Bad Chess Habits

Over the years, especially if those years are filled with routine, somehow most of us acquire bad habits. It takes some conscious mindfulness and cleanup to rid oneself of those harmful repetitive behaviors. Bad Chess habits are not as harmful as smoking or speed driving, but they can destroy one's pleasure from the game. If you are reading this, you very likely play chess for enjoyment, so I suggest pausing to give it some thought.

Here are some that come quickly to my mind:

1. Using the engine for analysing your games
2. Book flipping
3. Chess News reading
4. Video watching
5. Excessive blitz playing
6. Hoarding - books, software, etc
7. Caring about rating at the expense of improvement
8. Memorizing opening moves without understanding their meaning
9. Jumping openings when results don't improve quickly enough
10. Finding excuses for losses without looking at root problems

The list is definitely not complete, and there is something that is more true for some chess players than for others.

Best Place Online for Playing Rated 15 minute Chess games at the expert/master level?

Question for the readers - I am in the low 2200 in my national, FIDE, and ICC standard ratings, and I want to get a few 15 minute games a week on ICC to meet some of my yearly goals.  However, lately am finding I have to wait for a long time to get a game against opponent rated above 2000 on ICC. Otherwise the quality of games tends to be lower than what I see in the local chess tournaments, so this is a less than optimal situation. Is there a better option in terms of other playing sites?

In addition to ICC, I am open to looking at ChessPlanet, Lichess, PlayChess, newly launched Fide playing zone, etc, but want to hear if any of the readers have better experiences with getting slower games?

One Good Game - Improving Chess Results by Focusing on Quality of Play

While the focus of a chessplayer is usually on the quantifiable aspects of the game, such as rating, points, prizes, the quality of play is often not paid much attention to, and for no good reason. Rather than aiming for a certain result, such as 75 % of points, I’d like to recommend another approach.

In a given tournament - try to play one good game that you can be proud of! 

But what about the rest of the tournament? The reason for my advice is simple. If in a single tournament, a player is able to have one game where they play consistently well in the opening, middlegame and endgame – I believe that a good overall tournament result will follow along, and one would not have to worry about it. It is also easier to focus on playing strong moves, rather than trying to calculate your expected post-event rating after each round. And as it happens in life too, we can only be responsible for our efforts and actions, not for their outcome.

Setting Up Chess Goals - 2015

Setting up goals in chess or in anything can be eye opening if you've never done this before; it can also be therapeutic as it makes us more realistically consider what we can and cannot do in the near future. As time passes, goals are the measuring sticks that allow to see how much of what we set out to do – we are actually achieving. Not everyone does best with this paradigm, but for obsessive compulsive types – there is no use resisting this idea of being to set objectives and achieve them, or at least re-calibrate from time to time and reset those goals.
 I have attempted to have several chess-related goals for the next year that I think are both reasonable and appropriate for where I am in my life now (there is a place for chess in it, but I want to free up space for other things too). So here are my goals for 2015 (and maybe slightly beyond it):

Chess Improvement

• Achieve a rating of 2400 in one of the ICC categories (blitz/active/etc)
  
• Related to the above – I want/need to play at least 100 standard rated games on ICC in the same year
  
• Improve my confidence in the opening with the Black pieces (avoid quick losses or unpleasant positions due to being unfamiliar with the opening)
  
• This one is a challenge because it is hard to quantify what I am trying to achieve here
• Solve about 1000 tactical puzzles, roughly 3 puzzles a day
• Qualify for the provincial championship
• The qualification requirement has gone up to 10 rated games a year, so this one has just become that much harder

These goals won't be easy to reach, they will require continuous focus and addition of some regular habits:

• solving puzzles whenever I have a couple of spare minutes
• improve ability to focus during blitz games, as without focus - the rating objectives are clearly not achievable, not in the next year, not ever
• better planning of other activities so that I find the time to play a couple of half hour games every week

In addition to the usual desire of expressing thoughts in writing, another reason for sharing this set of goals is that as a reader of this blog – you might help me with quite a few of these goals, while also looking at chess study materials that you might have missed before.

I find chess improvement difficult without frequent reflection, and it currently it takes the form of writing on this blog, and making ebooks. [In my head] this has taken a life of its own, and lead me to a set of goals in Chess Publishing:

• Make my chess materials available on 4 platforms or more. Currently I cover 3, so I need maintain and improve on this
  • Amazon
    
  • Youtube
    
  • Kobo
  
  
• Have at least 10 additional Amazon reviews on my books in the next year
  • I have several reviews so far, so if you’ve read my books or their previews – please feel free to add your comments, on amazon or here, as feedback is what helps everyone do better
• Reach 1000 Youtube subscribers
  • After 7 years of posting, and with my channel at around 180 videos - I am now sitting at 900+ subscribers. Subscribe to get notifications of new videos!
    
  • 
  
  
• Publish all previously written/drafted books
• I have about 3 books that are nearly ready to be published, but still have that remaining 10-15% percent of polish that is still clearly required

If you've read this far, maybe you'd want to leave your comments:

• What are your chess goals?
• Do you find it useful to set goals in something that is really a hobby for 99% of those of us that call ourselves chessplayers? 
• When your results improve - is that a result of setting goals, or a natural part of studying the game?

Keeping Focused – On and Off the Chess Board

The issue of focus is an ever constant problem for anyone in the current society, but for chess players addressing it is particularly important. As Garry Kasparov once wrote – being able to concentrate fully on what’s happening on the board during a game and ignore everything else – is perhaps the most important skill for a chess player. That was written more than 25 years ago, and is true today more than ever.

When starting to study chess, I also read that chess, among other things - helps kids to improve their attention span, and I found that to be true at the time, but that was before computers, internet, mobile phones and other distractions came along. Maintaining focus during the game is easier because old habits kick in, and we are not allowed to use computers during tournaments, but during preparation – it is a challenge. If Anatoly Karpov was known to prepare for his Candidate Match games with the TV on, what can the mere mortals do? I’d like to suggest the following strategies for focus and motivation:

1. set up clear study plans with definable objectives over longer term
2. create habits that involve at least minimal daily chess study (e.g. solving 3 puzzles a day)
3. set up routine for regular longer chess sessions when you can dedicate an hour or two of uninterrupted time
4. get a study buddy or coach involve to keep yourself responsible to someone
5. turn off internet or blocking distracting websites
6. spend time away from the computer, with the chess board and books
7. emulate playing environment while training – using chess clocks when looking for a move, having a board in a quiet room, etc
8. during the tournament games – be mindful or where your clock time and attention goes – during your turn and your opponent’s
9. during longer games – have regular breaks to make sure you have blood flowing to the brain and you don’t play a “blackout” type of move that you later can’t explain yourself
10. arrive for tournament games a bit early, so that you can get into tune before the game starts, and don’t accidentally play a wrong opening move because you are still thinking a traffic jam you were in on the way to the game

Training games for chess improvement – Botvinnik’s method

Mikhail Botvinnik was a big supporter of training games as a tool for the chess improvement.  He himself played a number of such games and later published some in the collection of his games. He showed how ideas developed in training games helped him to win the competitive games. In fact, Jan Timman published an entire book dedicated to Botvinnik’s training games.

As for myself, about 10 years ago I played a match of 10 training games against an opponent of roughly my strength. I lost the match by 1 point and overall it was a good experience. Both me and my opponent noticed that we were willing to take more risks than in usual tournament games. It also helped my opening repertoire to include the Open Sicilian.

Here is my analysis of one of Botvinnik’s training games: Part 1

Part 2

How to Analyze a Chess Game - 10 Point Checklist

I already wrote about analyzing chess games, but would like to return to the subject, as I have recently re-evaluated the thoroughness with which this has to be done. Now I created a 10 point checklist, which repeats some of the previous ideas, but is more appropriate in the context of a single analyzed game:

1. Is the opening well annotated? Will you likely have problems in the same line ever again? Against the same opponent?
2. Do you have an evaluation graph of the game – in SCID or elsewhere? If not – do you have an idea of when advantage shifted from one side to another?
3. Is every blunder marked as “?” in your analysis?
4. Have you updated your opening repertoire (if you have it stored on a computer) based on this game?
5. Did you learn anything about chess in general from this game? Write it down!
6. Did you learn anything about yourself? Did it reveal your weakness in any area of the game – tactics, strategy, psychological issues (lack of confidence, nervousness, etc)?
7. Was your time management in this game appropriate? Would a grandmaster have to spend as much time on those moves as you did?
8. Did you write down your thoughts? Did you put down all the candidate moves you considered?
9. Are there any moves that you did not consider during the game – but now realize should have been on your mind?
10. Does it now feel like you spent way too much time going through this game??

Chess For Zebras – Book Review

I had liked Jonathan Rowson writing for quite awhile now so I was curious to see what ideas he has to share in his book Chess For Zebras. One interesting idea that drew my attention was that many chess amateurs pursue a lifetime goal of expanding their chess knowledge.  Our hope is that this would eventually directly improve our practical strength. In particular I had written a blog post on this exact subject.

Rowson arrives at a similar conclusion to what I implied in my post - chess knowledge and chess skills are two very different things. So rather than trying to memorize as many openings and positional ideas as possible it is much better to spend the same time practicing those ideas. A software application that provides the student with training positions will do more for their positional skill than an abstract collection of ideas that will be simply presented to them as pure facts.

Canadian Chess Open 2012 - Lessons Learned

After a (very) long break, I played in a major swiss chess tournament – Canadian Chess Open 2012 in Victoria. I scored only 50%, which is not too great given that all of my opponents were rated lower than myself. Nonetheless, I truly enjoyed playing after such a long break. Here is what I re-learned about competitive chess yet again:

1. Studying chess at home cannot replace regular tournament practice. Practical chess strength needs constant feeding by playing in tournaments
2. Opening preparation in large Swiss Events plays a major role. Everyone does it these days! Catch opponent unaware is more important than finding a hole in their old repertoire (they will play something new to surprise you anyway, so you should not expect them to walk the same path as in previous games). This was often an issue for me, where in 3-4 games my opponents served me with opening surprises, or simply remembered established theory better than I did
3. Opening repertoire must allow for variety, both to avoid getting surprised, and also to be more flexible and work around opponent’s weak spots
4. Getting enough sleep, food, fresh air before the games is quite essential for maintaining concentration during the games
5. The tension of a big slow time controls event cannot be compared to a blitz game online, and not even to an unrated rapid one-day Sunday tournament
6. Modern time controls don’t allow you to get flagged due to increments, but you only have a chance to think deep a couple of times during the game – choose those moments wisely. Ideally you don’t have to take those deep thinking sessions right out of the opening
7. Many players avoid mainline theory in favour of choosing lines that they are familiar with. Here is what those guys played against me in this tournament:
   As White:
   1.e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d3
   1.f4
   1.g3
   As Black: 1. e4 b6
8. There are a lot of young chess players in BC who need to be watched out for!
9. One can lose a lot of rating points in a tournament, and still enjoy the experience!
10. Victoria chess organizers take running events very seriously, and want to create the best environment for competitive chess

Chess Improvement - Looking for Mistakes in a Won Game

Just because you won the chess game, it does not mean you played extremely well throughout all the phases game. Won games should still be analyzed thoroughly since, some such games contain even more instructive moments than games we lost. Here is an example of my own old game where I made several mistakes while converting the advantage.

SCID Feature – Personal Chess Rating Graph

I have always been wondering why many commercial chess programs don’t let me visualize my rating progress from my own database of games, and was glad to find that free chess database software SCID has this feature. Here are a couple of my charts:

My ICC rating for games with “standard” time controls (15 min+):

The drops usually correspond to times when I had to re-start my ICC account and gradually grow the rating from scratch.

My CFC/FIDE rating:

These graphs not only shows periods of rating rise and fall, but also periods of declined activity, not bad at all for a free program! My CFC rating clearly shows that most of my chess growth happened in 1998-2001. That time range coincides to lot of data points, confirming that to improve – you need to play more!

Finding Unknown Unknowns – Get a Chess Coach

I am now looking back at some of the games I played 15 years ago, and naturally noticing some obvious defects in my play. What seems common sense to me now – was completely unknown to me back then. I had simply not accumulated enough experience to get a sense of those many types of positions. Looking back on my endgame play, it's completely obvious that I was unaware of the subject of weak dark squares, space advantage, how to utilize a pawn majority, the importance of doubled pawns in the ending, etc. In other words I did not know what I did not know! I can only notice those defects in my understanding of chess now looking back through my games with the extra 15 years of experience. This reminds me of the quote by Rumsfield about unknown unknowns. To make things worse, 15 years ago, computers were not as readily available, so occasionally I would lose a game without even ever understanding what specific mistakes I had made.

It took me many years to accumulate that knowledge, so that those mistakes would become glaringly obvious. And this is exactly what a coach can do - use his decades of experience to point out weaknesses in the chess players understanding of the game. One can study the games of grandmasters and the try to of grasp their understanding of the game, but nothing can replace an experienced player looking at your games and immediately point out things you don't understand. That can literally save you years and decades of experience and help to avoid painful losses. Such a coach must be ruthless and as undiplomatic as it is possible. It may hurt your feelings now, can but that is the most useful thing a chess coach can do for you.

Chess Psychology - Prematurely Agreeing to a Draw

Jiganchine – Degtiarev, 1996

White to play.

Since I was not sure what I was supposed to do here, in this position I played 18. Ke2 and offered a draw, which was accepted.

Agreeing to a draw prematurely was a sin I was suffering from a lot during most of my years as an active chess player, especially in Junior tournaments back in Russia. How to do you assess the above position? I had just missed a winning line a few moves ago, and was disappointed by that. But looking at the position today, White still has several advantages:

• most importantly – White has extra space
• pawn tension on kingside is in his favour
• Black pieces on the kingside are dramatically tied up

Ironically, even today I did not think of it way it until I realized that a computer engine evaluates a position as +- without giving any direct winning ideas. I think White should:

• manoeuvre to improve placement of his pieces
• d5 is a potential weakness in Black’s camp
• prepare for either opening of the ‘h’ file, or opening the queenside with b2-b4 at the right moment
• transfer rooks and other pieces to wherever the play opens up. This transfer of pieces from one side of the board is what will give White and advantage since his pieces are more mobile than Black’s

I moved the pieces around, and arrived at this sample position:

White to move – b2-b4 opens up the game to White’s advantage in what is still a complicated position. If ‘b’ file opens up – White will be quick to double his rooks on it, and Black’s rooks will have a hard time defending ‘b7’.

In short, nothing is really indicating a draw here, White can play for a win without significant risk. Offering a draw can be explained by a combination of factors:

• chess factors – lack of understanding how White can play for a win
• psychological – disappointment after immediate break with h2-h4 failed to win
• outside influence – I was a tired kid, playing a game in the evening on the weekday after school

Vladimir Kramnik’s Advice on Analysing Chess Positions

As I was listening to Kramnik discussing the current positions from current Wejk An Zee Tournament on the Russian site chess-news.ru, something caught my attention. Kramnik was only using computer engine to evaluate the position and he was hiding the (dockable?) portion of the UI that shows best move for each side. I tried analysing my game in this mode, and I realized that I think much harder on the position, and I actually know I am not making any gross mistakes in my calculation. Thank you, Mr. former World Champion!

There was a time when Kramnik did not use computer to analyse a chess position …

Taking a Break from Chess

In November/December - I stopped any studying of chess for about a month, and now resumed it. While that wasted a month of chess learning, this kind of temporary hiatus can have positive effects on your chess improvement and even overall well being (!):

1. You free up time for non-chess activities during the break
2. A break gives time to reflect on your studying methods
3. You can assess the improvements made during the previous study period
4. You get to plan on what your next goal in chess is, and what are the steps to achieve it
5. You get to reflect on the importance and role of chess (if any) in your life
6. You regain appetite for studying chess – when you feel like you are ready for it again
7. If you play a lot online, you also regain appetite for playing chess
8. Your new efforts will have some new, better focus
9. Your brush off bad habits, such as looking at games too quickly, or spending too much time surfing chess news websites
10. The openings that you felt were getting too boring, may not appear so when you look at them after a break – that can save you time for changing repertoire!

It is very easy to get into a rut in chess, like in anything in life, so taking a break is likely a good thing for any passion you may have!

Happy Chess Learning in 2012!

Meditation and Chess

Recently I have been looking into the benefits of meditation, as well as trying to understand as general purpose.  One of the key aspects of successful meditation is supposedly being able to focus on the current moment rather than worrying about the past and the future. World chess champion Garry Kasparov has pointed out that being able to concentrate at the important moment is perhaps one of the most overlooked and important keys to becoming a successful chess player. I recall Canadian Chess Champion Kevin Spraggett has also indicated that he used meditation for his chess growth.

In our society there are so many distractions coming from the media, technology and pressures of everyday life that being able to focus on a chess position is a skill that I would guess can be improved with meditation.  I consider difficulty with focusing is one of the main obstacles for my successful studying of chess and better tournament results, so I am getting curious if meditation can help me with that ...

“Think and Grow Rich” – Get Better at Chess

I have already written about motivational books such as Getting Things Done and How Life Imitates Chess and using their guidelines to increase one’s discipline and chess motivation. As I was reading the book “Think and grow rich”, I came across several principles that should drive a person whose goal is to make a lot of money:

1. Be definite as to the amount. (There is a psychological reason for definiteness which will be described in a subsequent chapter).
2. Determine exactly what you intend to give in return for the money you desire. (There is no such reality as "something for nothing.)
3. Establish a definite date when you intend to possess the money you desire.
4. Create a definite plan for carrying out your desire, and begin at once, whether you are ready or not, to put this plan into action.
5. Write out a clear, concise statement of the amount of money you intend to acquire, name the time limit for its acquisition, state what you intend to give in return for the money, and describe clearly the plan through which you intend to accumulate it.
6. Read your written statement aloud, twice daily, once just before retiring at night, and once after arising in the morning. AS YOU READ-SEE AND FEEL AND BELIEVE YOURSELF ALREADY IN POSSESSION OF THE MONEY.

These principles are good motivational guidelines in general, and can be applied to any goal, including achieving success at chess. To translate them into chess goals is not too hard:

1. Be definite about your chess goal – rating, title, tournament victory
2. Determine exactly what you need to improve to achieve that goal. What is the difference between my current level, and that of an IM, skillwise?
3. Establish a date, for example - 5 years from now. Make it realistic!
4. Establish a plan for achieving the chess goal, including a training (opening, middlegame, endgame) and tournament schedule
5. Keep reviewing your goal on a regular basis (daily!), encourage yourself

Blink – the Power of Intuition in Chess

Reading the book “Blink”, I could not help thinking about how it relates to chess. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell discusses how certain decisions can be correctly made with only minimal amount of thinking. It also gives examples where extra time taken to make a decision lead to worse results. The author also suggests the following:

In complex situations, quick intuitive decisions are often more likely to be correct than those based on a lot of complex analysis.

In simple situations, logical analysis actually proved useful and led to good results.

The book actually does not use the word “intuition” enough, but decisions made at the blink of an eye - obviously represent a person’s intuition. The above rules work in chess as well. Very often chess annotators point out that a chess player did not play a move that he would have easily played in a blitz game, instead went with a more complicated idea, which unsurprisingly turned out to be wrong. Another common observation is that “A long think usually leads to a bad move”.

To me - this just goes to prove that improving one’s intuition is very useful for blitz games, but will also make you an overall stronger player, save you time on the clock and add to your confidence as a chess player. For further discussion on the role of intuition of chess – read Dvoretsky’s book Attack and Defence In Chess.

How to Study the Endgame in Chess – 10 steps

I have written a lot about opening preparation, so this may have created create an impression that openings is the only thing I care about as a chess player. However that focus is merely to compensate for the fact that that I have always liked endgames more and my opening preparation was way behind. So here are some tips to improve your endgame:

1. Read a good book on endgame theory. I can recommend Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual
2. Read a good book on endgame technique. Here I recommend either some of Dvoretsky’s books, or Shereshevsky’s Endgame Strategy
3. Study your own games that included interesting endgames
4. Solve endgame puzzles and studies
5. Play practice games starting with endgame positions. Use time controls with increments.
6. Specialize in some material e.g. rooks + knights, or bishops of opposite colour.
7. Write articles about endgames for magazines or websites. A few years ago, I wrote a series of articles for ‘En Passant’, several of them were about endgames. I probably learned a lot more from that experience than any of the readers.
8. Use a training endgame course with a software like Peshka
9. Do a deep analysis of some selected positions and games. Trying to establish exactly whether a given endgame position is winning or a draw can help you to appreciate the whole complexity of chess
10. Study the games of players, who are particularly famous for their endgame skills – Karpov, Andersson, Rubinstein, Kramnik

Getting Things Done – Studying Chess

Personal chess improvement has always been an ongoing project for me, but often without well-defined goals and somewhat obscure objectives. Just like any a complex project, it needs some structure, planning, motivation, and ability to track progress. I believe this applies to both professional chess players and to amateurs, who only have a few hours a week to dedicate to chess improvement. No one can reach perfection in chess, so everyone’s time is limited, making success dependent on how effectively we study the game.

What happens often is that while going over your game, you realize – “oh yeah, I played badly in this rook endgame, I’d better study some related endgame theory”. Another day, during a blitz game online, your opponent throws a rare variation of Scandinavian defence at you, and you realize that you had never even considered this line in your opening preparation. Again, that creates another “TODO” item that may linger in your mind for a while, but most likely won’t materialize into action on your part. I’ve heard chess players often make regretful remarks during post-mortem sessions about what they “should have, could have, would have” studied. Things we want to do to improve our chess are of broad variety, here are some more examples:

• Studying a particular opening variation
• Reading a specific book that received good reviews
• Watching an interesting chess video with player interviews
• Trying out new training software, such as Peshka
• Studying games of a particular player – such as Botvinnik
• Playing practice games in a particular opening
• Preparing for a particular tournament
• Preparing against a particular opponent, whom you often face in tournaments
• Improving your time management
• Practicing tactics
• etc

What is a good way to keep track of this kind of lingering thoughts, ideas, and make sure your best intentions for self improvement are fulfilled with some meaningful actions? Turns out chess is not a very different from any other areas that “knowledge workers” are involved in – areas where defining “What To Do?” is almost as important then the action act of “Doing”. I believe that the system known as “Getting Things Done”, advocated by David Allen should apply almost ideally to studying chess.

  Here are some of the principles of Getting Things Done approach:

• Have a system to keep track of things you need “To Do”, rather than keeping them in your head and worry about forgetting individual items
• Do regular weekly reviews of tasks, act upon them depending on your available time and energy
• Focus on tasks based on the physical contexts you are in – near computer, in transit, etc
• Manage multiple projects within the same system – chess can be one of your “projects”, and you can have multiple projects dedicated to chess improvement
• Define short term and long term goals and objectives
• Life Time – Becoming a GM
• Long Term – 3-5 years - Becoming an IM
• Short term – 6 months - Improving your openings for Black

While this system is good for anything we do in life, it is not easy to consistently follow, as I discovered myself. However personal chess study strikes me as something where this “Getting Things Done” approach could be particularly effective.