(soft jaunty music) (soft jaunty music continues) - That's okay.

Happens to the best of us.

Keep your chin up.

(soft jaunty music) (flags flap) (dramatic music) (horse sputters) (metal clinks) (sword clinks) - Welcome to "Today in Chess," where, together, we'll explore the wide world of this iconic game.

Chess is the ancient game of kings and queens.

Today, it's played everywhere by the young and old, over the board and online.

The resurgence of chess has cut across America, and our journey today begins here in the chess capital of the US, St. Louis, Missouri.

How did that happen?

Well, as most cosmic shifts in society, it all started with a single idea.

(soft music) - I used to run a chess club called We're Just Pawns.

We met once a week at a Barnes & Noble out in South County, and it was the kind of chess club where you have a coffee can out for donations so that you can buy an extra chess board or a set or maybe a clock if you get enough.

It was fun.

It was a labor of love.

I just did it 'cause I really wanted to be able to play chess.

So fast forward a few years.

I graduate college, I'm working in my career, and I get approached by Bob Jacobs, who's a big guy in the St. Louis chess scene, and he says, "Hey Tony, there's this guy that really wants to start a chess club.

He's retired and moved back to St. Louis, and I think you should meet him.

It would be a good idea."

So we had a dinner one night, and maybe 15 of us got together.

and maybe 15 of us got together.

- "And I've been thinking of starting a chess club," and they said, "Well, how do we do it?"

And I said, "Maybe we should go around and look for some space."

and look for some space."

- I pictured it being in a little strip mall.

I thought I'd go up there after work on Wednesdays with my key and let some people in, make sure to set that coffee can out again.

When I first saw the space that the chess club was going to be in, I thought there's absolutely no way that they can turn this into a beautiful club.

You know, it was this abandoned space that looked like it hadn't been renovated in years and years.

The moment I realized that this was going to be as big as it was is when we walked into the chess club in its disarray, in the shape that it was in when we first saw this building and they said, "This is what we plan to have for the club, three stories, you know, have classrooms upstairs, have free play on the main floor, have a library in the basement."

And I thought, "There's no way I'm gonna be able to do this part time."

- Really, the mission of the club is to foster the game of chess and all of the educational benefits it can generate, especially to children, and we're in well over 100 schools, and we've got in-school programs, part of the regular curriculum and afterschool programs.

- As the childrens get more interested and they have their friends come and play, you know, that we see with these huge scholastic tournaments.

They have, you know, thousands of kids playing.

So that is what is the resurgence in chess, and thank goodness.

It's very important.

It's very important.

- There's no doubt that there's a correlation between how kids perform in chess between how kids perform in chess and how they perform in scholastics.

- And what it does is it helps engage learners.

- And what it does is it helps engage learners.

They enjoy doing chess.

It makes them become more analytical, more disciplined in terms of how they approach their studies in school overall.

It gives them something to look forward to.

As we've seen with surveys that were done, kids that have chess in school look forward to it, and they also become better students in and outside the classroom as well.

- We've started a program where we're teaching the police officers how to teach chess to schools.

So the police are now going into schools in an entirely different setting.

They're going in there as chess teachers.

- What this does is not only helps build the, you know, self esteem of the student, of the at-risk youth, also help them with discipline and other things.

But it does promote a better relationship between the police department and the community the police department serves.

- It's good to have police officers reaching out to kids, teaching them chess, engage in a game that they both enjoy, get to connect eyes over the chess board, shake hands, smile, and really be friends, and that can only be beneficial.

- It's really something that's been great for children and for academics in the St. Louis area in general.

It also gives us something to be proud of.

It builds civic pride.

We are the chess capital of the United States of America.

(riveting music) - Isn't it exciting how American chess continues to develop and grow?

It only makes sense that some of the world's top chess prodigies reside here in the USA, including the youngest player ever to earn the title of Grandmaster.

(slow dramatic music) - [Narrator] Abhimanyu Mishra is no stranger to breaking records.

Before becoming the world's youngest grandmaster at the age of 12 years, four months, 25 days, breaking a record that stood for 19 years in the process, he was already the United States Chess Federation record holder as both the youngest expert and national master in US history.

But the accomplished New Jersey-born teen is not done racking up awards.

He won the 2023 US Junior Championships, qualifying him for the prestigious US Championship, one of the strongest chess events on the planet, featuring world-class talent and took fourth place on his first try.

The sky is clearly the limit for this young talent.

His future and the future of US chess are both shining bright.

- I'm really excited.

So currently, I'm actually gonna be a rising junior at Washington University in St. Louis.

So I've been here in the summer doing research at the med school.

So I've been accustoming myself to the heat, (laughs) and I'm really excited just to play in this tournament.

- It feels great.

It's my first time in St. Louis, actually, ever.

So it's really exciting, and I'm excited to play.

- It feels great to be back to like see like people who I haven't seen in like so long and to just play more chess again, and St. Louis is such a nice city, so yeah.

- Well, this tournament is obviously really big, really prestigious, so I'm really honored to be here and also happy as well.

I'm hoping to improve my result from last year.

- It feels nice coming back here again.

I look forward to this tournament literally every single year.

It's like probably my favorite tournament of the year, so yeah.

- Great, of course, because this event, ever since I was younger, I always wanted to play in it.

So now I'm finally here, and I'm really excited.

- It feels great.

Everyone here has been so nice to me.

I love how the St. Louis Chess Club treats its players.

I've been here once before, but that was for a chess camp, and I know they've done a lot of changes since then, so I am really happy to be here.

- It's pretty awesome.

I was here last year.

I didn't do so well, so I'm excited to have another chance to play here against all these amazing people, and it's just a really nice venue, too, so very excited to be here overall.

- I'm excited.

Actually, don't know how many times I've played this tournament, but it's probably my last time this year, I think, 'cause I'm getting too old now, but it's good to be back.

I'm excited to play.

- It feels really great.

This is one of my favorite tournaments to play in.

I played in person for the past, this is my third year now, and to be able to like play against such strong young female counterparts is always a really great thing, and also being in St. Louis, it's always like a really fun experience.

So I'm really excited for this tournament, and I hope that it will go well.

(dramatic music) - Listening to the voices of these young chess players speak about visiting St. Louis is heartwarming for all of us who love this city.

Learning chess helps young people apply strategic thinking and the value of competition.

We all know the term reading, writing, and arithmetic.

It's an old English term referring to school.

Thanks to Dr. Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield, we can all learn straight from her book.

Each month, Grandmaster Var Akobian will offer beginner chess players a lesson on how to read and write chess.

(uplifting music) Var Akobian became an international master at age 16.

In 2001, he moved from Armenia to the United States and, one week after his 20th birthday in November 2003, earned the title of Grandmaster.

He's a world renowned chess player, coach, and teacher.

- I'm very excited to give you this beginner lesson and show you the squares on the chess board here.

Of course, we have 64 squares on the board, and very important to memorize the squares and to be able to see the good moves on the board.

Now I'm gonna show you how the pieces move on the chess board here.

So we're gonna start off with the king.

King is the most important piece, and you always have to try to protect your king.

So king can move only one square in any direction here.

So from E1 here, you have D1, F1, F2, E2, and D2.

So the next, we're gonna go to the most valuable piece and the strongest piece, which is the queen, and the reason it's so strong, because it can move like a combination of a rook and a bishop and can move any direction, can go all the way straight line or it can move diagonally as well, and the value of your queen is nine pawns.

The next valuable piece is the rook.

Rook, it's very simple how the rook moves.

It moves like a straight line.

It can move straight line or can move vertical on the rank.

The next is the bishop.

You have two bishops on a chess board.

So when you start a game, you have a bishop on C1, and you have another bishop on F1 here.

So the bishop on C1 is obviously on a dark square, so it can only move on dark squares.

It can move from C1 all the way here to the H6 square.

You can also move one square at a time.

You can go to B2 again one square or on a three.

So if you have a dark square bishop, you can only move this bishop on the dark squares.

So now we're gonna put this bishop to F1 because, when you start a game, you're gonna have two bishops.

So now it's on a light square, so you can move on the light squares as well.

So all the way to A6 that's on the light squares, that's your longest move on this diagonal.

The next is the knight.

When you start the game, you have two knights.

You will have one knight on B1 when you're playing with the white pieces, and you will have another knight on G1 here.

Knight moves like a letter L, so basically two squares up one side.

It's probably the hardest move to learn, but if you just remember letter L, so that's how the knight moves, two squares up one side or one square up two side, and it can go any direction to the right or to the left, and it's the only piece, actually, that can jump over other pieces.

For example, even the queen, the most valuable piece, cannot do that.

So I'm gonna put a pawn now on E2.

See, then I can jump two squares up one side, and that's perfectly legal move.

The only piece that can jump over other pieces, two squares up, one on the other side as well.

And now we come down to the last piece we have is the pawn, actually.

When you start the game, you have eight pawns, and these are basically your soldiers.

A lot of times, you sacrifice them, you exchange them, but you have eight of them when you start the game.

Pawn can move from the original position, only can move two squares.

Only time you can move two squares this pawn is from the original square.

After that, if you play this move, you can only move one square at a time.

But the way the pawn captures is diagonally, moves forward one or two squares but captures diagonally.

So for example, if there's a piece on D3, you can capture E2 takes D3, and every capture you do, it's gonna be on a diagonal.

So this completes how the pieces move on the chess board.

(riveting music) - 2023 is over, and it was a big year in chess.

We've seen tournaments all over the world.

Joining me now is Grandmaster Yasser Seirawan.

Hi, Yasser!

- Hi, Sharon.

- Good to see you.

- Hi, Sharon.

It's a delight to be with you.

- Now you've seen some truly phenomenal chess over this past year.

What's your personal take on the year 2023 in chess?

- Simply extraordinary, Sharon.

2023 was one of the most exciting years in chess in recent history.

The American Cup tournaments kicked off the year in March, double elimination tournaments featuring 16 of the strongest men and the strongest women in the United States.

(upbeat electronic music) In the open tournament, fan favorite Hikaru Nakamura was comfortable from start to finish, winning the champions bracket and clenching the second ever American Cup title.

Defending women's champion Irina Krush did what she does best and won in the Women's Championship match, beating Alice Lee for a second year in a row.

Bucharest, Romania hosted the Superbet Chess Classic, the first event of the Grand Chess Tour, where nine of the world's top players compete across five tournaments all over the world.

American number one Fabiano Caruana won two games in a row early, and that was enough to clinch the title and sit on top of the Grand Chess Tour after one event.

The tour then moved to Warsaw, Poland for the first of three Rapid & Blitz events where world's number one and former world champion Magnus Carlsen came in as a wild card player and stole first place in the Superbet Rapid & Blitz.

We then moved to St. Louis, Missouri for one of the strongest female chess events in the world, the Cairns Cup.

Bottom seed Anna Zatonskih had a career best performance, shocking the world, winning the event with a round to spare.

The third stop of the Grand Chess Tour was Zagreb, Croatia, where the SuperUnited Rapid & Blitz event kicked off, and, once again, wild card Magnus Carlsen stole the show as well as the title, highlighted by a perfect nine-win day in Blitz, an astounding achievement.

Attention falls on St. Louis once again where legends and young stars battled it out in the US Juniors and Seniors championship.

Melikset Khachiyan secured the senior championship title, scoring an impressive seven points out of nine.

American junior phenom Abhimanyu Mishra edged out the rest of the field and clinched the junior title, drawing a dramatic final round.

One of the strongest young girls in American chess, Alice Lee, won her first title at just 13 years old.

After a short summer break in August, we kicked off September with one of the most entertaining tournaments, Chess 9LX, where the back row is scrambled into one of 960 different starting positions.

Even the best players in the world have no clue what's coming.

Young American star Sam Sevian beat out a stacked field, including Fabiano Caruana, Hikaru Nakamura, and even former world champion Garry Kasparov to win the crown.

America's finest assembled in St. Louis just a month later for the US and US Women's Championship, where St. Louis local Fabiano Caruana clinched the title for the second year in a row.

Meanwhile, young Carissa Yip clinched her second US Women's Championship title in the last three years.

Chess returned in November for the last two events of the Grand Chess Tour, first with the St. Louis Rapid & Blitz where Fabiano Caurana continued his year of dominance and clinched the title, doing all but clinching the Grand Chess Tour title.

We wrapped up the year with the fifth and final event of the Grand Chess Tour, the illustrious Sinquefield Cup.

Who other than Fabiano Caruana would win on demand in the final round?

It would clench him the Sinquefield Cup title as well as victory in the 2023 Grand Chess Tour.

From tournament upsets to total dominance, 2023 is a year in which chess fans won't soon forget.

(bright upbeat music) - Competing in professional chess tournaments requires hours and hours of preparation.

Players must be ready for their opponents and understand the moves required to win.

Each month, "Today in Chess" will feature a lesson from the experts.

So get ready.

This is your chance to attend chess school and learn from the masters.

- We are now ready for our first chess lesson.

The chess board and battlefield are all set up, but like a good general who leads his army to battle, you should understand the battlefield.

64 squares.

These 32 squares, they belong to us.

They're our space.

Those 32 squares, they belong to the opponent.

That's their space.

It automatically triggers the idea, if I control all my space, you're not gonna be able to checkmate me.

So if I can control my territory as well as your own, I'm going to win the battle.

When we look at the battlefield, it turns out that these four squares dead in the center of the board are like the sweet spot of the tennis racket.

That's the high ground.

It's the center that we want to control.

The center is defined by these 16 squares right there, from C3 to F3 to F6 to C6, back to C3.

Those are the squares that we want to control.

(dramatic string music) Every opening move, we should think of our pieces in their barracks.

You want to bring them out into the battle, but to do that, your guiding principles are to control the center, to develop your pieces effectively, and safety for your king.

So an opening move might feature E4 controlling or attacking these two squares, and we're going to repeat for black the same opening moves.

We develop our knight, attacking the pawn on the E5.

The knight defends the pawn on E5.

We develop our bishop, attacking the knight on C6.

The knight attacks our pawn on E4.

We defend it with the movement D2, D3.

The bishop develops very much like ours, and we castle.

Now we stop for a moment to understand what we've done.

We've brought pieces into the battle, and we've made a safe place for our king.

These are the opening principles, control the center, develop your pieces, safe space for your king.

That's our chess lesson for today.

(uplifting music) - As you can see, there's a lot to learning in the game of chess.

The men and women who achieve professional status and world rankings exhibit the dedication that it takes to become a top chess player in today's world.

Coming this year in April is the Candidates Tournament, which will yield the next challenger for the World Championship, and America is well represented.

The Candidates Tournament is a prestigious chess competition held every two years to decide the challenger for the reigning world chess champion.

The Candidates Tournament features eight of the world's top chess players who have earned their invitations through various qualification methods, such as previous performance in top level tournaments for the Chess World Cup.

These elite players come from different parts of the globe and represent a diverse range of playing styles and chess philosophies.

In 2022, Magnus Carlsen shocked the world by announcing he would not defend his world title.

This seismic shift in the chess world created an opening for two challengers from the Candidates Tournament to battle over the board for the world championship vacated by Carlsen.

Ding Liren from China defeated Russian-born Ian Nepomniachtchi to become the new world champion in 2023.

(soft piano music) Also in 2023, Magnus Carlsen continued to professionally compete in tournaments all over the world.

His prowess is still the gold standard throughout the chess universe.

It is difficult for a current world champion to claim supreme dominance knowing that Magnus is out there lurking in every corner of the chess neighborhood.

The Candidates Tournament is known for its intense battles, brilliant combinations, and strategic maneuvering.

It often showcases innovative opening choices, deep preparation, and high quality endgame play.

The 2024 version of the Candidates Tournament will be played from April 2nd through to the 25th in Toronto, Canada.

Although Carlsen will not be involved, the tournament features many of the world's top players, including Ian Nepomniachtchi, Vidit Gujrathi, Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, Nijat Abasov.

This year also features two prominent American players, two Americans that have contributed to America's chess renaissance as much as anyone.

Hikaru Nakamura, besides being one of the most prolific chess players in the world, is also one of the most beloved online chess gamers, followed by millions of chess enthusiasts.

That brings us to the top American Candidates contender, the one and only Fabiano Caruana.

(dramatic music) - [Announcer] Fabiano knows all about the Candidates Tournament.

He's not only won it, but he nearly went on to win it all.

The Miami-born prodigy spent several years living in Europe, studying and improving his chess, but has settled down in the capital of chess in America, St. Louis, Missouri.

After numerous successes and tournament victories, Caruana did eventually win for the right to challenge the world champion for the title, the first American to do so since Bobby Fischer.

He nearly got the better of Magnus, too.

Caruana still has ambitions to be the world champion, looks primed to make another strong run at the world title.

Fabiano Caruana's success has not only brought more attention to American chess, but it has also brought in even more talent and competition.

With iron sharpening iron, America's top players are better than ever, setting the stage for a dominant era of American chess.

- Chess in America is thriving, and you can be part of it, especially here in St. Louis, Missouri, home to the World Chess Hall of Fame where, on any given day, you could see the likes of Fabiano Caruana walking down the streets.

Please join us again next month for more chess, straight from the chess capital of America.

Thanks for watching.

See you next time on "Today in Chess."

(upbeat electronic music) - [Announcer] This has been a presentation of the St. Louis Chess Club.

Any reproduction or distribution of this content without the express written consent of the St. Louis Chess Club is prohibited.