by Artur Yusupov, 304pp. (Quality Chess, 2009)

 

Renowned grandmaster Artur Yusupov completes his course of chess improvement.

Volume 1, The Fundamentals, showed club players the basic ideas they should know. Volume 2, Beyond the Basics, set off on the road to mastery and now in Volume 3 we arrive at our final destination.

 

Yusupov guides the reader using carefully selected positions and advice. This new understanding is then tested by a series of puzzles.

 

Artur Yusupov was ranked No. 3 in the world from 1986 to 1992, just behind the legendary Karpov and Kasparov. He has won everything there is to win in chess except for the World Championship.

In recent years he has mainly worked as a chess trainer with players ranging from current World Champion Anand to local amateurs in Germany, where he resides.

 

CONTENTS

Key to symbols used 4
Preface 5
Introduction 6
1 Combinations involving promotion 8
2 Evaluation of the position 20
3 Pawn endings 34
4 Rook against bishop 44
5 Opening repertoire for White with 1.d4 56
6 The isolated pawn 68
7 Playing against the isolated pawn 82
8 Simple tactics 94
9 The backward pawn 104
10 Bishop endings 114
11 French Defence 124
12 Training with studies 138
13 Blockade 148
14 Drawing combinations 160
15 Opposite-coloured bishops 168
16 Opening repertoire for White with 1.d4 (Part 2) 178
17 The elimination method 192
18 Hanging pawns 200
19 Playing against hanging pawns 212
20 Simple tactics 2 226
21 Doubled pawns 236
22 Opening repertoire for Black against 1.d4 248
23 The comparison method 260
24 Rook against knight 272
Final test 282
Appendices
Index of composers 292
Index of games 293
Recommended books 300

 

IM John Donaldson, JeremySilman.com:
"Very helpful for almost all players below 2200 who learned how to play chess outside the Soviet Union. With very few exceptions such players have fundamental gaps in thier knowledge."

Read an excerpt