"Chess is addicting! (Fortunately, there is no known cure!)"
"Chess
Life" ... isn't that redundant? Chess IS Life!
Probably the best of
the "personal homepage" style chess sites on
the web, this one has actual content; tidbits, opinions,
essays, problems, etc. Especially useful for those new to
online chess, Ed has a section comparing the various
chess servers, and a page devoted to the WinBoard
interface. The above description of this Thanks! |
I stumbled onto your outstanding
chess page while doing a net search for chess-related
topics. Your page combines lots of useful info with your
sparkling wit. I've owned my PC since last April and have
never enjoyed a page as much as I did yours. And thanks
for the link to FICS. Somebody at work said that they
played chess at Yahoo! and I wondered how good their site
could be. Having read your critique, my suspicions were
confirmed. The above comments were |
I've seen a lot of great
websites out there, but yours is the first one that has
moved me to write this kind of message of appreciation. I
think it's tremendously well done and obviously a labor
of love. I'm fond of chess -- started playing at around 10 but never very seriously. I'm now 76 and think that I played better when I was 10, but that's besides the point. Your site has encouraged me to get back to devoting a little time to the game. Many thanks. The above comments come from Robert Safier. Whoa! Thanks for the kind words! |
A position
from one of my over-the-board |
Several
years ago, when I lived in |
This chess page of mine was the Link of the Month in December 2000 from the |
Whoo hoo hoo! Another Link of the Month award! This one is from for the month of May 2002! Thanks gang! |
Note: Since I get several hundred hits to this chess page
of mine each and every month, and since many chess
players may also be fans of the board game Stratego,
this seems like a good place to mention my
Stratego Site!
I've been playing chess
regularly since 1972 and it will always
remain one of my passions. I'm currently rated 1677
according to the latest United States Chess Federation Rating Report. This is a drop from 1741! Agghhhh!!! Here's the one
beef I have with the |
The United States Chess
Federation recently started offering a new member
benefit - Online Chess Play! It's known as I'm a former Administrator at this
server, My handle is EdCollins. |
Click on the USCL graphic for more information. Brand new! |
When I'm not playing at the above US
Chess Live site, you might find me
playing rated games on FICS, the My handle there is also EdCollins. I've currently played over 4,500 rated games on this server alone. I'm also former Administrator on this site, so again, if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask. |
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Interested in knowing how
badly you're lagging on FICS? Although FICS currently
does not have its own "ping" command, if you're
running Windows 95 (and probably 98) you can still ping
yourself very easily, without downloading anything at
all. Here's how. Whoops! As of |
Here are eight different FICS login screens I designed. There is nothing wrong with the one FICS is currently using, but I felt it would be a refreshing change to see something new when we log on. I'd like to see one of these implemented, but I had fun designing them even if the powers that be choose not to do so. |
When I'm not playing rated games on US Chess Live, FICS, or Chess.net, I might be chatting with friends and playing unrated games at ICC, the World's Most Expensive On-line Chess Club. My tell variable will always be set to 1, so other guests like yourself will be able to chat with me. I'll be logged into channel 198 and 199. Do a inchan 198 199 command to see the people who are in both of those channels. (For the past several months, I've been the only guest in both.) |
The worst and most often heard chess joke / pun... usually heard at Christmas:
A group
of chess enthusiasts checked into a hotel and were
standing in the lobby discussing their recent tournament
victories.
The hotel manager immediately came over and asked
them to disperse. "But why?" they asked.
"Because," he said, "I can't stand chess nuts
boasting in an open foyer."
Can you solve this logic
problem? A
game started with 1.f3 How did the game go? Note:
It's not all that hard to figure out. |
From the starting position,
how many moves do you think it would take you to achieve
a position where both sides have 9 Queens? Try it
yourself and then see what is believed to be the ultimate solution. |
Here's a logic problem with a chess theme! | One of my
favorite chess compositions! |
In The Open,
a movie about six friends who get
together for a local tournament, improving their lives
and their game. Each character has their own story that intertwines with the others. The friends are all very different in personality and interests, but they have the common love of the game that binds them together. |
In the October 1997 issue of Chess Life, I was fortunate enough to have one of my letters published in their monthly Letters To The Editor column! I wrote this letter in rebuttal to a few other letters that were published a couple of months prior to that. |
Chess on Jeopardy! The TV game show Jeopardy recently had "Chess Mania" as a category! Check it out! |
54 different newspaper comic strips all with a chess-related theme! |
If you enjoy playing chess
at Yahoo!, I hope you're aware of the advantages the
chess servers offer over that site. If not, check out my Yahoo! Chess vs. the Chess Servers page! |
Here are a few |
Here's a tribute to my
favorite Internet chess server interface: WinBoard version 4.2.4 |
Here's an article by Brad Stone on FICS and ICC. It's a few years old now, but still entertaining and informative. |
Moments
to be worried at a chess tournament and Symptoms of Chess Addicts. |
Would you believe I once
missed a mate-in-one in a rated tournament game?? See for yourself! |
The Continuing Chronicles of
Grandmaster Gary and Loudmouth Larry |
The results are all in my my "Vote for your favorite board image!" See which image won and take part in another vote! |
Why I Don't Pay for Internet Chess |
My current record in OTB rated tournaments is 103 - 76 - 34. Here's a |
The Category 17 (2674)
Hoogovens Tournament in Wijk aan Zee was held from January 16th, through Jan 31st, 1999. The event included Kasparov, Anand, Shirov, Svidler, Kramnik, Yermolinsky, Topalov and several other top GM's. Here is the final crosstable of the
event _________________________ Here
is the final crosstable and games of the
first _________________________ And here are
the games from the... |
Chess Puzzle!
Can you make consecutive moves for White and manuever the King to the f1 square without ever entering the g2 square? (You can't enter the g2 square... it's guarded by the Black knight!) The three pawns never move and no piece may leave the 3x3 area.
|
Here's a very enjoyable
article by GM Yasser Seirawan titled Whose Title Is It, Anyway? which first appeared in the August 1998 issue of GAMES magazine. |
I enjoy these immensely. Check out a Glossary of Chess Terms. I'm not sure how long it will stay up, but check out this page which gives the results for a recent on-line New Chess Glossary contest. I can hardly believe it but... I won! |
You Make the Chess Call! See if you would rule correctly on these official rules of chess! |
My collection of Chess Books! |
What do you
get when you cross the game |
If your
Internet chess interface is still saving your games in
what is known as the "oldmoves format" you may
be interested in a (Note: most interfaces nowadays are able to save your games straight to a PGN file.) |
How
to create a |
|
Here's an
entertaining article I found titled My only
fault with this article |
Photos from the 2001 National Open |
In 1999 I completed a 15
round, single round-robin tournament between 16 of my
WinBoard-compatible freeware chess engines. The story,
results, and standings, in a text file, |
Chess Problems! Problems 1 - 10 White to Play |
A promotional shot for the 1970s television show Charlie's Angels starring Jaclyn Smith, Kate Jackson, and Farrah Fawcett-Majors. |
This image can be found all over on eBay... but it was reversed! A black square was in the lower right-hand corner! (Obviously I could not stand for this so I simply reversed the image with Paint Shop Pro.) |
Would you believe a stalemate can
occur in as few as 10 moves! 1.e3 a5 2.Qh5 Ra6 3.Qxa5 h5 4.Qxc7 Rah6 5.h4 f6 6.Qxd7+ Kf7 7.Qxb7 Qd3 8.Qxb8 Qh7 9.Qc8 Kg6 10.Qe6
|
That's amazing! But I think this
12-move stalemate in which no pieces
are captured is even more
amazing! 1.d4 e5 2.Qd2 e4 3.a4 a5 4.Qf4 f5 5.h3 Qh4 6.Qh2 Bb4+ 7.Nd2 d6 8.Ra3 Be6 9.Rg3 Bb3 10.c4 c5 11.f3 f4 12.d5 e3
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My mom
created the image below.
Looking for information on
the Garry Kasparov vs. The World chess match? If so, click here. |
Interested in purchasing a
personalized, commemorative photo of this match? If so, click here! |
Remember the Garry Kasparov
- Deep Blue rematch that was held in May of '97?
Here's
a couple of limericks I The
12 actual games Garry played against Deep Blue, from both
matches, can be found here. After
the above mentioned match, |
Here is a |
Here's a humorous WAV
file (234 KB in size) in which Gary
Kasparov and Deep Blue compete in... are you ready for
this... a swimming match!
I liked it! The length of the WAV file lasts for about a
minute and a half. The quality originally was terrible --
the volume was much too low and you could hear a lot of
static and hiss in the background. I took the time to
increase the volume and filter out some of the noise.
It's still not great... but it is much better. The 24 blitz games Garry Kasparov and Vladimir Kramnik played in their match over Thanksgiving weekend in 1998 in Moscow can be found here. Garry is no longer World Champion! Here are the 15 games from the recent Brain Games World Championship. |
Here's a text
file,
in PGN format, of 731 of Bobby's tournament games. |
Note that this file is more accurate
than many other similar files you will find on the
Internet. For one, all PGN tags for his name are
identical. (Some Fischer game files list one game as "R
Fischer" and than the next game as "Robert
Fischer" and then another game as "Fischer,
R" etc.) This file also has duplicate games
eliminated, something a few other files I have found do
not. Third, when at all possible, all games have been placed in chronological order. It's about 486,000 bytes in size, so it will take a few moments to fully load. |
Bobby Fischer (Andrews/Lazy
Susan) Bobby Fischer beat Spassky
in Iceland in '72. I
wish I had the smarts to understand her charts. In
Tampa Bay and Lafayette they all know Bobby Fischer's
name. She
said: "I drink chocolate milk, from a cow I built. They're
all saying that you'll never play again. Spies
in hideouts send their secret messages. Reykjavik,
no one ever says Reykjavik in a song. They're
all saying that you'll never play again. Spies
in hideouts send their secret messages. |
Robert
Byrne vs. Robert Fischer
Final round of the 1958-59 United States Championship
Fischer's Ten Best Chess Players
1964 Alexander
Alekhine |
1970 Mikhail
Botvinnik |
Here's a scan of the covers
of Life, Sports Illustrated, Chess Life & Review, and Newsweek when Fischer appeared on the cover. |
Speaking of Fischer, we do
have one thing in common -- we've both defeated players
who are now Grandmasters! I was fortunate enough to
defeat Tal Shaked in a simul he gave at However, my friend Brent Bowers, who was sitting to my immediate right, went one better. First he defeated Tal, then he played him again and held him to a draw! Good work, Brent! We still have a joke about his first
game. Tal saw the win long before Brent did. Here's a piece of advice: |
Although this chess program
will interest almost none of you, I'm putting a copy of
it up here anyway because hey, this is MY homepage.
<grin> It's a chess program called
EdChess. I recently took a look at it this program again and it brought back a lot of memories. It's a chess program with the simplest of graphics... if you can call them graphics. It uses ASCII characters to display the pieces! The program was written by David Hendricks and John T. Bell over a period of three years. This is version 2.30 and to my knowledge, was the last version released. The four files that make up the program are zipped up and are only about 78KB in size. (Trust me, if you don't wish to download this I won't be disappointed.) |