Courses (1087)

For decades, the French Defense has demanded a complete answer to White's alternatives. Players comfortable against the Advance, Tarrasch, or Steinitz often find themselves unprepared when White sidesteps theory with 2.d3, 2.Qe2, or the deceptively simple Exchange Variation. GM Szymon Gumularz and GM Pier Luigi Basso now complete their French Defense series by tackling precisely these gaps—offering a unified repertoire against every system White can throw at you after 1.e4 e6.

The Queen's Indian Defense has long been chess's quiet answer to 1.d4 — a hypermodern system where Black controls the center from a distance rather than occupying it directly. Yet for decades, players seeking active counterplay gravitated toward sharper systems like the King's Indian, treating the Queen's Indian as a fallback option.

GM Mitrabha Guha challenges that assumption head-on. In his debut Modern Chess course, the Indian grandmaster presents the Queen's Indian not as a drawing weapon, but as one of the rare Black openings where you can genuinely play for the win against 1.d4. His repertoire is built around 4...Bb7 rather than the more forcing 4...Ba6, emphasizing deep positional understanding over memorization — a choice that makes the opening both more resilient and more instructive.

The Slav Defense with 4...Bf5 has always been Black's most principled attempt to solve the opening's central problem: developing the light-squared bishop before closing the position with ...e6. It's theoretically sound, strategically ambitious, and demands precise understanding rather than pure memorization.
In this second volume of their Positional Slav for White repertoire project, GM Alexey Dreev and GM Pier Luigi Basso present a classical yet deeply modern approach built around the flexible 7.Be2 — delaying Nxg6 until White can dictate the most favorable moment for the exchange. But what sets this course apart is its format: most chapters are structured as analytical conversations between the two authors, exploring not just what to play, but how to think in these middlegames.

Viktor Korchnoi didn't play the French Defense — he fought with it. While Rubinstein gave the opening its strategic foundations and Petrosian refined it into a tool of prophylactic perfection, Korchnoi transformed the French into something entirely different: a weapon of uncompromising combativeness. This third volume in GM Pier Luigi Basso's Understand the French Defense series presents the opening through the eyes of one of history's most resilient fighters, revealing how "ugly" positions and concrete energy can overcome even the most objectively balanced evaluations.

When Bobby Fischer called the Paulsen "one of Black's soundest defenses," he was acknowledging something fundamental: flexibility without predictability. Half a century later, GM Harshit Raja's new course revives this principle for the modern game. Where the Najdorf forces immediate concrete knowledge and the Dragon demands theoretical precision move by move, the Paulsen offers something rarer — strategic maneuverability combined with genuine winning chances. Harshit's repertoire is built around 5...a6, a move order that delays ...Qc7 and preserves Black's options across multiple pawn structures.

When GM Daniil Dubov unveiled his ...h5 Dragon setup at the elite level, many thought the Yugoslav Attack needed renovation. When Magnus Carlsen started mixing Dragon structures with Najdorf timing via the Dragdorf, others wondered if White's classical approach still held water. The authors of this course — GM Jose Martinez Alcantara, IM Dragos Ceres, and GM Pier Luigi Basso — came to a different conclusion: the Yugoslav Attack doesn't need to be abandoned. It needs to be rebuilt with precision tools that account for every modern deviation Black has invented over the past decade.

When IM Kushager Krishnater set out to create the second installment of his Open Sicilian repertoire, he made a deliberate choice: avoid the mainline theoretical highways where preparation battles are won and lost at move 25. Instead, his approach treats the Sicilian as a strategic battleground where understanding trumps memorization.
Against both 2...e6 and 2...Nc6, Krishnater recommends lines that are fresh, relatively unexplored, and designed to steer opponents away from their home preparation. The philosophy is consistent throughout: choose the move that creates normal Sicilian structures rather than entering forcing variations that reward the player with the stronger engine.

The Open Sicilian has always been chess's ultimate proving ground. While theory sprawls endlessly across hundreds of sub-variations, elite preparation has increasingly favored a different approach: flexible, pressure-oriented systems that force opponents into uncomfortable territory early. Rather than memorizing 25 moves deep into established main lines, the modern trend is toward fresh move orders and sideline deviations that retain all the objective punch while amplifying practical discomfort.
IM Kushager Krishnater builds his repertoire on precisely this philosophy. His complete Open Sicilian system after 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 promises maximum practical pressure without sacrificing theoretical soundness.

When GM Vidit Gujrathi sat down to face Alireza Firouzja at the Candidates 2024, he didn't reach for the safe repertoire choices that dominate modern preparation. He played 6.Bc4 — the Sozin Attack — and Firouzja's surprise was visible.
The line Fischer and Kasparov wielded as a weapon had become a rarity at the absolute top. But rarity isn't the same as refutation. As Vidit proved, and as GM Jose Martinez Alcantara and IM Dragos Ceres demonstrate throughout this course, the Sozin remains one of the most concrete and dangerous systems White can employ against the Najdorf and Classical Sicilian structures.

10 Must-Know Games in the Catalan by GM Pier Luigi Basso is not a theory course. It is not a variation dump. It is a carefully curated tour through six decades of the sharpest, most instructive, most iconic Catalan battles ever played—games that reveal why this quiet diagonal remains the ultimate positional weapon at the highest level.