- Hi, I'm Chess Grandmaster Maurice Ashley.

April has arrived and spring is in the air.

As the chess world gears up for the Candidates tournaments, we have assembled a great show for you today.

Collegiate chess, the American Cup, the amazing career of Fabiano Caurana and much more coming up right now on "Today in Chess."

(excited music) - Hello, everyone and welcome to another edition of "Today in Chess."

I'm your host, Sharon Carpenter.

As Maurice mentioned, we have a great show in store for you.

We'll hear from the number two chess player in the world, we'll visit with the University of Missouri's chess coach, we have lessons from the masters, and so much more, but first, the American Cup.

This double elimination tournament that's consistently gained popularity was just completed and what a competition it was, featuring a group of established chess stars, but once again, a young chess prodigy rose to the top.

- [Announcer] The 2024 American Cup was an event that no one will soon forget.

Two stack fields competed in a double elimination knockout tournament to see who would become the next American Cup champion.

Fabiano Caurana headlined the open section and started off strong with a convincing win over Grigoriy Oparin, only to fall to Levon Aronian in a blitz playoff in the following match, resulting in being relegated to the elimination bracket.

Looking to be the first player to come back and win it all.

He knocked out veteran Leinier Domínguez and moved on to face the number two seed Wesley So, where again in a blitz playoff, would be eliminated from the event.

So went on to defeat Ray Robson for a chance to face off again.

Champions bracket winner Levon Aronian in the grand final.

After quick draws in the first three games, Levon Aronian found an advantage with the black pieces and never looked back, claiming his first American Cup title.

(rock music) The women's section was nothing short of upsets and exciting matches where Zoey Tang started off her American Cup with a win over two-time champion and top seated Irina Krush only to fall in the next two games to lose the match and be moved to the elimination bracket.

Third Seed Alice Lee racked up wins over Tatev Abrahamyan and Begim Tokhirjonova to meet Irina Krush in the champions bracket final for the third year in a row.

Irina would get the best of her yet again, sending Alice to the elimination bracket to fight her way back to the grand final.

Alice Lee did just that with a dominating three one match win over Tokhirjonova for the second time in the event.

After two years of finishing in second place and watching Irina Krush claim the title, Alice Lee shocked everyone and beat Irina Krush to force a rapid grand final match.

It took all four rapid games and a blitz playoff, but Alice Lee finally dethroned the two-Time champion claiming her second major tournament victory.

Champions were crowned and young stars made their mark.

The American Cup is quickly becoming a tournament both players and fans won't wanna miss - Alice Lee, what an amazing talent.

Can you imagine being just 14 years old and sitting across the table from eight-time US Women's Champ by Irina Krush and then winning?

That was an incredible victory for Alice and a great match for any chess fan.

Besides double elimination, the American Cup features a variety of time controls.

Grandmaster Yasser Seirawan will take us through the development of time pieces that are an integral part of any chess match.

(techno music) - Hello, everyone.

Today, I'm gonna talk about the three chess time controls.

When you think about chess, you think about two players engaging in battle, but what you have to do is regulate the movements of the players.

You don't want a player just to sit there forever, no.

So we have what we call classical chess.

Classical chess are what the top professionals of the game play.

And essentially, it's two minutes to 90 seconds per move, per player.

So it's something like 40 moves in two hours.

Then we have rapid chess, which is far faster.

That's a game of chess where you have 30 minutes per player for all of the moves.

And then the most popular form of chess is blitz chess.

That's five minutes chess.

You get five minutes, I get five minutes and towards the end of the game, boy those players are hitting the clock madly.

What do I mean by the chess clock?

I refer to this device on the right side of the table.

When it's my opponent to move, my opponent will make a move, press their clock, my clock starts ticking, I make a move, I press my clock.

Sometimes, it's a game of seconds.

And here in St. Louis, we have seen some of America's Cup go down to one second.

- How do you feel about the new format of this event with two-time controls being played in the same day?

- Oh, I think it's fun.

I think Tony is always thinking to spice it up and make it interesting.

I generally love this tournament because you know, the double knockout is is a really good idea and I think a lot of tournaments just understood how good it is and they started employing it everywhere.

So it's exciting.

- I mean, okay, so I wasn't here before so I can't say anything, but I mean I feel like more games will be better.

Also, I feel like Rapid will be more exciting, so - I'm not sure.

I think it's interesting.

We'll see how it goes because definitely it's more games than the two classical game match and I think that makes it more interesting because there's more chances for like comebacks and also there's just more games, so more chess in general.

I'm not sure whether I like the two classical games or this format more because I think I did pretty well with the classical games, but I think this one is definitely very exciting and I'm excited to try it out.

- I think it's fine.

It's interesting.

We won't know until we see it happen, but I've sort of always thought that classical chess is a bit too slow, which I think a lot of other people share that sentiment.

But I think the solution is not to chop it all the way down to rapid chess and I very much like the idea of having somewhat faster classical chess, and I think this will be fantastic.

- I actually really like the format.

I've never seen it where it's like classical and rapid on the same day.

Especially like, not even just myself having played, but just seeing any tournament like that.

And I think it's really interesting.

I'm a little bit worried that like I won't be able to like, you know, concentrate as in the second game 'cause I'll be like, or thinking about the first game where I'll be like tired or something.

But I think it definitely makes it more exciting and yeah, I think it's a good format.

- I think American Cup is my favorite event because of its exciting formats and I like that we have format matches against each player now.

So in case you have one bad day, you'll have still plenty of games to recover.

- Well, this is a very big change in the format, I would say.

It's actually very hard to say how it's gonna go.

I mean, of course it's a more challenging format, you know, and it's a lot about your stamina.

I ,mean I think it's just a very different challenge, right?

It's gonna, you know, challenge of preparation that you have to prepare for two games a day, that you have to basically start your rapid game quite soon after your classical game.

So I've never done anything like this before, but I am up for the challenge.

- Professional chess players work hard to understand their opponents and study their moves and strategies, and for good reason.

Each month today in chess features a lesson from the experts.

It's time for chess school and your chance to learn from the Masters.

(gentle music) - Hi everyone.

In this lesson, I'm gonna show you the few things that king cannot do.

In one of the previous lessons, I show you how the king moves and again, king can move any direction one square, but in this position, if you take a look carefully, for example, you cannot play the move king F1 because black has a rook on F5, and the rook is covering the F1 square.

So you cannot walk in into a check.

Same example is here.

If you try to move the key to D2 here, now there is another rook on D8.

You cannot do that.

That will be an illegal move.

Another idea is if you think, "Oh, maybe I can escape the danger by castling to the queen side," that's again, you cannot do that because the rook on D8 is covering the D5.

You cannot jump through the D5 in order to castle.

So the castling also is not gonna be a possible move in this position.

So another idea is if, let's say, the rook is on D8 is giving you a check, you cannot castle when you are under a check.

You need to block the check or move your king away or capture the piece that check you.

But you certainly cannot castle when you are under a check.

So it's very important to know which moves you can play with the king.

And if the squares are under control by your opponent, you cannot move your king into an attack.

So these are the few things you cannot do with your king.

And very important to remember, you can't castle when you're under check and you cannot move into square when one of pieces are covering it.

So hope you enjoyed this lesson.

See you next time.

(lively music) - Maurice Ashley is a well-known American chess player, author and commentator.

25 years ago, he became the first Black grandmaster in history.

Maurice has been doing commentary for major tournaments around the world and was for a long time, a permanent member of the shows that we do here in St. Louis.

And guess what?

Maurice is with us right now.

Maurice Ashley, the one and only.

- Thanks so much for having me, Sharon.

- How are you doing?

- I'm doing great, I'm doing great.

Wonderful to be back in St. Louis.

You said a permanent member.

I guess not, things have changed.

- Well up until you left.

Exactly.

Well you have tons going on.

We're going to ask you all about it.

But first look, let's talk about, you know, the first few months of this year in chess.

It's been, you know, a lot of excitement happening.

How would you describe the year 2024 in chess right now?

Where we are right now?

- I think it's absolutely explosive.

It used to be back in the day, you would have a few tournaments a year, especially top events.

You'd be waiting, looking forward to these events.

But now, it seems like it's happening every single week.

Yeah, the top players really have an embarrassment of riches right now.

Events to play in.

They're traveling from country to country, they're able to play online as well.

So it's an absolutely brand new age for the world of chess.

- You actually discovered your love of chess while you were in Jamaica as a young kid.

You moved to America when you were 12, but how old were you when you first discovered chess and was chess something big in your neighborhood growing up in Jamaica, - Chess was not that big.

I was hanging out with my older brother and his friends.

They were playing chess.

I decided to play along.

I liked the game, but I didn't fall in love until Brooklyn Technical High School where I went.

I was a sophomore.

I saw a friend of mine, a classmate playing chess.

I knew I was a smart kid, won a lot of games, so I decided I would crush him.

Turns out he crushed me.

Fortunately, there was a book in the library.

I didn't go looking for it, it just seemed to just jump off the bookshelf.

I checked it out, read the whole book, went to play my friend, he crushed me again.

Turns out he had read that book and a bunch of other books, but that started the love affair.

From there I was reading like crazy and eventually I did beat my friend.

- Yeah.

And then becoming the first Black grandmaster in history.

That's huge.

How did that impact your life and how do you think that impacted chess?

- It changed my life certainly.

I mean, it was a lifelong goal of mine to become a grandmaster ever since those days back at Brooklyn Tech.

And I got a lot more recognition and a lot more opportunities from it, frankly.

In terms of the broader world of chess, you know, it's been 25 years since I became a grandmaster and there hasn't been another African American who has accomplished the same feat.

So for me, I think that's a little bit depressing, quite frankly.

And from a legacy standpoint, I'd like to see more change.

So I'm pushing now with young people who are talented, identifying some talented ones, even coaching one right now and plan to coach more so that there can be more players representing this diverse coalition of chess players all around the world.

- Maurice Ashley, thank you so much.

- Thanks for having me.

- And congrats on everything.

- Thank you.

- [Narrator] Wesley So is almost always smiling, but the same can't be said for his opponents.

Before transferring to the US Chess Federation in 2014, he was already a three-time Philippine chess champion.

But after the change in scenery, he quickly ascended to the ranks of the world's elite grandmasters.

The two-time grand chess tour champion reached new heights in 2017, climbing to number two in the world.

He followed up this monumental achievement by becoming a world champion Candidate in 2018 and the inaugural Fisher random world champion in 2019.

Whether So pursues more world championship titles or chess continues enjoying and playing chess, he will not only go down as arguably one of the best players in US history, but one of the best players to ever play the game.

- College chess has become a recognized sport in many major schools.

With scholarships and international competitions, young college players are now competing as part of their curriculum.

Cristian Chirila is a grandmaster born in Romania who now calls Columbia Missouri home.

He's a great ambassador for the game of chess and also the head coach of the chess team at the University of Missouri.

(bright music) - I'm Cristian Chirila and I'm the head coach and director of the chess program at the University of Missouri.

We've had some success throughout the years.

We are national champions right now, actually.

We just won in at the beginning of 2024.

In January we won the Pan-American Championships.

That's the most prestigious collegiate event in chess.

And this was the first time that we won it.

In terms of level, college chess is up there.

We have professional chess players, in fact, coming and competing for their respective colleges.

But at the same time, they also want to continue their career as chess professionals.

These kids, they are 18, 19, whenever they come to college.

They've been playing professional chess for a while now.

You can definitely get a scholarship for chess and in fact, I've done that myself when I moved here from Romania to the US more than a decade ago.

I came here to the United States on a chess scholarship and a lot of our players are getting a full ride scholarship.

Recruitment is a big part of my job and we don't have as many spots.

It's very competitive.

We don't have 80 scholarships to give away.

We only have between eight and 10 scholarships to give away.

We are definitely at a moment in time where some rivalries are brewing up.

And of course, within the State of Missouri, we have some very strong programs.

One of them is Webster, the other one is SLU, St. Louis University.

And there's also some very strong colleges in Texas as well.

I wouldn't say we're necessarily rivals, but we do get to compete against each other on a regular basis, yes.

There are some expectations.

You have to meet a certain grade point average GPA.

Quite high in that regard to maintain your scholarship.

But you also need to practice to come to training.

We have training sessions in the chess room with the whole team.

It's a great environment.

Players are helping each other.

We also have this chess team facility, which is open to our players.

They can come in 24/7.

They can do their homework in the chess team.

It's a great facility to have.

It's a great environment to be in.

If you are looking to grow as an athlete, grow as a student as well.

It's very important to use those crucial years between 18 to 20 something to put yourself on the right path.

If you are a motivated chess player, a motivated student as well, and you want to continue growing your expertise and getting a degree globally recognized, you should definitely consider coming to Mizzou and joining the chess program.

(bright music) - Hi, everyone.

In this lesson, we're gonna learn how to checkmate with the queen and bishop.

In this position, black is material up, however, it's our move and we are gonna use it wisely.

In this position, we are gonna take Queen C7, check.

And black cannot take the queen because our bishop on E5 protecting the queen.

Therefore, black has to play king A7 or king A8.

They have only two squares to go.

They cannot go to C8 because queen is protecting the C8 square as well.

Therefore, let's move to King to A7.

Here, we have checkmate in one move, which is queen A5.

This is a checkmate because it king cannot go back to B8.

Our E5 bishop is still covering the B eight square, therefore, disposition is checkmate.

- 2024 is the year of the Candidates tournament.

The winner will go on to play for the world championship next year.

And for the first time ever, both men and women will play at the same time and the same place.

Toronto, Canada.

We also have an incredible slate of tournaments throughout the year.

The grand chess tour kicks off its 2024 campaign soon.

Here's a preview of what's to come.

(bright music) - [Narrator] One of the richest and highest rated chess tours in the world starts its ninth season in May.

A collaboration of the St. Louis Chess club and chess icon, Garry Kasparov, the Grand Chess Tour brings together the best players in the world and a challenging five-stop tour with top prize money over 1 1/2 million for this year.

The defending champion is number two in the world.

Grandmaster Fabiano Caruana who finished the tour last year with wins at the St. Louis Sinquefield Cup and St. Louis Rapid & Blitz events.

The excitement of the Grand Chess Tour stems not just from the elite list of players and the amazing prize money, but also from the combination of classical and Rapid & Blitz events.

And for the first time, the GCT will start with a Rapid & Blitz event.

The Superbet Rapid & Blitz from Warsaw, Poland.

The schedule is rounded out with two more Rapid & Blitz stops and two classical events including the Sinquefield Cup in St. Louis at the end of August.

It truly is a world tour.

There are nine players chosen as full tour participants, which this year, includes the world's very best.

Starting with Fabi, the list includes GM Ian Nepomniachtchi ranked number seven in the world.

Young phenom GM Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, the youngest tour participant.

and St. Louis's own GM Wesley So who won the tour in 2021.

Besides these nine great players, there are wild cards added each year.

Wild cards drop into the tournament stops to fill out the field.

In the past, they've included none other than many time world champion Magnus Carlsen, and India's great chess hero, Viswanathan Anand.

You'll be able to watch all the action on the live Grand Chess Tour stream with commentary originating from our St. Louis studios.

The Grand Chess Tour, simply the best in chess.

(bright music) - Fabi, it's great to have you here.

We're here in St. Louis, the city you call home and also the capital of chess here in America.

What would you say is your biggest challenge to winning the Candidates tournament?

You've done it before, 2018.

What's your biggest challenge this time around, do you think?

- Well, I think that, I mean, you have a challenge from all the players because they're all very tenacious and they all want to do their best to win their working very hard towards this goal.

So for many players, they'll look at it as like a once in a lifetime goal to win the Kansas to potentially become world champion.

But I think the bigger struggle is always a personal one because if you bring your best chess, there is a chance of course that it won't be enough.

You could do your best and you could even have a great tournament and just someone is a tiny step ahead of you.

But more often than not, if you bring your best, then you do have a very good chance of succeeding.

So I think if I think back on like, what went wrong in the past, it wasn't that my opponents were too far ahead, that I couldn't catch them, it was that I did something a little bit wrong in my own plan.

- What do you think you learned from the first time around in 2018 and then challenging madness?

You've been through this before.

Do you feel like going through this process at this point in time, you are sort of more prepared for it?

Did you learn something from the first time around in 2018 that has you even more ready this time around?

- I think that I did learn things from every time I played the Candidates and even the time that I won.

But for example, last time, I was, let's say, my most experienced up to that point, and it was maybe my biggest disappointment.

And the first time I played the Candidates was two years before I won it in 2016 was my first Candidates.

And I was basically a hair away from winning, even without the experience and without good preparation.

Because sometimes, it's also good to have that like optimism and freshness and not everything works out perfectly, but not everything has to work out perfectly.

Like again, as I mentioned, I think it's also a very personal thing.

So even if some circumstances are going against you, let's say health for example, I was sick during the first half of 2016 and maybe preparation isn't perfect and you don't have all the experience in the world, but it's very much like putting your best out there and fighting till the very end and all those other things are just as important.

And that's what I didn't do well last time.

I didn't fight my best and I got too emotional.

I ended up failing at the critical moment.

So hopefully, this time, I can improve on that.

- Well, congratulations on everything that you've achieved so far and we're very excited to see what 2024 has in store for you in Warby.

Watching every step of the way, that's for sure.

- Thank you Sharon.

- [Sharon] Yeah, thanks for hanging out with us.

- [Narrator] Nazi Paikidze is an international master in women's grandmaster from the Eastern European country of Georgia.

She grew into a determined competitor honing her skills, playing tournaments across Europe, representing her age group as a four-time European youth champion and a two-time world youth champion.

Paikidze transferred to the American Chess Federation in 2014.

Nazi immediately showed that she belonged, taking second place in her first ever US Women's Championship appearance.

The following year in 2016, she won it all.

Repeating the feat again in 2018 to become a two-time US women's champion.

Nazi's playing days are far from over as she continues competing in elite events like the 2024 American Cup and continues to blaze new paths and inspire future generations of American women.

- I hope you enjoyed this episode of "Today in Chess," featuring some of the best of chess from all over the world.

There are so many opportunities for you to get involved and we hope you do.

Thanks for watching and see you next time on "Today in Chess."

(bright 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.