Today’s hectic lifestyle affects everything.

The following is my Quora post from 9 years ago.

Recently I was asked about my daily routine when I was “at the top of my game.”

Prophylaxis in chess can have different forms and this one is probably something you wouldn’t expect.

I always wondered what Fischer had in mind as an alternative to his Najdorf Sicilian.

Usually we associate beauty in chess with sacrifical attacks and “triumph of spirit over matter.” There are many examples of this in chess history and it is not surprising that we have got used to it.

For me the feeling of being rushed is one of the worst.

They say that genius is somebody who transcends his or her own time and their accomplishments are seen as timeless.

When I was growing up and starting with chess in the 1980s, there was no technology to help.

There is usually one part of our chess that we know needs work, but we just cannot find it in ourselves to do it.

We all know a bad bishop when we see one.

The influence of engines on modern chess cannot be overstated.

Last week I wrote about my last tournament, the European Championship in 2019, for which I prepared quite thoroughly.

As it turned out, the European Individual Championship in Skopje in 2019 was the last tournament of my chess career.

Nowadays chess theory develops by the minute.

The quality of your decisions depends on the precision of your calculations.

Last week I analysed the situation when facing a stronger opponent.

YouTube video by GM Alex Colovic

It is a truth universally acknowledged that when you are winning you should simplify and when you’re losing you should complicate.

Opening preparation can be approached in more than one way and that is what makes the process creative.

Most chess advice is about material.

It is generally considered that White has the “moral obligation” to play for a win, but sometimes drawing with White is necessary.

Max Euwe is by far the most underestimated World Champion.

I was studying the games of Vassily Smyslov from his book Letopis Shakhmatnogo Tvorchestva (in Russian, a book of his best games annotated by himself, an approximate translation would be Chronicles/An...

It is too common an occurence when we get attracted to an idea and we immediately delve into it deeply, fascinated by the moves and fireworks it offers.

YouTube video by GM Alex Colovic

After playing chess for a very long time it is easy to assume that I have seen it all.

When it comes to opening choices, some players treat faster time controls differently.

The London System is one of the most popular openings nowadays.

The Sozin is a relatively universal weapon against the Sicilian - just play Bc4 whenever it makes sense!

When I was playing the Grunfeld I could never understand why they were writing in different books that the endgames should be good for Black with the queenside majority as the main factor.

Every player has an innate feeling how much risk he or she can take.

There are some books that persecute me.

The following example made a strong impression on me.

The match Fischer-Larsen in Denver 1971 is one of the most famous ones in chess history.

Two questions I’ve been asked the most are: 1.

There is one thing that was very surprising for me when I was analysing the World Championship match in Dubai between Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi.

This post was published on my blog, but I’m reposting it here because it’s older and easy to miss, while several newer subscribers likely haven’t seen it.

Let me get this one straight - I am not talking about bad openings like 1.e4 f5 or such; no, in this email I want to discuss situations when you mess up the opening and end up in a bad one.

I have written before about the character of openings, how different openings require different treatment.

Every player who has entered the elite studied chess in a profound way.

The engines really don’t care about us, humans, who have to play a position that they happily evaluate as equal.

In today’s email I would like to describe how chess preparation looks like in practice, so hopefully you can pick up something that can be of use.

I have been taught and grew up with the idea that you need to understand chess in order to play it well.

The final chapter on the surprises by Bobby Fischer is about a discovery of his games in the simuls he gave after the Olympiad in Siegen.

Continuing the exploration of Fischer’s preparation matches in 1992 let’s see what happened in the match with Gligoric.

Some time ago I was thinking about Bobby Fischer’s preparation matches prior to the match with Spassky in 1992.

I am not a professional player anymore.