Neil started playing chess on Tornelo in April with a very low rating which he soon pushed up. He has had a couple of rating drops in that time, but generally he has had a steady rise.
​Neil plays some of the longest games of all regular juniors at our Chess @ 4 tournaments. This means that he is getting a lot of practice at playing endgames, and he seems to do pretty well in that part of the game. The strategy is quite different to earlier in the game. We are thinking about promoting pawns, trying to get our king into the game and being very accurate about whether we are trying to win or draw. Have a look at the positions in this endgame which Neil played last week.

So what do you think the result should be here? It is Black to move. Can Black win? Will Black lose? Should it be a draw? And how should both sides be trying to play? What should be their strategies?

Now it's White to move. White is a pawn down. Is there any way to save the game?

Now it is Black to move. How would you try to win this position? Would it help if I told you there is a forced mate in 5 moves?

Find out the answers to these questions, and see how Neil played the endgame here.

Alexander joined the Tornelo tournament scene at the end of June when his rating was just 253. He has played lots of chess and this week won three of our chess @ 4 Challengers tournaments to finally rise above 800 which means he'll be trying out in the Premier division for the first time. That will be a new challenge for Alexander, and we all wish him good luck.
Alexander is generally a safe player rather than a risk taker. He is good at spotting tactics that win him material, and then he uses the extra material well.

This is a tricky position. It is White to play, what move would you choose? The whole game, including this position, can be found here. The next position is what was possibly the move of the week.

It is White to play. What is the winning move? Check your answer here.

This is definitely the save of the week. First Black is way down on material but still created a mate threat, and then White saved the game with a perpetual. But one thing I noticed was how difficult it is to spot long queen moves, especially when there is little time on your clock. What would you play as White? You can check out the answer and this endgame here.

It's probably everyone's dream to play for their country at their favourite sport. It doesn't matter whether it's cricket, soccer, tennis, netball or chess, the best thing must be knowing you're good enough to represent your country.
Every two years, chess has its own Olympics, a tournament that dates back to the founding of the World Chess Federation, FIDE, in 1924. This year, the tournament couldn't go ahead as planned because of Covid restrictions and world travel bans. So instead, FIDE put the tournament online, and it is being hosted by chess.com. 
Kids Unlimited is very happy to be represented by our coach, Woman Grand Master Julia Ryjanova, and we wish Julia and the rest of the Australian team the very best of luck in their division. You can follow them online from 6:00pm on Friday 14th August

Each week I will be looking at a player from our Chess @ 4 series. This will be the player of the week and it is possible to be Player of the Week more than once! To be considered for this position, all you need to do is score 15 points during the week in the Chess  @ 4 series on Tornelo. Chess @ 4 is a series of 5 round events that run Monday to Friday, starting at 4:00pm. Between the rounds there are interviews with players, analysis of games and positions, and chat about other chess related things.

In our Chess @ 4 events we run 2 divisions. These are divided by ratings, so there is a tournament for players rated above 800 (Premier), and a tournament for players rated 800 or below (Challengers). There are some players who move up from the Challengers to the Premier, and some who move back down to the Challengers from the Premier. There are even some players who bounce back and forward between the 2 events. In the past week, we saw Utku Tanin make the jump from Challengers to Premier, and stay in the top event. Utku's progress has been steadily rising, but with a few setbacks.
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Starting with a rating below 500 Utku improved slowly until our lockdown when he started playing more regularly in our tournaments. You can see from the graph that it has been hard for Utku to hold on to his improvements, and he's had a few dips, but generally he is improving.

In the past week, what I've noticed is that Utku has really strengthened his tactical vision, so even if he gets into tricky positions, he is trying to find tactical tricks to get himself a lead in the game.

White has just played Bb5 pinning Black's knight. Black decided to kick the bishop away by playing 1..a6. Was this a good move? Answer is here.

Utku is Black, and is a pawn down, but he decided to try out one of his favourite tricks, a discovered attack. What do you think Black played here? Answer is here.

Utku is Black and has another discovered attack in mind. Here Black plays 1..Ne7, a crazy looking move as his knight can just be taken. What do you think the idea is behind this move? Answer is here.

Solving tactics is a great way to improve your game, especially when you can then use the tactics in your games to win points or checkmate your opponent. There are some good places to solve chess tactics online. Try either ideachess or chesstempo, as they're probably the best.