"

It has inspired generations of Russians to take up the game, including arguably the two greatest players of all time, the 12th and 13th World Champions.

--------------------------------------

'A remarkable book, from which I learnt to play chess' - Garry Kasparov
'A wonderful book which I studied myself' - Anatoly Karpov

How to beat your dad in chess.

OTB tournament

Do you have any upcoming OTB tournament?

and how is the covid situation in your country.

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I am playing OTB next Saturday. A quick G30 with only 4 rounds, but I have been craving OTB chess.

I am currently playing the "Madrid Rapid Team Championship". It consists of 14 rounds. The Time Control is 25 + 5. Every Sunday we play 2 rounds. So I played yesterday and managed to win both games. Unfortunately, my team just won the first round and lost the second one. Covid measures included masks, open windows, alcohol and a glass screen between the players.

I liked my second game with black because I managed to bury his bishop and it did not take part in the game until the end when it had to be sacrificed to avoid checkmate, so I am posting it here:

I am playing again this weekend in Dallas Tx. I am flying out there this morning and will fly home Monday.

G90+30 FIDE rated tournament. 5 rounds in 2 days, 3 games Saturday and 2 games on Sunday. It is a tough schedule, but it is the only tournament I could find within 1000 miles of me, and I need to play, so we go!

Unlikely to be any OTB chess here before the summer at the earliest.

Slav Exchange vs Queen's Gambit Exchange

Hi Chessmood Friends,

As black, do you prefer playing Slav Exchange or Queen's Gambit Exchange?

Which one gives black better winning chances?

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As black you can't choose? 

I like to play fianchetto openings against d4.

From this two probably Slav exchange, but it doesn't mean that it's better than Queen's gambit.

When faced with d4 and c4, I personally would play the Slav as I used to lose the majority of the games when the e-file is exposed and my king hasn't castled yet, since normally my opponent would put a file attacker (rook/queen) and pin my pieces to my king.

Avoiding blunders

I found a link to this book which was developed by a near 2200 on avoiding blunders and spotting tactics. Haven't gone through it yet nor sure how practical it would be (even if not, maybe something can be taken from it), but wondering if I won't need my hoodie when playing any longer.

http://www.neoneuro.com/downloads/chuzhakinssystem.pdf

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Also a course suggestion - how to avoid hoodie blunders.

Is there a copyright on the daily puzzles?

 I'm thinking about assembling some of them I like and printing them, with answers, to give to friend as a cute present. Is this ok?

I see in the Terms of Service: 

You agree not to reproduce, duplicate, copy, sell, resell or exploit any portion of the Service, use of the Service, or access to the Service or any contact on the website through which the service is provided, without express written permission by us.

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As far as I know, you can't copyright the position, but you could copyright the anthology or any commentary. As for a solution (just the moves) when it wasn't a record of a real game I would guess this one is a grey area.

One certainly to get permission from Chessmood beforehand. To be fair if it was marked that Chessmood was the source, that's a great advert for Chessmood.

Hey Inguh! 
Thanks for the question and for being so polite :) 

No problem, you can do that. 
The puzzles are created by another composers, not us. 
So it's fine, especially when you collect all together, mention that the collection was made by ChessMood. 

When I was younger, I solved more than 10.000 puzzles, saved 1000 of the best in my file. 
Then kept 500 best. 

Here is the collection of not hard ones. 
Some of them have the beginning in the original study, but it would be tougher to solve, so I've added the position from the last part of the study, 

Go ahead to send the gift to your friend :) 

this is so cute :))))

When did you start playing chess

Hi everyone,

How long are you playing chess and what moment inspired you to become a fan of chess?

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At 4. 
My father was at war in Artsakh, and my Grandmother taught me :) 
After 3 months we moved to backgammon :D :D 

At 4 :)

But I've started to study at 6 

New Gambit

Would you get the vaccine? :D 

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Haha :) 
Watching our courses should be a good vaccine already :) 

NEW ARTICLE: Nimzowitsch Defense – 1...Nc6 | How should you react?

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Having just completed it - nice course and succinct.

I guess for White this leaves a few options left to cover, the main one being Owen's b6 which in blitz is seen quite often at amateur level, as well as various hippo defences that result from b6 and g6 with one or both knights ending up on the 2nd rank which can be annoying to break down and are often played to run the opponent out of time - I think there is also a lesson here in showing one's cards since often the hippo is just that, Black waits for White to commit a pawn structure first and stays flexible.

The other move that perhaps deserves a mention for completeness is a6 - the St George, given Karpov was famously defeated by it.

f5, the Fred, I guess will be covered in Abracadabra gambits as a relative of the Colarado. Does the borg (1... g5) even deserve a mention as a gambit or otherwise?

And other odd surprise moves such as Na6, Nh6, a5, h5, h6, f6.... As you've said before, you can't cover everything in detail, but I think there is a little value in covering how to deal with unexpected openings/moves to either get a good position or steer the game into something similar to the repertoire. Another option would be to have a course on opening principles that is collecting some of the lessons and wisdom from the other courses, how to find and select good model games, prepare for opponents, analyse deviations from the courses or theory and so on. Dealing with the unexpected / odd / forgotten / unstudied could be a chapter in that.

Perhaps this can be paired up with odd openings Black might face (I guess main minor options b3, b4, g3, f4, Nf3, Nc3 will have their own courses, individually or collated), and perhaps the grob 1. g4 may go under Abracadabra gambits since the pawn is often offered. Some of the others offer transpositions to the Black side, for example c3 c5 c4, or e3, e5, e4, but there are also stand alone variations and particularly e3 and d3 do appear from (occasional) time to time. The ideas of f3 Kf2 (Hammerschlag etc or King's Head variation if e4 comes with it - probably named after the club/pub rather than the king putting its head on the chopping block) can be an interesting lesson for how to attack the king. And then sillies like h3 and a3 offering to pass the move can be dealt with in how to develop sensibly into similar positions in the courses, where hopefully move will not be useful or harm White. Again maybe for an opening principles course.

Hi Coach,

Nimzowitsch Defense is indded a nicely presented course. I liked especially we can transform it to other openings in a way that is unfavorable for Black.

This will help me to easier remember parts of the other (transformed) openings.

I also liked the article explaining the main ideas behind the chosen lines. Please do it also for the other openings in the chessmood repertoire.

I faced once 1...Nc6 and the guy followed d6, e6, Nf3 and fianchetto both bishops. He was a 1500 player and probably went for something solid, a system, more than a challenging opening where you have to learn variations. I have played vs. this setup online a couple of times with a different move order and it was called St.George or something similar. The ECO code was C0X or C1X so it was classified in the French segment but without d5, c5 or simlar moves.

2.Nf3! instead of 2.d4, what a good advice. Since your video of not showing your cards I changed my mind setup and now I delay castling as much as I can. Well, I am a Sicilian player and wait if white 0-0-0 and goes for a pawn storm.

I remember game#1 of the Carlsen - Caruana WC match 2018 and remember that it was a Moscow variation. Fabi went for the attack opening the f file and just in the last moment MC 0-0-0. Fabi had no king to attack and MC started a smart piece maneuvering in the g and h files that could give him the game if he was an attacking player and saw that instead of piling on the g file, Qg7 to use the long diagonal and go to the unprotected Qside was the winning procedure. From then Fabi didn't attack anymore with white and with black and his boring Petroff, we all know how this match ended.

I realized I have a book Play 1...Nc6!

In the the book as the best reply against 2.Nf3 the following line is given:

1.e4 Nc6 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e5 Ng4 4.d4 d6

It would be nice to have this line coveredin the course

London 3.Nd2

How do we continue after 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bf4 g6 3.Nd2 ? If 3...d5, White plays a normal London, where we don't normally play ..d5. If 3...Bg7 (the most common response), White plays 4.e4, which we don't normally allow.

Perhaps 3...c5 is in our spirit, e.g., 4.c3 (still wants to play e4) cxd4 5.cxd4 Nc6 6.Nf3 Bg7 7.e4 d5! 8.e5 Ne4 9.Bd3 Bg4!? with interesting play.

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Hey Peter! 
A very tricky question. 
I found in my file marked with red (I mark red the moves, where I have questions for myself) 

I have added two options for Black, which can be analyzed further. 
1st - 3...Bg7 4.e4 d6 (with White's bishop on g5 is a big theory). 
Now the bishop on f4 is a bit misplaced and we have interesting Nc6,Nd7,e5 idea in the future. 

2nd - 3...Nh5!? if you love to play interesting chess )) 
4.Be5 f6! 5.Bg3 e5! 6.de5 Ng3 and fe5.  

This would be a crime, if White has played 2.e3 , as in the same variation, at the end White would play with Nc3, controlling the d5 square. 
When the N is on d2, this variation becomes very interesting. 

c6 d5 plan in the Modern

This was mentioned by someone else before, but it looks like there could do with some instruction in these lines. I was getting a number of wins as Black in the tournament playing this. The general plan is to not play Bg7, but play h5, Nh6 and maybe Bg4 to swap the light squared bishop (what I played in the tournament, though my opponent played Bf5 in the attached game) and put all the pawns on the light squares. Didn't seem to be an easy plan for my opponents to break down, and nor was it when I first faced it myself, game attached. This plan is usually against d4, but it might also work against Nc3.

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Hey David,

System seems unusual ) But I don't like knight position on h6 and seems if white players properly, it would be very limited piece.

Hey David! 
The system will be added in the Modern Pirc. 
I just want to update the abra cadabra gambits first, as most of our students are struggling against them. 

SU 35 Video

Since I could not find the way to comment under the video I do it here

Seems clear we have to play on queen side but... how? 

Pushing a pawn...a4 a5? Exchange a5 on b6 if he doesn't push b5? But why? Is it the plan just to open a file? 

Thank you in advance

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Claudio, why don't you comment in the comments section on Youtube? 
Yeah, your answer with a4 is right :) 

..

.

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Would you give the position or the full move order please?

Krystof, no need to go so deep.
11...Nh6 is already a novelty in a rare variation. 

12.Nd1 is a novelty against a novelty in a rare variation. 
You should have worries about such things, only on 2650+ level. 

Anyway, I've analyzed it with cloud engine 12.Nd1 move. 
After 12...Qd2 13.Kd2 a5!, engine gives White adv. , but if you let him to think, he changed his opinion. 
I went deeper in my analyzes, but there is no need to go into details and share all 4 moves I've analyzed after 13...a5 :) 

As I have 2600+ students, I need to go to deeper sometimes, but you don't need guys.  

P.S 

Please, such questions, related to our courses, post in the PRO Members channel, otherwise, our Grandmasters can miss them. 
Thanks 

NEW ARTICLE: How I Achieved 2.900 on Chess.com!

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First congratulations, your persistance and achievement was impressive.

Last year I hired a GM as a coach and one day I ask him if blitz help to improve. He said no although he had a good rating at chessli and chess.com. My conclusion is that blitz (and bullet) are for Masters and Youngsters.

Kids and youngsters like to play fast even at classical chess. They finish their game with 30-60min of spare time.

Masters are good players so is logical they play good at any time control. Humans like to do in what they excel. Success makes people more happy.

I am an amateur in my late 50 so I don't play blitz. I like to solve exercises and read the theory and history of our amazing game. Sometimes I go OTB in classical time control, but lately I blunder a lot and drop lot of material, time takes it's toll. 

Couldn't be a better ending for Chessmood in 2020!!! Sooo motivating and useful!

I want to reach 2200 on chess.com by the end of 2021

Firstly congratulations GM Avetik! Well, I am floating around 1860-1900 on chess.com and lichess blitz. Target is 2000. And in rapid I float around 1880-1910 and I also want 2000. Note: I have raised 230 points in all time controls last year.

Well done sensei, some of those games were extremely well played and very instructive, perhaps you should use them in the courses as further examples of just how devastating the repertoire can be.

Congrats !! GM Avetik for this achievement.Very inspirational article specially i like paragraphs under heading Doing a deep analysis, The importance of practice & What I did wrong.

Congratulations GM Avetik

Congratulations. The article is very inspiring.

Wow the raised arms pic is priceless! The power of goals with a strong WHY. I'm gonna try it for the new year!

you are a truly role model!

Pro member

How to become a pro member by paying with credit card /debit card? 

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That's how I did it. Click on PRO Members, click get started I believe and follow instructions there.

You can with PayPal as well.