Nihal reveals one of his favorite books

by Shahid Ahmed - 23/07/2019

Yesterday reigning Asian Continental Blitz Champion, 14-year-old GM Nihal Sarin made a post on his facebook page mentioning about one of his favorite books - Quick Chess Knockouts by Julian Hodgson. We all wonder what did the champions study in their formative years, what made them achieve greatness by becoming so strong. Nihal shares a small spec of it in his latest facebook post. Photo: Nihal Sarin's facebook page.

Nihal Sarin's Knockout idea

Yesterday Nihal posted this on his facebook page

Nihal said that he has been reading the book since he was 7-years-old and it has helped him win many fun games. He mentioned about the game between him and Javokhir Sindarov in World Youth 2014 and credited the book in helping him win many fun games like that.

Here is the game between Nihal and Javokhir Sindarov of Uzbekistan from round 8 of World Youth 2014 (under-14 open) in Durban, South Africa.

Now you must be wondering where is the idea in the book which Nihal learnt from the book, here you go:

On the left, page 133 of Quick Chess Knockouts talks about a capture in QGA, on the right, exactly same position occurred in the game between Nihal and Sindarov in Wch under-10 in 2014

Do you have any similar incident happening in your game where exactly what you studied in the book or prepared, appeared in a tournament game?