His repertoire is well known. It is very well worked out and it is  almost impossible to catch him out in the opening. Especially when he is white. I think many GM:s didnt take his white openings seroiusly. He knows every nuance of them and can play his "drawish" opening" with great skill. Most players facing Hebden focus on other white openings like nimzo,queens Indian,standard KID set ups and more and not "his" openings.

I think his repertoire is interesting especially against strong players. I mean you are solid...you know the plans and how to play. Your strong oponent just cant blow you off the board. There are no immediate pitfalls in the opening ......and the middlegame I would say.

Me myself I have printed out all of Hebdens games as white. All openings separated. The best thing would be to play through his most instructive games as many times as possible. Try to understand the ideas and typepositions. Just play through the games and you will get a feeling where the pieces will go.  Just let me say i dont play his repertoire now. But I used it many blitzgames with great success. Many wounded oponents.  

Book sources I have  : 

A killers opening repertoire .Summerscale
Dealing with 1.d4 deviations  Cox (a chapter on "Hebden Torre").

Winning with the Torre Attack   Stetsko Gufeld

How to play the Torre attack  Eric Schiller

A winning white repertoire   Tangborn (Has Torre as the backbone of his repertoire. And also cover some other Hebden set ups).

Gary Lanes book Modern chessopenings  1 d4 repertoire with the London system as the headsystem of the repertoire. Lane covers the barry attack ,150 attack,pseudo benko and other setups that Hebden plays.

Graham Burgess great book   'The Torre attack'

A Foxy video by Plaskett   'Torre attack'


I know chessbase  recently  released a Torre attack video  by  Nigel Davies. But I dont have that one.

I think this is a good base if you intend to take up his white "monster" repertoire.  

Another source to understand his repertoire better is to buy the book: How to build your chess opening repertoire by Steve Giddins. He has analyzed Hebdens repertoire and explains the key factors for its success in a good way.

Hi Zatara,

I just created a Dossier on Hebden using Big Database 2008, and here is the skeleton of his White and Black repertoire:

6. Repertoire - White

1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Bf4 Bg7  74%, 2556 100 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6  76%, 2566 36 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.c3 c5 4.Bg5  71%, 2572 45 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.c3 b6 4.Bg5 Bb7  79%, 2637 28 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.c4 d5 4.Bg5 Be7  71%, 2509 40 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.c4 b6 4.g3  54%, 2488 27 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 d5 3.c4 c6 4.e3 Bf5  63%, 2534 27 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 c5 3.d5  81%, 2632 34 Games   
1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.Nf3  57%, 2510 22 Games   
1.d4 e6 2.e4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5  72%, 2524 30 Games   
1.d4 f5 2.g3 Nf6 3.Bg2  73%, 2543 22 Games 
1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.Nf3  71%, 2577 29 Games 
1.e4 c5 2.f4 g6  57%, 2499 21 Games 
1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3.Nf3  55%, 2441 30 Games   
1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.c4 Nf6  78%, 2581 47 Games 
1.e4 g6  63%, 2509 30 Games 


7. Repertoire - Black

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6  44%, 2460 205 Games 
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Bxc6 dxc6  29%, 2364 40 Games 
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.d3 Be7  55%, 2537 42 Games 
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6  38%, 2447 21 Games 
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6  38%, 2435 30 Games   
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6  45%, 2489 163 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.Nf3 0-0  44%, 2471 47 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 b5 4.cxb5 a6  35%, 2360 24 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.g3 Bg7 4.Bg2 0-0  54%, 2551 26 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Bg5 Bg7  48%, 2477 21 Games 
1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 Ne4  46%, 2495 27 Games 
1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4  17%, 2216 23 Games 
1.Nf3 Nf6 2.g3 g6  38%, 2408 24 Games 
1.c4 g6 2.Nc3 Bg7 3.g3 Nf6 4.Bg2 0-0  34%, 2403 38 Games   
1.g3  44%, 2460 25 Games 
 
Mark Hebden has 2050 games in Big Database 2008 (and even more in the upcoming Big/Mega Database 2009), giving you plenty of model games for the variations you would like to adopt from his repertoire.