Blindfold Chess Podcast

Mar 08 2025 62 ep. 12 mins 143

Blindfold Chess Podcast artwork

A bi-weekly look into a chess game between 20-25 moves. The goal is to help players work on their visualization by examining games of the Masters.

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S3 E6 Eric Hansen v. A. Kim (2019)

Mar 08 2025 19 mins

Hello everyone, this week we are looking at the youngest Alberta champion, at one point the highest rated bullet player on Chess.com, the highest rated active Canadian player, and a founder of the Youtube and Twitch channel the “Chessbrahs” - Eric Hansen. A couple of years after he started playing chess, in 2003, he participated in the Alberta Provincial Under 12 Championship w

S3 E5 C. Incutto v. Boris Spassky (1960)

Feb 22 2025 24 mins

This week, we are looking at the long career of the 10th World Champion, the youngest person to become Grandmaster in history (at the time), the youngest Candidate to the World Championship (at the time), and the famed opponent of the 1972 World Championship against Bobby Fischer - Boris Spassky. Spassky learned to play chess at the age of 5 on a train evacuating Leningrad during t

S3 E4 Maia Chiburdanidze v. O. Andreieva (1973)

Feb 08 2025 18 mins

This week, we are looking (at the time) the youngest Women’s World Champion, a 13-time Olympiad Gold Medal Winner, the second Woman in history to be awarded the Grandmaster title, and a Women’s World Champion for 13 years - Maia Chiburdanidze. She was born in Kutaisi of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic of the USSR in 1961 where she learned to play chess at the age of 8. S

S3 E3 Levon Aronian v P. Bortoli (1994)

Jan 25 2025 20 mins

This week, we are taking a look at who CNN has called the “David Beckham of Chess” - the former World Rapid Champion, World Blitz Champion, World Chess960 Champion, former 2nd highest rating in the world, and 5-time Candidate for the World Championship - Levon Aronian. In 2004, he played in his first FIDE World Chess Championship - a 128 player knockout tournament. The winner o

S3 E2 Judit Polgar v. S. Mamedyarov (2002)

Jan 11 2025 24 mins

In Season 1, we looked at one of the Polgar sisters - Susan. Today, we are looking at the youngest sister - Judit Polgar. Prepare yourself for a large list of records and milestones. Judit was born in 1976 in Hungary as the youngest of her two other siblings - Susan and Sofia. They grew up as part of an educational experiment carried out by their dad - Laszlo Polgar - with the hypo

S3 E1 Howard Staunton v. D. Harrwitz (1846)

Jan 01 2025 20 mins

Hello everyone, welcome back to the third season of the Blindfold Chess Podcast. This week, we will be looking at a name synonymous with the chess community - Howard Staunton. If you have been around the game for any length of time, you may have heard of him as an unofficial World Champion in the mid-1800s, or you’ve heard of his opening - the Staunton Gambit of 1. d4 f5 2. e4, o

S2 E28 Cassidy Noble (show host) v J. Fuller (2019)

Jul 13 2024 13 mins

Hi there, its me Cassidy, I’ve been the writer and voice of this podcast for a couple of years now. I have enjoyed doing the podcast, but life is starting to creep up so this will be my last episode before taking a hiatus. I appreciate each and every one of you who download and listen to me. The listenership has been so far beyond what I could imagine for. I was hoping to hold of

S2 E27 Deep Blue

Jun 29 2024 22 mins

This week, I wanted to look at a relatively new branch of chess - chess computers. The first ‘chess machine’ built in 1770 was called the Mechanical Turk. The supposed machine would play challengers with various indications that it was a functional machine. In reality, a human operated the machine using ‘The Turk’ as a sophisticated marionette. You have to jump almost 150 y

S2 E26 Francois Philidor v. Cotter (1789)

Jun 15 2024 13 mins

This week, we are looking at the opera writer and musician who documented chess books and endgames so well we are still using them today. Francois-Andre Danican (Dan-ee-con) Philidor came from a well known musical family. His grandfather was given nickname of Philidor by King Louis XIII of France because his oboe playing reminded him of the Italian oboist Filidor. When he was 6, Ph

S2 E25 Yasser Seirawan v. B. Spassky (1990)

Jun 01 2024 13 mins

This week, we are looking at one of the most influential names in chess - Yasser Sierawan. Yasser was born in Damascus, Syria to his Syrian father and English mother. At the age of 7, his family immigrated to Seattle, Washington. He didn’t start playing chess until the age of 12 - this was in 1972, right in the thick of the Fischer Boom that was happening in the United States. Th