Chess forum by Grandmasters

Carokan 5..g6

Hello people ! There are a lot of guys playing this move order with me:

1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. exd5 cxd5 4. Bd3 Nc6 5. c3 g6 

Please Avetik, can you help us ? Take good care ! 

Replies

Hi Juliano

In the Caro-Kann course this is covered under section 4 6..g6. This is a move later, but you are very likely to transpose after 6. Bf4 (we always aim for this diagonal with our DSB is C-K) 

https://chessmood.com/course/caro-kann-defence

In summary depends on Black intentions after g6 ..

if Bf5 then Bxf5 gxf5 with key move Nd2 (aiming for Ndf3) and Ne2 (aiming for Nc1, Nd3 and Ne5 or Qc1 with Nf4, Nd3, Ne5) ..

if Bg7 again key move Nd2  with h3 (flexible move - allows Bh2 after Nh5, support g4 pawn push against Black castled King). When Black castle 0-0, then Ngf3, Qe2 with Ne5.

There is more details in the Advanced Section, but I not there yet.

Hope this helps

@Susanna_Gaboyan Do you remember I've asked you about g6 too.

Juliano, we'll play the same setup. 
I recommend Nf3 Ne5 idea of the adv. section. 

Today's simul on lichess

no longer relevant

Replies

What has happened?

Lichess PRO Members Team

I created an account on Lichess, Sriram_ChessMood, and asked to join the team and since then being awaiting approval. Did I do it wrong?

Replies

No, this is ok, maybe you had to write your email but I think that they will approve you in no time..

Guys, it's not an automatic process, and there is no someone sitting and waiting :) 
During the day we approve requests :) Patience, please :) 

Two bishops advantage

Hey champions! 
What games come to your mind, when speaking about the "Two bishops advantage"? 

Replies

Levon Aronian vs Vishy Anand Tata Steel 2013 heheh. 23 move superb win and I love it. Final Move was Be3!!!! if I remember right.

Opening was Semi Slav I think.  And there was a deep prep against Ng5 and black played c5!!! and after Nxh7 then I think Nde5? I hope I am remembering right. I won tons of game using this game in past.

I remember the game of Alphazero - Stockfish

The Bongcloud!

ChessMood family I have a question. Do you think what Hikaru Nakamura pulled in the last round of the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz against Jeffrey Xiong was acceptable. Please don't be shy, I would love to hear all your thoughts: 

https://youtu.be/qATl41Ofjuo?t

Replies

As Carlsen said at the end, some of those funny moves don't necessarily lead to lost games. Maybe that makes them "acceptable". I do wonder what Seirawan was thinking... :)

Nikaru is streaming a lot now, so I think he does this for his audience, it's fun :D

Carlsen showed some strange and "stupid" lines, then the commentators asked him, so were you prepared for this line? he replied that, probably I would answer Ke7, then Ke1 Ke8, then we would play chess without castling :D

I think that the sponsors were really happy about it. This game is going to be the most remembered of the tournament, and probably of the year! He was lost and Xiong's punishing mode did not work, he was too nervous and probably Hikaru knows him well. Hikaru is an excellent poker played, he gambled and it worked really good! I say, bring it on, the next one in a classical game Hikaru!

I think many people make a show... 
They try to get more subscribers etc... 

Some people love such things and become fans, share with others, some people like me hate it.  

Avetik 

Opening

Hi Gm Avetik,i wanted to share to you that i often tend to forget our chess mood lines,especially during blitz games,i dont even have time to think and recollect our moves,is it normal? I have been playinh our chessmood openings only for around a month now,but often forget critical lines,i have created my own pgn as u suggested,how long will it take for me to start getting familiarized with our openings?

Replies

Hey

I am not sensi Avetik clearly. What has helped me though, is to play 5+3 blitz for openings (just focused on opening) and after every game in our opening go through the lines to see where and if I didn't recall something. If my opponent did something strange to see if I punished it correctly.

Also a training partner can help, I have done a few sessions and it helpedquite some. Lastly, I would reccomend Chess tempo opening trainer. You import your pgn into it (I have a 2nd verson myself with just key lines in it) and then you can train your opening. It uses spaced repetition technique. So if you get a line or move wrong it will repeat more often.

A great answer by @jamie_Wilby! 
I have students who digested all the information in a few months, working a few hours a day on chess. 

weakening the dark-square bishop

The Pirc course says that black is weakening the dsb by playing e6 and g6.  It seems to me that the dsb has room to move now, but the lsb is limited.

Please help me understand how the dsb is weakened by these pawn moves.

Thank you,
Jim

Replies

Jim, whenever Black plays e6 and g6 - both moves, we'll try to exchange the DSQ and then f6 square and opponent's king will be very weak. 

When will English course be published

When will the course English be published?

And what are the other plans

Replies

as I know many tactics and endgame courses are coming soon.

Hi Franck,

GM Gabuzyan already started the recordings of the English for Black. Recently a similar question was asked in the following thread:

https://chessmood.com/forum/pro-members/english-opening-2-g3-line

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLjkPSXhsDA

Regarding the rest of the courses, I do not know about you Franck, but I have so much things in my plate already that it is difficult to keep up! I did almost all the courses, and I am watching again and taking more notes on the Classical Games, but for what Avetik said in several streams, this is what will be coming on our screens soon:

The continuation courses about endgames (commented endgames and the thematic pieces endings)

More Happy pieces videos (A fantastic course that showed me a lot of wonderful unexpected moves)

More Attacking Games (I really like this series!)

I also think that a Tactics course was also in mind.

Benko, Sicilian Sidelines and Accelerated Dragon Revamped, these courses will go through a make over and more lines will be added. When Avetik was doing the streams from 1600 to 2400, many people were playing dubious moves and many of them will be added for the lesser gifted like me...

And I am sure that we will be spoiled with much more content... Let's try to keep up the pace and COGROw a lot!!!

Just a comment for Avetik and his team: Do not overload yourselves! We prefer your quality over quantity... Art cannot be rushed and you are chess artists!

Best regards Franck!

We should have uploaded it this week, but there were mistakes in the recordings. 
Today we are looking again, if all good, we might launch it today or max. in a few today - the first section. 

Guess the players

Do you know who are these two strong players from the past? 

P.S The left one is one of the world champions.

Replies

Left: Emanuel Lasker

Right: Akiba Rubinstein

There's a "Guess the chess player" game (in Russian) that I enjoy playing: https://www.shahimat.org/ugaday-shahmatista/

 Lasker & Rubinstein for sure.

Your Playing Style

HI, I wanna know the playing style of our chessmood family. It's so cool to know how many of your likes attacking chess, positional chess or may be universal players. 

Note: If possible then share the names of books which improved your current style so other can learn from those valuable books.

About me: 

~The Beginning ~

It's funny because I am novice so I thought I wanna become a positional chess player. So when I had one on one call with coach I told him I love positional play and I wanna become very good in positional chess. So after I joined chessmood and joined every webinar and streams I do not know but I started to play so aggressive. I do not know but patterns which I saw in streams sometimes comes in my mind and I win many games with attacking skills. But chessmood streams also improved my positional play. I heard many times from coach Gabuzyan (This pawn is weak so let me fix the pawn then I will win this) Yes, for strong players it's simple thing to say but for a novice like me I felt so excited to see the outcome of his words on board and in the end his technique of fixing a weakness then win it worked well. So I learnt like oh if I wanna win a pawn then fixing it then winning is best idea. I know it depends on positions but normally this is the idea.  

~Now~

Now my mindset is totally changed. I like to play the position. If the position is quiet I play with slow approach and hope to win like Karpov or Ulf but if the position is based on initiative then timing is everything then I try to play like Shirov. Heheheh, I know they are world class masters but they are also human. If we follow their games and lessons we can also attack and defend and play positional like them . Now, I am just a universal player and improving my overall skills.

Replies

Before joining chessmood, I was very weak positionally and very weak in endgames. But while taking advantage of the courses did not turn me into a positional style player. I always loved to attack, even before joining chessmood, but now I think the chessmood openings repertoire fits to my style a lot. One of my favourite parts of a chess game is when I sacrifice. I mean, I prefer to end a game like Nezhmetdinov, Kerres, or Tal. I also wanted to add that I was an 1.e4 player since I was very beginner. I didn't also focus on systems and now with the chessmood openings I have very good results. The last month I also started to make accurate queen sacrifices even on classical game and I am watching muself growing.

The winners of September

Hello ChessMood Family! 
We are very excited to see, that each month the quality of the games are becoming better and better. 
Thanks for all the games you've posted! 

The 5th prize goes to @Abhi_yadav for his crushing the Caro Kann. 

The 4th prize goes to @Karl_Strohmaier for crushing the Scandinavian with his nice Nc6! 

The 3rd prize goes to @Ash_Pv for his brilliant game with Modern Maroczy.  The two breakthroughs d5 and b5 and the conversation of  2 bishops advantage was very nice.  The game will be added in the "model games" section of the course.  
(Here is the link: https://lichess.org/mzo41NxE/black#79) 

The 2nd prize goes to @Jaylen_Lenear for his nice positional game which he finished with two knight sacrifices. 

And the winner of this month becomes @Keok_Woltek who sacrificed almost all his pieces :) 

The guy who improved the most, comparing to the previous month is @Aayush_Shirodkar! 
For which he gets 50k. 

Congratulations, winners and everyone who raised their rating improved their game, or enjoyed playing chess this month! 

See you in the next month's competition. 

Replies

Thanks a lot 

Thank You So Much, Sir!

[Book] Defend Like Petrosian

Defend Like Petrosian by Grandmaster Alexey Bezgodov has just been released on ForwardChess: https://forwardchess.com/sample/defend-like-petrosian.  (There are free sample sections to see if you like it.)

Replies

Thanks Hunan, Nice one!! I have many books on Petrosian, my grand father (he taught me chess when I was 4 years old) used to tell me that in chess I defended like a tiger. Now that I am older, I do not know how the tigers defend, but I like Petrosian's style a lot because it is completely opposite at what I do... ;-) Best!

Is there a chess doping, food or drink or capsule, etc? Like in limitless movie?

Is there a chess doping, food or drink or capsule, etc? Like in limitless movie?

We use good coffee for mood buster, before play in tournament.... Is it good?

Thank you. 

Replies

I think yes, there is. But I will never try it. Coffee is always a good and safe idea :)

@Heri_Darmanto

Beta Blockers.

Coffee, mate, tea, maybe even water!

Meditation

Missed a pretty mate!

I was in this position as white, and played gxf6 missing a pretty mate!

Put a + in the comments when you find the mate, but dont give the answer away, so others can have the chance to find it too!

Also let me know if you think you would of spotted it with 29 seconds left on your clock like I had :)

Replies

Unrelated to the question: why not Rxh1?

I found it in 10 sec +

I found the move quickly because I knew there was a mate but it took me more than 30 seconds to make sure it was totally forced. Definetly, I would not have found it in the game. I would have played Rxh1

Chess Mindset

Mindset mind·set (noun) The deeply held beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions we create about who we are, how the world works, what we are capable of and deserve, and what is possible.

 What do you think, ChessMood family, what is a strong chess mindset?

Replies

My mindset is simple because I do not think of a lot things. I am super positive, confident, never give up attitude. My mindset is like I will be champ soon because I am working with amazing chess partners like @Jay_Garrison and @Devansh_Shah. I do not think more. 

I would sum up a strong chess mindset as:

- I believe I can. I know I can if I am committed enough

- I never surrender and rise like the Phoenix from the ashes if necessary

- Mistakes make me stronger (and wiser)

- I am determined to walk the long and winding road to the end

"Never Give Up" Attitude 

We Can Call It a Mindset?

However, This Attitude/Mindset Has Helped Me A Lot in Chess And In My Life!

So For Me, This is a Very Important Attitude/Mindset!

Knight+Bishop mate

The hardest mate in chess is knight+bishop against the king. Many players even grandmasters have missed a win and finished their games draw. Do you know how to win? Has it happened to you?

Replies

I took the time to learn this mating pattern in a video by Var Akobian:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OGAiz5p_L4

He makes it easy to remember the pattern.

I have not yet had the opportunity to use this knowledge in a game yet though!

oh hehehe, my story is super funny about this mate. It's so rare mate right? But back in 2013 when I started learning basics of chess from useless resources then I learnt oh B+N can checkmate. I felt so surprised because it was new thing for me. I had no video of mating pattern that time so I tried to checkmate my virtual opponent's king with bishop and knight and I did that but without method so next time when I tired this mate then I failed.  Then I found a new video and I learnt the technique. I called it I V N then W. this way I remembered the final pattern well. And guess what happened? In the very next tournament my opponent gave his final two pawns and said draw because I had bishop and knight and I was also unrated and he was 1450. I said no it's a win. He said do you know this checkmate? I said yeah. Then I checkmated him and due to my victory my team got a draw against a very strong new delhi team. So it's funny but amazing story. Like I learnt something and in the very next event I had the chance to see that over the board. That's why soon     I am gonna learn atleast these two endgames.

1. B+R vs R endgame and Queen vs Rook all defenses. Because I do not know but I feel like I will get those positions in my real life soon. Even though they are so uncommon but I prefer not to give my opponent any chances to hold or win.

I learnt it from a video by Simon Williams and then practiced v stock fish.

I managed to get the mate down under 30 seconds actually!

Its very tricky but once you know the technique its just a matter of practice 

Physical preparation

As it is well known, it's very important to be in a good shape not only with chesswise but physically too.

It's very interesting to ask what kind of sports do you prefer? Is there any that you are doing systematically? 

P.S https://chessmood.com/blog/the-right-way-to-prepare-for-a-chess-tournament Also if You haven't read this article yet, click and correct your mistake :) 

Replies

I don't focus on physical stuffs but I will work on it before the tournament. As I am a heart patient so I dont like any physical games but I like to walk slowly.

Hi master @WIM_Siranush_Ghukasyan if you find time then check out this post which I made and give your opinions. Only one FM is active there but I still need more strong players there so we will reach the conclusion

https://chessmood.com/forum/main-channel/carlsbad-ideas-lets-debate

Kettlebells!

Well, I do Karate!

The War

Hey Champions!

I've recently been asked a lot, because of the war now Armenia is in, are we going to continue our events and uploading more courses?

Yes, we're going!

I believe that the war is not only on the border with weapons. There are also informational wars, economic wars, cyberwar, and others.

And the best Armenian nation can do now (who is not with the weapons now on the border), to do his job as good, as he had never done.

So, we'll continue all our events, updating and uploading new courses and the rest. 

P.S 
In a few words, what has happened - you can find here: 
https://gagrule.net/armenia-has-no-motive-to-start-a-war-azerbaijan-was-the-first-to-start-thomas-de-waal

Replies

Sorry, please be safe and I hope everything gonna be alright

Botvinnik on Ragozin

Ragozin vs Botvinnik (1930)

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1031740

Fascinating game, but sharing here because of Botvinnik's note at the end.

"[Ragozin]'s chess intuition was phenomenal, and he often saw things which others did not notice. He achieved a lot in his chess career, and would have achieved more had it not been for his gentle character. Well, why beat about the bush, he was a little lazy."

Botvinnik, Half a Century of Chess, Game 10, p.27.

Replies

Morra Gambit

Avetik,

I met this trying to play Sicilian, any advice on how to proceed.  I have copied the game below, which was won when my opponent timed out, having wasted 12 mins or so?!

[Event "Rated Rapid game"]

[Site "https://lichess.org/yDZTYByG"]

[Date "2020.09.28"]

[Round "?"]

[White "rappster"]

[Black "amicusUK"]

[Result "0-1"]

[BlackElo "1716"]

[BlackRatingDiff "+38"]

[ECO "B21"]

[Termination "Time forfeit"]

[TimeControl "900+10"]

[UTCDate "2020.09.28"]

[UTCTime "20:42:18"]

[Variant "Standard"]

[WhiteElo "1679"]

[WhiteRatingDiff "-5"]

1.e4 c5 2.d4 cxd4 3.c3 d3 4.Bxd3 g6 5.Nf3 Bg7 6.O-O Nc6 7.Bc4 e6 8.Be3 Nge7 9.Ng5 O-O 10.f4 d5 11.exd5 Nxd5 12.Bd2 a6 13.Kh1 b5 14.Bb3 Na5 15.Bc2 Nc4 16.Qe1 Nxb2 17.Qh4 h6 18.Qg3 hxg5 19.fxg5 Nc4 20.Bc1 Bb7 0-1

Replies

This is covered in the Sicilian Sidelines course. 

After 1.e4 c5 2. d4 cd 3. c3 we play Nf6. It is all covered quite well by GM Gabuzyan. 

Good Luck!