Grandmaster's Openings Laboratory

270 Pages·2013·3.665 MB·English

by  Igor Smirnov

E-BOOK VERSION COMPILED BY
PEKCHA
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Chess teacher:
Grandmaster Igor Smirnov

The Grandmaster’s Openings Laboratory
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Contents

A. Video Course Lessons Part 5

 Lesson 1 – “Forget about the openings!” 6
 Lesson 2 – “How to choose the openings?” 10
 Lesson 3 – “The Practical description of all the openings” 16
 Lesson 4 – “How to learn the openings effectively?” 31
 Lesson 5 – Your powerful opening repertoire.” 40

B. Practical Part 45

 Instruction For The Practical Part 46

 Black Section 47
- A. Benko Gambit 48
 Benko Section 48
 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.Nf3 Section 87
- B. Scandinavian Defense 91
- C. Sicilian Defense 102
 Kan Variation 102
 Mora Gambit 107
 King Indian Attack 110

 White Section 114
- A. 1. e4 e5 115
 Spanish Game 115
 Petrov’s Defence 125
 Philidor’s Defense 129
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Contents

- B. Sicilian Defense 134
 Najdorf 134
 Rauzer 142
 Scheveninger (Keres Attack) 150
 Dragon 155
 Variation Qb6 162
 Kan 165
 Sveshnikov 218
 Accelerated Dragon 228
- C. French Defense 233
- D. Caro-Kann Defense 237
- E. Scandinavian Defense 241
- F. Pirc Defense 245
- G. Alekhine’s Defense 248

C. New Opening Lines 252

 A. King Indian Defense 253
 B. Gruenfeld Defense 259
 C. Sicilian Defense – 5.f3 Line 261
 D. Sicilian Defense – 6.f4 Line 266
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The Grandmaster’s Openings Laboratory
Video Course Lessons Part:
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THE GRANDMASTER’S OPENINGS LABORATORY
by GM Igor Smirnov
Lesson 1: “Forget about the openings!”

Hi everyone! I am Igor Smirnov, International Grandmaster and a chess coach. This is the
chess course “The Grandmaster’s openings laboratory”.
In modern chess, opening theory has developed significantly. There are a lot of books,
databases, programs, articles, video lessons, DVDs and so on about the openings. Some
players are obsessed with trying to learn all this stuff! It takes a lot of time and doesn’t bring
great progress. The main problem for the chess players now is how to deal with all this
information and how to use it effectively. This course will help you to do it.
Here is the first lesson: “Forget about the openings!”
The title of this lesson probably seems strange to you. But I am not joking. This is really my
first advice to you: forget about the openings!
Now I am going to explain this idea in more detail.
When the new student asks me for help, most often he says something like this: “I’ve got
problems in Najdorf variation. Recently my opponent made the powerful move, which I
haven’t seen before, and I lost quickly. I think my openings preparation is not as good as it
should be, so could you help me to solve this problem, please?” After that, I usually ask the
pupil to show me several of his games. In these games, I always can see that an evaluation
of the position have been changed many times during the game. For example, after the
opening white was better, in the middlegame black got an advantage and finally it was a
draw. Then I ask the pupil: “Do you really think that the results of your games depend
mostly on the quality of your openings preparation?” Just think isn’t this story is about you?

The main idea I want to show you is that it is much more important to improve your general
playing skills than just try to learn more openings or another concrete variations.
I don’t recommend you to ignore the openings or not to learn them at all. I only say that it is
not the main thing you should care about.
So what exactly you should do regarding the openings preparation?
Let’s remember again that you should not spend much time on learning the openings, but
you need to play them somehow. What’s the decision? You should create your good
opening repertoire and play it. It is that simple. But I know you will say: “It is simple only
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in theory, while in practice it is not”. Ok, but for you it will be much simpler, because you will
create a good opening repertoire right after the studying of this course.
Let’s discuss this idea (“you should create your good opening repertoire and play it”) more
specifically. What does it mean “the good opening repertoire”? Let’s realize what
happens most usual with a player? A player plays some openings, which he has learned by
chance: perhaps one of his friends showed something to him or he read a book about some
openings, or maybe he just copies the game of the strong Grandmaster. After some
practice, the player realizes that he has problems in some of these opening lines. So he
learns other lines. This operation happens many times and a player wastes his time on
learning the openings too often.
That’s why it is much better not to study and to play the dubious openings, but create the
good opening repertoire from the beginning. What are the “good lines”? They are the
variations which follow the base strategical principles of a chess game. Little later we will
discuss this question in more detail.
What do I mean by saying “…and play it” (“you should create your good opening
repertoire and play it”)? I mean that after the creating of a good opening repertoire you
should not spend much time on the opening preparation.
I know what you want to say now! In some interviews or in personal conversation one
strong player said he spends most of his time on the opening’s analysis. That’s true. Top
Grandmasters spend nearly all their time on the opening preparation. But the thing is that
the opening preparation becomes important on the Master’s and especially on the
Grandmaster’s level. In the situation when the player have already reached his peak of
chess power and understanding of the chess game. After that, they start to compete in the
preparation quality. If you are one of these guys you definitely need to study the openings

Till that time, you may simply play your initial opening repertoire and put your efforts on
improving of your understanding of the chess game. Of course it doesn’t mean that you
should not study the openings at all. Sometimes you will have single questions about the
concrete opening line or you will simply be bored with the same positions all the time. In this
case you may put some extra time on the openings, but not too much.
The next idea: opening is the easiest stage of game! The first argument is a huge
opening’s theory. The second is that the strategical content of an opening is easier than of
the other parts of game. In the opening you basically need to realize the 3 main
opening’s tasks:
- Develop the pieces;
- Castle;
- Connect the rooks (moving the queen).
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I will not explain this in great detail, because I’ve already made it in the course “The
Grandmaster’s secrets”. Let’s just quickly repeat the main points:
the base strategical ideas about the openings:
1. We should develop the pieces.
This means that if we have a choice to move the piece or to move the pawn – we should
move the piece. The pawn moves could be good only when they help us to develop the
piece. By the way, the moves like h3 and a3 (with an idea to stop the Bg4 and Bb4 pin)
most often are just mistakes.
2. We should develop the minor pieces (knights and bishops) first.
If you develop the heavy pieces too early – then they become an object of the attack for the
opponent’s pieces.
3. To find the best move we should mainly use the principles of “the
least active piece” and “maximum activity”.
It means that we should move the piece which is the least active, and we should move it as
forward as possible.
According to these principles, we should develop the knights before bishops (because the
bishop is active on its own position and the knight is totally passive).
Another consequence is that we should not make several moves with the one piece
(because it breaks the principle of the least active piece).
4. We should use “the principle of flexibility” also.
Sometimes we can realize that one move needs to be done anyway and we are not too
sure about other moves. Certainly we need to make the obligatory move first, because it
leaves more opportunities for us, and we will choose the best one depending on the future
situation.
For example, usually the best squares for knights are f3 and c3, so we should make
such moves first and then decide where to put the bishops.
Quite often we need to make castling king-side (if we’ve already move the queen-side
pawns). So we should do it and then we can decide how to develop the queen-side pieces
better.
5. Castling queen-side is little bit stronger than castling king-side.
It is quite strange that a lot of chess players don’t understand it really. The main idea
of a chess game is an activity of the pieces. Castling queen-side brings the rook into the
game while the castling king-side doesn’t.
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Certainly I don’t recommend you to make castling queen-side in Benko gambit  I mean
the situations with an equal choice when both castles are possible and quite normal.
6. After the castling we usually need to move the queen to connect
the rooks.
I’ve already talked about this in the main opening’s tasks. But I want to pay particular
attention onto this idea, because too often chess players forget about it, trying to start an
attack faster.
7. After the finishing the main opening’s tasks we should start an
attack.
It also means that we should not start an attack BEFORE the finishing of the main
opening’s tasks. A premature attack will not be effective. In fact you will only waste time and
create some weaknesses in your position. That’s why the premature attack is dangerous
mostly for the side, which starts this attack 
The premature attack is one of the most typical mistakes. Once I’ve had a conversation with
my colleague. He is a chess coach and now he is an official trainer of the Olympic team of
one country. I don’t say the names, because I don’t want to offend someone. He said to me:
“My first year of teaching here was dedicated to force them to stop making the move g4 in
the openings” 
He meant exactly the premature attacks!
8. After the finishing of the main opening’s tasks sometimes we
should make the last preparation moves: bring the rooks into the center lines.
Basically we need to start an attack immediately after the finishing of the main opening
tasks. But sometimes it’s impossible. Then we should use the principles of “the least active
piece” and “maximum of activity” once again and bring the rooks on the central lines.
The main opening’s tasks help you to realize what you should do in the opening. They are
your goals. The base strategical principles help you to understand how exactly you should
realize these tasks. As you can see everything is clear. It is impossible to describe the
middlegame so easily. That’s why I recommend you not to spend too much time on learning
of the openings. That’s why the title of this lesson is “forget about the openings!”

Let’s make up some conclusions:
 You should create a good opening repertoire and play it.
 Opening is the easiest stage of game, so you should not spend too
much time on studying it.
 In any opening you should realize the main opening’s tasks following
the base strategical principles.
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THE GRANDMASTER’S OPENINGS LABORATORY
by GM Igor Smirnov
Lesson 2: “How to choose the openings?”
Hi everybody. I am Igor Smirnov, International Grandmaster and a chess coach. This is
lesson 2: “How to choose the openings?”
Which openings should we play? How can we choose good opening lines? The biggest
problem regarding this topic is that a player understands the answers only after losing lots
of time. Let me warn you against any future problems.
I am now going to describe a very typical situation. You play some openings which work
well on your current level. Then your chess skills improve and you start playing against
stronger opponents. The stronger opponents prepare for the game better, they use the
weaknesses of your opening repertoire and it gives you a lot of trouble in the opening
stage. It forces you to start learning other opening lines.
Now let’s think about this situation. Your opponents already have a strong opening
repertoire. They have practiced it a lot. They are working on improving one of their
openings and finding novelties while you only start learning new ones. Such a situation is
certainly very hard for you and your results will not satisfy you.

To avoid this situation you need to know how to choose the openings from the beginning. I
will give you some advice which will help you do it.
1. You should play the correct openings.
The opening line should follow the basic positional principles which we have discussed in
the 1st lesson. Do all the well-known openings follow these principles? Definitely not. Look
at the super-tournaments. The top Grandmasters play only a few openings. They almost
never play Pirc defense for example. You can see that I am really sharing the
Grandmasters’ secrets with you. Let’s look at the concrete examples.
What do you think about the Caro-Kann defense? First, we know that we should develop
the pieces in the opening. 1…c6 doesn’t help black to develop anything. Quite the contrary,
it does not allow black to develop the “b8” knight. Second, we should move the pawns and
the pieces forward as quickly as possible, so the pawn should go on the 5th rank. We can
see that the Caro-Kann breaks several base principles right from the beginning.
What about the “Dutch”? Quite the same: f5 is a pawn move, which doesn’t help black
develop anything.
I will show you a lot of the similar examples in the next lesson.