So's Surprise Weapon Against the Sveshnikov

I love Lichess and I love them every day a bit more. In a world of money- and power-grabbing, destruction, and divisiveness, Lichess is my oasis: a community of volunteers creating the best chess experience in the world, together with the Stockfish and Leela Chess Zero collectives!

I already was a Lichess patreon for almost four years but decided I will donate the 2022 proceeds of my Chessable course So's Surprise Weapon Against the Sveshnikov to Lichess.

In 2003, IM Jeroen Bosch investigated the following line in his series Secrets of Opening Surprises:
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 e5 6. Ndb5 d6 7. Nd5 Nxd5 8. exd5 Nb8 9. Qf3.

We used this line in the final round of the Open Dutch Youth Championships under 12 in 2005. My daughter Lisa was paired against the tournament leader, Hugo ten Hertog. Hugo had been dominating the tournament and was leading with 10.5 out of 12 games. Lisa, who was rated more than 400 points below Hugo, had been sick during the tournament and was trailing at 8 out of 12 points.
The tournament was played behind closed doors but could be followed on monitors. Suddenly the move transmission stopped working and after just 30 minutes Lisa came out of the tournament hall. I expected that something had gone wrong against the big favorite, but surprisingly, Lisa had won in just 17 moves! In the end, Hugo still became youth champion on tie break and Lisa was crowned Open Dutch girls' champion under 12

Flash forward 15 years. Wesley So uses this line to beat Magnus Carlsen in the finals of the Skilling Open! Based on that game, IM Jeroen Bosch updated his analysis for New In Chess Yearbook 138 and this is how my mini-course was born.

I create my courses for club players, selecting and prioritizing lines based on the Lichess Rapid and Classical games database. My courses are by design small, easy to learn, and fun to play. The first variation in the course is the one you are most likely to get over the board.
An example of one of my students from the Lichess 45 45 league.

Lichess continues to improve. For instance, I really like the new functionality of browsing the opening tree of a player. Lichess is not only fast, with the best functionality but also ad-free and tracking-free.
With regards to tracking, compare the privacy policies of chess.com and Lichess on iOS.

This is Lichess App Privacy. Nothing there.

This is the Chess.com App Privacy.
Chess.com is tracking your browsing across apps and websites owned by other companies! Why is that necessary? Surveillance capitalism where the user is the product instead of the customer. I contacted chess.com and they told me: "A lot of companies are doing it and you can block the tracking in your device settings." OK, but why go there in the first place?

Thank you Lichess and its army of volunteers for being such a positive force in the chess world!

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