Submitted by
kurtgodden on Thu Aug 21, 2008 6:32pm.
I have been corresponding with a very bright teenager named Adam, whose name on chess.com is Revan24, about my blog from last December regarding the longest possible chess game.
My conclusion was that, according to FIDE rules, the longest ... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Sat Aug 2, 2008 7:46am.
There is a nicely written post by Rael regarding the chess.com community: The Soul of Chess.com
While reading it, a thought occurred to me and I was wondering how much enthusiasm there might be for it. There are a lot of people here ... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Wed Jul 23, 2008 7:33pm.
The Nimzowitsch Defense, 1. e4 Nc6, is named after the über-famous Aron Nimzowitsch (1886—1935), whose last name at birth was the 4-syllable ‘Niemzowitsch’. The opening, as others we have looked at in this series, was ... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Fri Jul 18, 2008 1:30pm.
Not long ago, Sigma Xi, a research society of nearly 60,000 scientists worldwide that includes several Nobel Prize winners, asked their members to document how they first became interested in science. Was it a teacher? Something they r... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Sat Jul 12, 2008 8:51pm.
The Danish grandmaster Bent Larsen (1935- ) has enjoyed playing out-of-favor chess openings since he was a child. This trait began around the age of 12 when he read a book that said modern chess masters were cowards for avoiding the King&rsq... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Tue Jul 8, 2008 2:47pm.
A few days ago, American expert (USCF 2038) Tim Moroney, while competing at the World Open in Philadelphia, told me about a puzzle in which there 6 pawns all lined up on the same file. Intrigued by this morsel of information, I investigated ... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Fri Jul 4, 2008 10:48pm.
In Steinbeck’s sequel to his famous book Cannery Row, his richly deep and delightful character Doc proclaims that “chess is possibly the only game in the world in which it is impossible to cheat.” He was, of course, talking... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Wed Jul 2, 2008 11:09am.
Chess is a mental playground for mathematicians. How many ways can you place 8 rooks on a chessboard such that none of them attacks another? This is similar to the 8 Lonely Queens problem that I discussed in another blog. For the... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Sat Jun 28, 2008 8:49am.
Five years before Alekhine became World Champion, he was defeated so surprisingly that he resigned after 55 moves by throwing his king across the room. Alekhine was not exactly the most sanguine player as I have described in a previous blog,... Read more »
Submitted by
kurtgodden on Sat Jun 21, 2008 12:01pm.
In 1848 Max Bezzel published what has become one of the most famous chess puzzles in history. His article appeared in the German chess magazine Die Schachzeitung and introduced the ‘8 Queens’ problem. The task is to place 8... Read more »