Know the Terrain Vol. 6: Isolated Queen's Pawn

The explosion of information has led to a massive growth in opening theory. But how often do you win with a prepared line? What gives strong players the edge over their opponents is not some crazy innovation, but a deep understanding of the pawn structures that 'their' openings lead to - an understanding that extends into the middlegame and endgame, and that is transferable between different openings with similar structures. In this DVD, Sam Collins examines the Queen's Solani (DI) and related structures. Using games drawn almost exclusively from grandmaster practice over the last two years, Collins explains all the main ideas for playing with and against the DI, including the d5 advance, kingside attacks (including the rook swing, h4-h5 and Bxh6 sacrifice), central hits (including the Rxe6 exchange sacrifice in various Russian positions), queenside play and simplifications, and also gives some guidelines for assessing transitions to similar structures. The universality of the DI is illustrated by the games on this DVD, played in openings as diverse as the Nimzo-Indian, Queen's Gambit Accepted, Semi-Tarrasch, Caro-Kann, Slav, c3-Sicilian, Tarrasch French, Bogo-Indian and Ruslan. A concluding question and answer section (in ChessBase's new interactive format) tests and reinforces the reader's knowledge of the DI, one of the most important structures in modern chess.