GM Peter Svidler (and goodbye, for now...)

(Newly-minted) FM James Canty III was the very first guest on 64: A Chess Podcast, and on the 1-year anniversary of the podcast, he re-joins the show to update me about his journey towards the GM title, his growth as a Twitch streamer, and the habits which allow him to achieve his goals. FM Canty has an infectious passion for chess, and it really shines through in this episode. James is a true friend of the pod, and it's always great to catch up with him! If you want to support him on his own journey towards the GM title, subscribe to him on Twitch and subscribe to his YouTube. I hope this interview becomes a yearly tradition, and otherwise, thank you so much for the last year of streams <3 Cheers to another year of episodes!64: A Chess Podcast is sponsored by Chessable -- if you want to learn more about Chessable & my favorite courses, check out go.chessable.com/64podCheck out 64: A Chess Channel and if you liked the show, follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!Also, if you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks to Chessable for sponsoring 64: A Chess Podcast, and thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast as well -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

25 Mar 202257min

GM Noël Studer is a (2-time) Swiss Chess Champion. He was awarded the grandmaster title when he was 20 years old, making him the youngest person in Switzerland's history to reach GM. During his chess career, he played many top events including the Biel Chess Festival, GRENKE Open, and Gibraltar Masters; he also represented Switzerland in several Chess Olympiads. He started "Next Level Chess", a chess blog, in March 2021, and announced his retirement from professional chess in August 2021 to focus on his health and on helping others improve their chess. You can follow him on Twitter here.I'd tried to get GM Studer on the podcast for almost a year, and the wait was certainly worth it! We dived deep into his chess blog, and discussed the state of professional chess in 2022. Noël was gracious enough to share some anecdotes from his days as an up and coming professional chess player, and was uninhibited when sharing his opinions about FIDE and what needs to happen next for the growth of chess as a sport. I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I enjoyed recording it!Check out "Next Level Chess" to start making serious improvement towards your chess goals. Sign up for Noël's newsletter here: https://nextlevelchess.blog/newsletter/64: A Chess Podcast is sponsored by Chessable -- if you want to learn more about Chessable & my favorite courses, check out go.chessable.com/64podCheck out 64: A Chess Channel and if you liked the show, follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!Also, if you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks to Chessable for sponsoring 64: A Chess Podcast, and thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast as well -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

20 Mar 202259min

Tarjei Svensen is the most prolific journalist working in the chess world today. Currently writing featured articles on chess24, Tarjei has also written for Chess.com, and many other platforms. With over 21,000 followers on Twitter, Tarjei is also one of my main sources for chess updates + tournament coverage for my own podcast. Tarjei joined me earlier this week to talk about the impact of the Russian invasion on the future of chess. Tarjei shared his thoughts on Sergey Karjakin's future in chess, being unblocked by Hikaru Nakamura on Twitter, and shared some of his favorite stories that he's written for the chess world. I didn't mention this on the podcast, but going into college I wanted to be a journalist, and I learned a lot from Tarjei -- hope to have him back on the podcast again :-) until then, you can follow Tarjei on Twitter here. (Also, I apologize for mispronouncing your name!) 64: A Chess Podcast is sponsored by Chessable! If you want to learn more about Chessable & my favorite courses, check out go.chessable.com/64podCheck out 64: A Chess Channel and if you liked the show, follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!Also, if you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks to Chessable for sponsoring 64: A Chess Podcast, and thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast as well -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

14 Mar 202244min

It's been almost a month since I recorded an episode of 64: A Chess Podcast, and in that time some cataclysmic events have occurred on our planet. Russia has invaded Ukraine, starting a war that has been internationally condemned by both opponents and allies of Putin. This war has obviously led to a massive loss of live and outflow of refugees from Ukraine, but it has also had consequences on the chess world. Joining me to talk about Ukraine and his own chess career is IM Yuriy Krykun, a Ukranian-born chess player currently residing in St. Louis, USA as a chess coach and critically acclaimed chess author. Yuriy played on the Webster University chess team under coach GM Susan Polgar, and achieved the IM title in Autumn 2020, when chess tournaments globally were just starting up again. Yuriy's love for chess is infectious and I really hope to record a podcast with him again! Until then, you can follow him on Twitter here.I also would like to announce that 64: A Chess Podcast is officially sponsored by Chessable! I'll be collaborating with them over the next few weeks/months on giveaways and community events, so stay tuned for the future :-)As a reminder, I have a Youtube channel -- 64: A Chess Channel -- so check it out and please subscribe if you enjoyed this episode! You can also follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!If you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks to Chessable for sponsoring 64: A Chess Podcast, and thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast as well -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

6 Mar 20221h 16min

Last weekend, World Champion Magnus Carlsen played for his club Offerspill on 1st board in the top flight of the Norwegian League, and was miraculously held to a draw by Norwegian IM Geir Sune Østmoe. The game made International headlines as Magnus, who is currently pursuing the goal of 2900 Elo, lost all the Elo he gained after winning Tata Steel just a few days prior.IM Østmoe and GM Carlsen were opponents several times in the early 2000s, when both were youth players competing for chess glory in Norway; this week, I am joined by IM Østmoe to talk about the crazy game he played, the last few days of internet fame, his recollections of Norwegian chess across the last two decades (including playing and befriending a young Magnus), and his thoughts on what Magnus is going to do next. Geir also has a long career as a chess composer, and it was delightful to learn about chess composition from someone who is a FM in chess composition and who has competed in the World Championship of Chess Composition. Thanks so much Geir for coming on the podcast!Don't forget to follow Geir on Twitter! If you liked the episode, please consider subscribing and leaving a review :-)As a reminder, I have a Youtube channel -- 64: A Chess Channel -- so check it out and please subscribe if you enjoyed this episode! You can also follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!If you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

10 Feb 202259min

This week I'm joined by FM Anna-Maja Kazarian. FM Kazarian, as of recording this episode, has over 23,000 Twitch followers, and is signed to the e-sports organization Alliance as a content creator and competitive chess player. She won the Dutch Online Women's Chess Championship in 2021, and has played in several OTB tournaments, trying to bring her rating back to 2300+. She started streaming a little under two years ago and has cultivated a positive, welcoming community on her one-of-a-kind Twitch stream. Anna-Maja recently played in the World Rapid and Blitz in Warsaw, Poland at the end of 2021, so I asked her a bunch of questions about what it was like to be back OTB around some of the greatest chess players of our time. We then dove into the highs and lows of streaming chess. I also asked Anna-Maja about her thoughts on FIDE declaring 2022 as the "Year of the Woman" in chess, and more broadly talked with her about what the chess world can do to be more welcoming to female players, and to narrow the gender gap in chess. As someone who has watched Anna-Maja's streams for a few months, it was really cool to interview her on my podcast! I hope we do it again and I thank her for coming on the show this weekend. As a reminder, I have a Youtube channel -- 64: A Chess Channel -- so check it out and please subscribe if you enjoyed this episode! You can also follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!If you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!PS: If you haven't yet, make sure to check out Anna-Maja's amazing Twitch stream and give her a follow & subscribe!

31 Jan 20221h 19min

This week I am joined by FM Nate Solon. Away from the board, FM Solon is a data scientist, which informs his work when blogging and writing about chess. Years ago he was a professional poker player, and to this day is a somewhat active chess player. He also works as a consultant for Chessable, a member of the Play Magnus Group.This discussion with Nate, about studying and improving at chess in the context of engines and computers, is one of the most fascinating and deep discussions I've ever hosted on the podcast. As someone who works with big data for my research job, it's exciting to learn that chess is really on the brink of an open-source data boom, where anyone can use Python and free databases to create different kinds of engines and methods to study chess. If you have an itch for data science, or want to hear two people nerd out about it, then this is the episode for you. I really want to thank FM Nate Solon for coming on the show earlier this week to record. This is one of my favorite episodes of 64: A Chess Podcast, and I'm going to use what Nate told me to create new ways for me to study chess :)As a reminder, I have a Youtube channel -- 64: A Chess Channel -- so check it out and please subscribe if you enjoyed this episode! You can also follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!If you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!Don't forget to subscribe to FM Nate Solon's fantastic newsletter! We covered his articles about club-level opening explorations and touched upon his checklist for chess improvement.

23 Jan 20221h 10min

This week I am joined by the lads from the Chess Pit Podcast-- Jon, Phil, and Robin. I came on their podcast during the Magnus-Nepo match and discussed the state of the chess media-sphere (you can check out that episode here). We continued that discussion on this episode of 64: A Chess Podcast, and also gave our thoughts on the perils of being hyperfixated on immediate and stark chess improvement.Talking with the Chess Pit guys made me feel like I was sitting on my couch talking sports with my pals. John, Phil, and Robin are hilarious -- please give them a follow on Twitter, and subscribe to their podcast! -- I'm a big fan of theirs and super grateful that they found time to record with me last week! I hope we do it again soon.Also, I've made a Youtube channel -- 64: A Chess Channel -- so check it out and please subscribe if you enjoyed this episode! You can also follow me on Twitter and Twitch :-) thanks again for listening to this week's episode of 64!If you like what you've heard this week and want to support my podcast financially, you can subscribe to my Patreon for as little as $1 a month!Thanks as always to Aimchess for sponsoring the podcast -- use code "DAVID30" to get 30% off of your first month with Aimchess!

17 Jan 20221h 9min