<Campbell Report,

ChessChick Archive.

ChesChick's Guide to Girl Stuff>

There are some enlightening articles there.

I've made a special new section in my profile to brag about it.

You're not jealous <chessmoron>, are you?

I don't want you to be jealous.

You seem to be doing extremely well with your chess these days. I would like to ask you a few questions, and I hope you wouldn't be too bothered by them.

Just a year and a half ago, you were around 1200, the same as me. While all I've done is to crawl to the 1250 level, you have risen to routinely beat the crap out of 2000-rated players.

So I have a question - other than a 3-month long break from Chess, we have spent about the same time on the game. How come you improve so quickly? What do you do to practice your chess? And what can I do to make myself improve?

What should I study? What books should I read?

Thanks a lot.

I will restrict my answer to the actual things I think got me better from stage to stage.

First thing is, I wasn't 1200 rated when we met online, or when I started Kibbutzing here.

I always loved chess and played a lot when I was a kid, and I had a regular partner in High School and "Wagons Ho Tony" who I played against at University for "groveling privileges."

But I was away studying in Montreal for a long time with nary a game.

When I returned to BC, I was kind of "housebound" cuz my Dad was sick and such.

So I was online a lot, and accidentally re-started my chess career on Yahoo.

I was very rusty, and I kept going in to endgames and losing with won positions... finally I asked my Dad what to do. He said "Play slower and make sure you have a long time control. When you know you have the game won, don't let up-- slow down and concentrate even harder"

This helped.

However, playing through hundreds of games at CG.com (Anand and Fischer mainly) got me up to the high 1400s on Yahoo within a couple of months.

So when we played our first Correspondence game I was around 300 points higher than you.

I studied a good online book about basic chess principles by <Edward Lasker> while I lived in New Westminister.

Regularly playing games on <Yahoo> against people 50-100 points higher than me further improved my rating.

Then: LAST SUMMER-

4-6 months going through the <Chessmaster CD tutorials> also helped.

Picking a repetoire of 2 white and 2 black openings and sticking to that helped.

Playing a Consultation Correspondence game with <Eyal>, and training with him online, helped. Try to find someone close to Master strength who is willing to coach you, if possible.

Joining an OTB chessclub for three months. This actually did more for my playing strength than all the rest of the stuff put together. I found I played 1-200 points over my Yahoo rating in "real life." Highlights included beating the Club president (1783 USCF) and treasurer (1900+ USCF).

MORE RECENTLY (since I came to Korea):

watching Chess videos on YouTube from <letsplaychess.com> helped.

Strictly playing one game white, the next black helped.

Studying with <User: achieve> helped a lot. Check out his forum-- it is currently dedicated to chess training for all. In addition, especially if you can't find a Master Level coach, check out <User: notyetagm> forum-- it is in fact a superb coaching resource.

Perhaps most of all-- the biggest help to get me from 1500 range to 1800 range:

Analyzing LOSSES, not just wins, with a Chess Engine. Slowly and carefully taking notes along the way.

I write down every move of every game in a logbook and analyze it after.

Analyzing losses is like torture but I don't think there's any way around this necessary task.

Final note-- I have only 2 wins in my life against 2000+ rated players on Yahoo-- both within the last month.

Good luck with your training and playing!!

Don't forget to ENJOY your chess activity, or else what's the point?

I played a very long game against a very tough opponent today-- I lost, but I'm halfway through analyzing it. I will finish my analysis tomorrow after work. I HATE LOSING but I'm very slowly learning that it's better to lose against "best" or "strong" play than to win against "weak" play.

So far my Engine tells me that I played a real ferocious attacking game with the Black pieces-- I couldn't crack him in the end-- However, I'm at the point where I sacced my Knight to push a pawn on his King and my "Engine" shows the sac was SOUND.

Which means it was the right idea but I couldn't finish the job in this case.

Point is, the torture of losing and the torture of spending time analyzing a loss isn't so tortuous if you find that you are actually becoming a STRONGER player.

Also you mentioned <achieve>, <eyal> and <notyetagm> as coaches. If I contacted them, will they be happy to coach me?

One last thing: is the Edward Lasker book for free?

A.

The entire game is <tactics>-- "positional play" is really tactics, if you think about it. Therefore, all chess study-play has tactics first and foremost.

chess IS tactics.

That said, I don't personally go the "chess puzzle" route, but many find this helpful.

B. I don't know- but if you don't ask you'll never find out. If you can't find a personal coach, watch <Kingscrusher videos> on YouTube and DO the exercises and examples given in <Achieve> and <Notyetagm> forums. These three players, all Master Level or close to it, are in effect offering to Coach EVERYBODY in the world at the same time.

Here are all 141 of <kingscrusher's> chess Vids:

http://www.youtube.com/profile_vide...

C. Yes, the Lasker book is online for free. <Acieve> is also a big believer in this book. It certainly can't hurt your chess!!

The "fun" way to "study" GM games is to Blitz through them in one minute here at CG.com.

The "better way" (although I like the "fun" way too) is to PRETEND YOU ARE PLAYING BOTH SIDES.

Pretend you are actually playing. Think of what you would play, and WHY.

Then see what was actually played.

Second, when they make a move you don't understand, find out why. Many, many of the GM games at CG.com have helpful Kibbutzing analysis at the bottom that explains why certain moves were made.

Or you can use your Chess Engine to find out why.

Point is, there's no way to learn from a GM game unless you go through it slowly and try to figure out WHY certain moves were made, ESPECIALLY if the move doesn't seem to make any sense.

Also, this is why <Kingscrusher> videos are so excellent. He goes through GM games and SHOWS YOU WHY certain moves were and were not made.

You can pause the vids at any point to think and replay them over and over.

Also, Chess vids on YouTube by <majnu> and <canstein> are also brilliant in this way.

Books for the <improving> player -- in between 'getting started' and 'already experienced' -- vary hugely in quality. I gave myself a Christmas present of a glossy coffee table chess book, which proved to be total crap.

A much better example is Burgess, The Mammoth Book of Chess. I bought it for my nephew, and liked it so much I kept it for myself. He got one too.

Before Fritzes and online databases, it was important to find good-quality games -- preferably annotated -- to play through. Stronger players used to swear by the Informator series. Surprisingly, this format isn't quite obsolete yet -- I have a copy of Super Tournaments 2000 (a Bulgarian publication, in sometimes hilarious English, eg "White begins a combination, longing to keep the eluding initiative").

Each issue has the decisive and theoretically significant games from that year's strongest tournaments.

I picked 2000 because Khalifman was playing the French that year, and was also reigning FIDE world champion (Las Vegas 1999), *and* was one of the book's main editorial contributors.

For me, Khalifman's notes are actually better source material than any openings book I've seen, including specialist works on the French by Watson and Psakhis. And of course all the other openings are covered too.

Finding a repertoire is a vital part of the improvement process. I still think it's good to have a one-volume book on all the openings, like MCO or BCO. And try out as many as possible, then focus on the ones that suit you best. When I started playing the French, I also played some correspondence games with it, which gave me the incentive to study it while using it -- much easier than trying to memorize book lines.

In any case, you should play through games in your favorite opening. Not to memorize it, but to get a feel for typical plans, ideal development, attacks that work well and attacks that don't, etc.

One IM I know says it's the only method he uses to study an opening before playing it -- he cuts out opening books entirely and goes straight to studying practical examples. It has the advantage of presenting a whole game as a unit, without artificial division into opening, middlegame, endgame.

As for endgames, some things (eg, basic pawn endings, drawing with opposite colour bishops, the Lucena position in rook ending) simply *must* be known. But otherwise the best method is to play a lot and to study entire games.

As for the games you pick to study... The 'obvious' ones -- super-GMs, mega-tournaments -- are not always best. Games can be too complex, or based around ideas that will never happen in games you or I might play. I think it's best to get the games from a big open tournament -- like Hastings, currently going on in England but already in the CG database. You can see all levels at work: a 2600 GM demolishes a 2400 IM who then destroys a 2200 FM, who then plays a 2000 expert, who then goes to town on somebody like me. And even somebody like me can look flashy, given a suitable opponent.

There's no need to get stuck on a plateau. If you have the desire, the drive, the energy and the interest and the time, you can always get better. I think the two vital elements are play (as much as you can, ideally against players just a bit stronger than you) and study of annotated games. Biographical collections are good -- I'm currently working through Petrosian and Gelfand 'greatest hits' collections. You don't *need* a book -- the games are all in the database -- but top-grade annotation is very helpful. The trick is to really think the games thru, not just skim them. This also applies to other media, DVDs etc. No skimming.

He's got the movie rights to my previous (oh, so long) post. I want Fernando Rey to play me, and will even grow a white beard if needed. In postlife movies, it's the 'original' who changes to match the actor.

Strictly no living actors, so Johnny Depp, Winona Ryder, and Jessica Alba are unavailable. Tom Cruise, nobody seems to be sure. John Travolta is available from the neck down.

The good news is we've got Bette Davis to play you, with Louise Brooks as body double. Elixir can choose between Sir John Gielgud, Sal Mineo, and Mac Culkin (available in age 12 version only, due to some kinda metaphysical technicality).

Like those cathedrals in the late middle ages that held holy relics of saints, etc. 530,000 chips of wood from Noah's Ark and the true Cross, enough for a fleet of woody dreadnoughts. Another had a feather from the wing of the Angel Gabriel.

But my favorite is the dispute between Church A and Church B. The former held the skull of John the Baptist, but the latter trumped it with the skull of John the Baptist as a child.

Luis, anticlerical to the end and beyond it, likes these stories and wants them in the screenplay, and wants Dali to play the skull. Oh, and Charles Aznavour as Petrosian, River Phoenix as Magnus Carlsen, and Rudi Valentino as Kasparov. Olivier has dug out his Russo-Israeli accent for Gelfand: death has not improved it.

Marilyn is interested in playing a Polgar.

The father, says Bunuel.

Indeed superbe advice! All within a handful of posts, right on the nose, in my opinion...

But no surprise since both are pretty smart, one's a teacher- and the other has a vast body of experience and knowledge...

All complementary, even comPLImentary, which is vital, too-- and a sure road to succes if indeed followed up and adjusted along the way.

Thanks, guys- and surely a confirmation of the benefit of a group of (chess)friends, devoted to this royal game, and the potential for improvement in all directions...

One idea which might help to make such practice productive is going systematically over the games of great players who are/were known as experts in handling certain openings and played a large number of "thematic" games in them: e.g. Fischer & Anand's games with the White pieces in the Ruy Lopez, Kramnik in the Petrov, Korchnoi and Uhlmann in the French, etc.

OK Nielsy will join Branko and stony in congratulating you on having become a 23 yr young woman!!

Wearing the pink hat?

I'm with you in your celebrations-- and respect for you, Jess, and your wonderful humour and energy!!

Your pal,
Niels

UNDERSTOOD?!?