The Art of The Gambit by Laura Smith

Breathe New Life Into Your Chess Games With Attacking Chess!

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What Will You Learn?

Whether you are new to chess or have been playing for some time, gambit openings are essential to know. If you prefer closed openings where you slowly gain space and try to accumulate small advantages, you may not have taken an interest in gambits. However, if you are not familiar with gambits and how to defend against them, they will surely be used against you. On the other hand, if you like attacking chess and want to know how to get more aggressive in your games and stymie your opponents, learning the most popular and effective gambits are a great way to open up your game.

In this course, Women’s FIDE Master Laura Smith will take you through some of the best known gambits and some gambits that are not so well known that can have your opponents on their heels quickly. The great thing about gambits is that they can quickly take your opponent out of their game and get them playing on your terms.

 A gambit is an opening where you sacrifice a bit of material, usually a pawn, in the opening in order to gain control of the center and secure a quick positional advantage which you can use to launch a devastating attack. These positions can be extremely double-edged, where one mistake can leave you or your opponent hopelessly lost before you realize what is happening. Laura’s instruction, which includes step-by-step guidance and sample games, can help you make sure it is your opponent who makes the critical misstep, and not you.

Part I of the course is great for prospective gambiteers who like to play 1 e4. It begins by focusing on the lines that start after 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 d4 exd4. We gambit the d-pawn to take black out of the center. Here we can respond with c3 (the Goring Gambit) or Bc4 (the Scotch Gambit). Both are very sharp openings that allow white to play aggressive, attacking chess right from the get go. In this part of the course, Laura takes you down the main lines in the Goring and Scotch, letting you know what your goals are, what to expect, what your disadvantages are and how you can capitalize on your opponent’s lag in development and center control.

Of course, not all opponents respond to 1 e4 with e5, which is why Laura also walks you through some great anti-Sicilian and anti-French gambits, the Smith-Morra Gambit (vs. the Scilian) and the Wing Gambit (playable against both Sicilian and French).

Laura’s analysis of the Wing Gambit continues into Part II. The Wing Gambit is characterized by an early attempt to sacrifice the b-pawn with b4, which again pulls black out of the center and opens up lines for white to attack. Laura will show you how to fight for a winning position with white whether black accepts or declines.

Fans of the Netflix show “The Queen’s Gambit,” will love the next section, where Laura not only explains the Queen’s Gambit in detail (1 d4 d5 2 c4), but analyzes the climactic game between Harmon and Borgov from the series. Closing out the course are some lesser known but very trap-laden gambits, including some highly effective gambit responses to d4, such as the Englund Gambit and the Albin Countergambit. In just a few short hours, “The Art of the Gambit” will teach you everything you know to be a fearsome chess gambiteer!

So, What Exactly Do You Get?

PART 1