How to Be a Winner at Chess, Fred Reinfeld, 1954, 189 pages, ISBN 144991206X, Dewey 794.1
Shows where we're headed when we go beyond the basics.
Three How to Be a Winner at Chess, Fred Reinfeld, 1954, 189 pages, ISBN 144991206X, Dewey 794.1
Shows where we're headed when we go beyond the basics.
Three strongest moves: checks, capturing threats, pawn promotion.
Opening principles.
Mobility and piece cooperation in the middle game.
Endgames: elementary checkmates, active king, passed pawns, rook on seventh rank, simplify when you have a material advantage.
Pins.
Vidmar was a great cigar smoker, but he abstained in deference to Nimzovich's well-known hatred for smoking. However, Vidmar could not resist teasing Nimzovich by setting out his cigar case on the chess table. Nimzovich eyed the cigars nervously for hours. Finally he could no longer restrain himself and rushed off with his complaint to the tournament director. After listening patiently to Nimzovich, the official was baffled. "But you admit he hasn't smoked, so what are you complaining about?" "True," Nimzovich replied, wringing his hands; "but he THREATENS to smoke, and you know with us chess players the threat is stronger than the fulfillment!" pp. 149-150.
Chess Handbook: Book for Arbiters, Zoran Bojovic (1962-) and Branislav Suhartovic (1952-), 2017. Revised to include FIDE rule changes adopted 1 July 2Chess Handbook: Book for Arbiters, Zoran Bojovic (1962-) and Branislav Suhartovic (1952-), 2017. Revised to include FIDE rule changes adopted 1 July 2017. Translated from Serbian by GM Nikola Djukić, 292 pages. ISBN 9788691827311.
Five stars for pages 132-145, how to make the Berger round-robin pairing tables and Scheveningen pairing tables.
(view spoiler)[BERGER ROUND-ROBIN PAIRINGS AND COLORS: For an even number N of players (if an odd number of players, player #N is the bye): Assign player-numbers at random, #1 through the number of players. Pairs NOT involving the largest-numbered player #N, player p vs. opponent o, p < N, o < N: For (p + o) <= N, they meet in round number (p + o - 1). For (p + o) > N, they meet in round number (p + o - N). For (p + o) odd, the larger-numbered player has black. For (p + o) even, the larger-numbered player has white. Pairs involving the largest numbered player (#N of N): The largest-numbered player (#N of N) plays black against opponents o, o <= N/2, in (odd-numbered) rounds (2*o - 1). The largest-numbered player (#N of N) plays white against opponents o, o > N/2, in (even-numbered) rounds (2*o - N).
If there is an even number of players, players in the first half of the crosstable have an extra white and players in the last half of the crosstable have an extra black.
If it's a double round-robin, two players have the same color three times in a row: in the last round of the first cycle and the first two rounds of the second cycle. (hide spoiler)]
For /everything/ else, see instead the current FIDE Arbiters' Manual: google for it with site:fide.com , pick the most recent one: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22FI...
Also, the 2015-2018 FIDE Arbiters' Magazine, online at https://arbiters.fide.com/news/catego... , shows contentious situations from competitions, with FIDE rulings.
Described in their book, Bojovic and Suhartovic bravely direct a 13-player 9-round Swiss-system tournament, then explain in detail why the player in clear second place after round 8 must receive the (full-point) last-round bye to make the black/white assignments come out right.
Later FIDE rules changes and clarifications render some of this book's interpretations incorrect.
FIDE also shuffled the table of contents of its rules for its 2017 revision. This book, originally written in 2014, largely retains the 2014 FIDE-rules section- and subsection-designations, now obsolete.
Grandmaster Preparation, Lyev Polugayevsky (1934-1995), 1977 in Russian, updated English translation by Kenneth P. Neat, 1981, 240 pages, Library-of-CGrandmaster Preparation, Lyev Polugayevsky (1934-1995), 1977 in Russian, updated English translation by Kenneth P. Neat, 1981, 240 pages, Library-of-Congress GV 1445 P6417 1981 Memorial Library, ISBN 0080240992
You have to be a very strong player to need this.
1. On How This Book Found its Author "Admit it--you're a lazy-bones! You should be ashamed of yourself! It's the duty of every grandmaster to write books." --Mikhail Botvinnik, Dec. 17, 1969.
He starts with a game he lost, with white in a Ruy Lopez, at age 13 as a first-category player against a candidate master who knew lines in the opening that Polugayevsky did not know. pp. 3-4.
So Polugayevsky resolved to prepare opening pitfalls for his opponents. Gaining only a few wins--but:
"An exceptional moment is worth more than a year serenely-lived." p. 5.
"At age 18 in 1953 as Black against 1. d4, only the Meran Defence featured in my repertoire." p. 5.
"It is more accurate to compare not the number of wins of players past and present, but the quality of those wins, and not the degree of knowledge, but the degree of individual creativity." p. 6.
2. The Birth of a Variation (Sicilian Defense Polugayevsky Variation) Updated to include Polugayevsky's response to challenges, including two games from his victory over Tal in the 1980 Candidates' Quarter-Final Match.
First played in 1959. p. 21. After a gestation of several years.
3. In the Interval (The Analysis of Adjourned Games) "Lyev Polugayevsky is one of the strongest masters of the analysis of adjourned positions." --Mikahil Tal. p. x
4. On the Eve (How to Prepare for Decisive Games) Updated with Polugayevsky's accounts of his 1977 Candidates' Match with Mecking, and of his most significant meetings with each of the seven post-war World Champions.
"Staring at a position for a few seconds is often enough for me to see who is better, which plans will work, which pieces should be traded, etc. …
"Studying the 140 games and fragments in this book, the reader will learn many of the most important plans, patterns and ideas in chess." --GM Axel Bachmann p. 5.
The contents reflect the openings the author likes to play:
In chess we are judged, not by our playing style or our love of the game, but by our achievements and rating
IM Cyrus Lakdawala on nature vs. nurture:
In chess we are judged, not by our playing style or our love of the game, but by our achievements and rating. And mine were abysmal.
I began as a promising not-prodigy, rated a sorry 1150 at age 13. By age 17, I achieved enormous not-progress, with a rating of 1795—hardly the raw materials for a titled player. The dream was to one day earn a FIDE title, but my friends began to place me in the dreaded delusional-upstart category, teasing me for living in a dream world. I so desperately wanted to prove them wrong. Then, as if by magic, I stumbled on to a “secret” formula: over-training. My training method included the following steps:
*If I was to play in a tournament on the following Saturday, I would gather every book on combinations I owned and begin solving on Tuesday morning at 7:00 a.m. I would will myself to keep solving for the next 24 hours, no matter how much the mind and body begged to stop.
*A physical regimen of two to three hours per day of varied exercise.
*I would study chess at least six hours per day from the book alone, increasing my powers of visualization/calculation.
*The “normal stuff:” Master an opening repertoire which suited my style, master basic endings, and study the classics, preferably with annotated games.
What I’m trying to convey: a genetic advantage of natural chess talent is overrated. /Anyone/ can hugely surpass expectations—even your own—if you are willing to pay the brutal price of outworking your opposition.
In /Logical Chess: Move by Move/, Irving Chernev (1900-1981), 1957, Game 1, von Scheve - Teichmann, Berlin 19Oops! I Resigned Again!, Ian Rogers, 2021
In /Logical Chess: Move by Move/, Irving Chernev (1900-1981), 1957, Game 1, von Scheve - Teichmann, Berlin 1907, White resigned on move 18, in an equal position: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... ...more