French; Steinitz Variation | The Sensei Speedrun | GM Naroditsky 

Danya's opponent: "Yep, this is all normal, I like my position, I'm a pawn up.." Danya: "...it's called a demolition sacrifice" [Slams down Nxg7...., e6.... Checkmate] Opponent: Wtf just happened?

The demolition sacrifice. What a finish

Gotta love chat, looking at a +8 position, going "nice sac but there's no way you'd play this against Magnus" lmao

"Sorry for the mediocre play." Plays Nxg7!! Brilliant move. That's Naroditsky.

Kudos to Danya's opponent for a great game. The knight sac followed by the pawn intermezzo leading to mate was a crazy sequence. Dont think I ever wouldve seen that and danya saw it in seconds.

Engine:!! Danya: yeah knight g7 is good

Forget the knight sacrifice, Danya always amazes me with this "subpar" variation of the Advanced French. It looks easy when he plays the moves but requires abstract positional understanding to convert to a win. All the tactics and poisoned pawns in the middlegame, playing around 2 pawns in your throat... It's more brilliant knowing how to make use of what the engine hates than what the engine thinks is brilliant.

Keep it up Danya. You are hands down the best chess RU-vidr! It is not even close!

Damn that guy went from pawn up to just utter collapse in 10 moves, I feel sorry for him

Holy moly that was a cool attack

As a French D player, I'd like to see Danya play WITH a French setup, instead of demolishing this opening time after time. Lol

22:40 lol, the best move for the opponent is giving up an exchange for the compensation of not getting crushed immediately.

Great analysis, you're an excellent player and teacher.

Always a good day when Dana uploads!

If there were some magic algorithm for chess, Max Deutsch would have beaten Magnus.

To the person that asked if he would have made the same sacrifice while playing Magnus.. Magnus would have never played those moves to get to that type of position anyway..

Me down a pawn: *I'm completely lost* Daniel down a pawn: *GIGACHAD*

What a finish. You make chess so beautiful. Thank you for everything you do!

I really like these videos and the depth of it. It really helped me improve

Disgusting checkmate. I would quit if that was played against me

This game actually helped me a LOT. I’m so used to defending and being reactionary But watch him allow the bishop to be captured to open the c file was really helpful in how to think mid game. Thanks Danya (from an 1100)

Such a great teacher!

Great video! Thank you so much! ❤

I'd very much love a full opening video on the Steinitz Advanced French. (Apparently it's called the Nimzovitch Variation or the Ruisdonk Gambit...)

That was such a simple looking attack and brilliant mate

Very instructive game, I will definitely try this variation vs the French in my own games. Thank you 🙏

Love this game. Very interesting tactics from both sides, especially in the opening. The opponent sadly went down the path of developing some pieces to the queenside, trying to grab some pawns, but leaving the king very exposed and getting mated quickly after castling.

Thanks for sharing all this knowledge

Really instructive game with an impressive finish!

Thanks Daniel, top notch content again. I will play this tonight, and intuitively calculate my way to a loss;)

Top video like usual Danya

Its awesome to view these videos and "learn" how to just play. When to make what decisions. My rating is climbing as a result of fully engaging in these videos.

OMG. This is another example of why I stand no chance at ever killing it with chess. Wow. I never saw this attack unravel like you played it out. Nice stuff Danya

one of the instructivest game ever seen, expecially for the f4 pawn thing, I think I am understanding how gambits work

2:00 I learned the hard way not to take that b2 pawn. That move always backfires at least for me

Yes finally! Man it's torture to wait 8-9 days for a new episode of the speedrun. I was getting used to the every second day upload.

Danya hitting em with the !! Brilliant out of nowhere for style points

Who needs to sleep when the sensei has a new video

Best chess RU-vid teacher and it’s not even close

Changing up the move order if something doesn't quite work is such a usefull lesson!

Always watch your videos during lunch :)

Insane attack

I like this classy and tasteful game.

Love the French videos!

Thanks for the speedrun videos Danya. I just wanted to tell your videos are super instructional and they're not just helpful for beginners. I've climbed from 1800 to 2000 because of absorbing your speedrun videos. One advice that's helped me the most is that players at this rating crumble under pressure

Woooohooooo! I thought the series was over.

Danya bro, you look tired! Another great game, thanks for teaching us all so much! 🙏🏻

That check made was brutal

That mating sequence was craaaazy

cool finish

Ha danya didn’t even see that one coming. Shocking finish

very cool game

true masterclass

Wow I am so impressed with the checkmate

Cool game, I actually think this is a good advert for the French Defense.

That was big and satisfying

What a beautiful ending

I know you mentioned Ben Finegold was in the chat. If he were commentating on this game, I'm sure he'd say that black's pieces were doing a good job defending the king and highlight the three pieces on the queen side. Rule of thumb, if three of your opponent's pieces are on the a & b files and their king is on the g file, your attack on the king is likely to be very successful

The prophet!

"im not going to go into too much depth in the opening theory" *proceeds to go into opening theory in-depth

best chess teacher on YT

Sac the pawn, sac the exchange, sac the knight, for positional and tactical reasons depending on the line. This game really drove home for me how long the road to chess mastery is.

Okay before the knight sac move and if you read Silman I felt like there was something in the position. If you're lower rated this is where you might ask yourself what ifs. You also want to start studying what's in the position.there is a book the art of the sacrifice then you come up with candidate moves and calculate their lines.

Oh man you are perfect

3:42 u got my attention back

What style!

Sacrifices is probably one of the most difficult things in chess which differentiate beginners and intermediates - granted you found one, you just have to know exact winning continuation because one slow move is gonna kill your eval

Thanks for trying to bring back the real definition of 'literally' - and for the chess analysis.

bro used the dark side of the force for that last attack

V nice 👏🏼

That rf6 engine line was insane 💀

It's called the Nimzowitsch variation. The Steinitz French is 1 e4, e6, 2 d4, d5 3 Nc3, Nf6 4 e5.

This felt like a magic trick.

Guy who already wrote a book: "Maybe someday when I write a book..."

19:11 a simple strategy to use here to decide on the knight sac on g7 is to count that white has 3 attackers (B,Q,R) and black has no defenders… a general rule in chess is that 3 attacking pieces is enough to give checkmate.

That escalated in a hurry.

Isn't the Steinitz Variation 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5? Versus what is show on the video which is an advance variation with 3. e5?

I am trying to find the video, where you play the french defence yourself. Can anyone give the name of the video? Would you consider adding it to your repertoire more often next to carro kann (since ideas are similar)

You mentioned a possible book. "Principles in chess" would be a good topic. NOT learning specific moves but a METHOD how to think, like you teach us in your vids. Like if you would buy the book.

Let's gooooo

Oh, yea. Can you please play the Petrov defense as well so we can get that Russian school of chess info from you? Thanks so much!

Danya your intuition is impressive, to say the least. I saw the mate combination but didn't think that the opponent would take the pawn with the bishop. Was there an obvious alternative mate if he hadn't taken the pawn?

Wow. Like really, wow

Can you do some more grandmaster level puzzles too please

Personally more scared to sacrifice because if I miss something in calculation then I'm proverbially allowing Be6. Playing correspondence games has allowed me to look at positions more deeply and make sure my move is good, hopefully I can increase my general confidence that way.

I'm confused, how is this the Steinitz variation and not just the Advance? The Steinitz is only after 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5 no? Or is there another Steinitz variation I'm not aware of?

Man you are my teacher, I would really like to meet you someday.

I love that you say "his or her", well done. I always try to use "they" when I talk about my virtual opponents.

omg, Grand Masters are monsters!

its been a while!

25:32 the truth hurts

What's the difference between this and nimzokovich?

Can you play the king's gambit bishop B4 line so I can play it like you? Thanks in advance! :-)))

I really wish I was a more attacking player, but I really can’t play like this for more than a game without getting exhausted. I really should incorporate these tactics into my play, I bet it’ll get me to 1800.

Sees Ng7 is a brilliant move "ok Ng7 is a good move" Meanwhile other rookies start sharing the screen shot of their lucky brilliant move all over social media.

I really think this French defense is in the top 3 against E4 for all players under 2486.

Beginner me had a rougher time than usual trying to wrap my head around a few parts of this one. It seemed more dense or maybe verbally faster than usual with rattling off the variations. Definitely still worthwhile. Maybe I have to rewatch it & stop it here & there & see if I do better at really soaking it in.👍🙏

This is not Steinitz, this is the Nimzowitch system.

Man, Twitch chat was salty in this one.

Opponent fell apart at end