Members in action
From today, the Indian National Online Chess Championship will start in different categories. Arshiya will participate in different categories & will represent Tripura, her Indian state. More information here.
Manish and Shahil are still in Hungary, both participating in another GM tournament. So far Shahil has 3.5/5, and Manish 1.5/5 and Mishra is 2.5/4. The game between Shahil and Manish today ended with Shahil taking the full point with white.
Kushal came 4th in the 7 rounds U18 tournament and is now playing the U16 tournament.
Ricard Garrido Olivares has been playing the Madrid’s club championship for the last three months. His team finished third in the second category, one spot short of promotion. On an individual level, Ricard scored 9/11 (+9-2=0;) and although his opponents were considerably lower rated than him, he is winning some elo and, hopefully, returning to the 2200 club. You can find the games here.
Frederick Rhine is playing in the Chicago Class in mid-July (under-2200 section). His first OTB in almost two years. Here is the entry list so far.
Christopher and Volodar are both playing in the Gelfand Challenge.
Send us links or information if you are playing a tournament. Your friends in the academy will be routing for you!
Trainers in action
Sam was in Glasgow for the past weeks, learning how to play card games. In between he played blitz with Jacob, and prepared for the Prague International Chess Festival, with Round-Robins for both the Masters and Futures groups.
Jacob was invited to John Hartmann’s podcast, Cover stories with Chess Life. As Brendan pointed out on the Forum, “Don’t miss the discussion around the 53:30 mark, on the difference between the A8-H1 and A7-G1 diagonals, when it comes to stopping King infiltration (In practice they are not the same length/have the same usefulness depending on the position!), I had never thought about it like this!”
Classes
As you know, we are planning an intensive camp on Strategy for the end of June. Danish GM Sune Berg Hansen will join our strategy camp at the end of the month. Those who have read Thinking Inside the Box, will recognise the name. Jacob and Sune are from the same region in Denmark and even played on the same team for a few years.
Under 1700 classes with Peter Long continue every Saturday, 10-12 UK time.
Sam Shankland has sent out a welcoming letter to the opening analysis study group that probably has scared the hell out of everybody! The first meeting will be organised for after Prague Masters, where Sam will be playing from Monday.
Renier’s Homework for Sunday is up in the course page. He was not waiting for it, as he has been solving the regular homework for Tuesday, where he will also give both classes. There is less homework for Sunday, as I want to take about general technique for a bit and show a few games. Apologies to those who wanted to work on the homework earlier in the week.
Tomorrow, Saturday, we have a “Playing Position u2000”. It will be a slightly different type of position than in the past. It should be an instructive experience. To join, you have to apply for our lichess simul team in advance, giving your membership email and name with the application (the thing that says “Please can I join the team” – change the text! Our simul team can be found here.
Position of the week was uploaded earlier today on our YouTube channel, with Sam and Jacob.
Sunday Tournament
We continue to have tournaments on Sundays.
Last Sunday, Christopher Yoo won the Can you beat Sam Shankland? Arena
This Sunday at 19:00 UK time, 10+5 Rapid While the Indians are all busy. As always, invite your friends to join!
From Jacob:
The last few weeks have been very intensive, with a hard deadline on the Nigel Short book “Winning” and a three week visit from Sam Shankland in a training camp. Yesterday Sam went to Prague and I realised I had “hit the wall” in the same way marathon runners do. The Academy is my second job. Sometimes the first job, at Quality Chess, is quite demanding… But I think I am on top of everything now. Sorry for a few things that took a bit of extra time to complete.
Btw. Inside tip: Denmark or Scotland will win Euro 2021!
See you in the class!