Overview

You can play this opening against anyone. This opening is especially well suited for rapid and blitz games, since in the reduced time control in particular the role of the initiative increases. Generally speaking, not in every opening will you find such a thing as Black having the initiative from the very first moves (although this pleasure is paid for with a whole pawn!). I played this opening with a classical time control against the ex-champion of Russia, Grandmaster Igor Lysyj, and very comfortably equalized in the opening, although later the class difference showed and my eminent opponent beat me. Nevertheless, the opening had absolutely nothing to do with it. This opening worked great when I played it in Rostov-on-Don, when I beat many strong players and after that they preferred to play 1.c4, doing whatever they could to avoid the Benko Gambit. Of course, to my understanding this opening is especially good to play against amateurs, or weaker players than yourself, who do not know its intricacies you can quickly get a promising position. This opening is suitable for active players striving for a lively, initiative-rich game, with a strong spirit. After all, you need to understand that if something goes wrong, you may face big problems, since you do not have a pawn, but as in any opening there are pluses and minuses, and in the Benko Gambit there are also disadvantages. First of all, in some places you need to play very accurately (this will be especially evident in the positions that we will consider in volume 2) and the cost of an error is quite high. But if the reader carefully studies the books, then I think that there should be no problems and the Benko Gambit will give you many of your most interesting fights!

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Alexey Kovalchuk was born in 1994 in Russia and learned to play chess at the “late” age of 12. In November of 2017 he reached his highest Elo yet of 2445 and is considered an IM without the norms. Alexey has never had a coach having studied with the aid of books and other materials. His tournament successes include winning the Rostov Championship in both classical and rapid. He is a three-time winner of the Taganrog Championship and has won prizes in many events including Taganrog, Togliatti, Astrakhan, Lipetsk, Kharkov and Donetsk. His reputation as a theoretician is well known and he has previously published a book on the Grünfeld Defense. Currently Alexey serves as a second for several grandmasters as well as coach for several aspiring students.

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