Effeciently Using Clock Time in a Chess Game

In order to improve my time management - I keep track of time I spend on every move during tournament games. Those get scribbled into score sheets by hand and then I enter them into the database by hand together with the moves themselves.

Do I ever look at them again? Not very often until now – having discovered how handy it is to look at this data in SCID score graph, so after converting values into the graph-friendly format, I can see my remaining time visually – from 100 minutes remaining on the clock to 0. I can see that my time took a drive on move 13 or so in a recent game I played.
 

Clicking on the dot on the graph – I can recall that I was trying to spend some time out of the opening – trying to find a plan, before playing 14… Qe7. Was it justified? Looking at the graph above – probably not.

SCID Score Graph feature

SCID (also available as “SCID vs. PC”) has a great feature where based on annotated games (that SCID can also do for you) – you can generate evaluation graphs. They are called Score Graph and are available under tools menu.

Clicking on the place in the graph where the evaluation took a dive on move 14, I can find that White just dropped a piece by leaving the bishop unprotected.

 

In this case this gives me a better picture of the flow of the game than many verbal annotations that often accompany chess games. SCID does it, and not only for the game that you just played, but for any game stored in your database with engine evaluations!

Kramnik in the Sveshnikov – The Breakthrough Style

The book of Vladimir Kramnik’s  games published in Russia in the end of the 1990’s was called the “Break”, and for a while it became my constant source of aesthetic pleasure. I did not understand back then why people talk about Kramnik as a boring or even solid player, and still don’t understand it now – from following most of the tournaments where he plays. This is a player with a very dynamic sense of pawn structure and of how pawns and pieces release their power in unexpected (to the opponent) moments of the game.

Merely looking through a collection of his games in B33 ECO classifications I immediately came across several examples (I had known most of them from before, but a couple were new to me!). These games were played against the top players of the world, with good results. While regretting that Kramnik stopped playing the Sveshnikov, I do understand that one has to switch repertoire from time to time – in part to develop one’s style, but also to avoid computer preparation as lines that Kramnik makes popular – get overanalyzed to death and become difficult to play for a win.

Lutz –Kramnik, 1995
  26…e3 ripped White’s position apart before queenside pawns could promote.

Polgar – Kramnik, 1998
  With unexpected 38… a4, Black undermined White’s knight and pinned 3 White pieces along the long diagonal.

Anand – Kramnik, 1998
After 13. Qf3, Black fought for initiative by sacrificing two pawns – 14…f5! 15. exf5 d5! getting enough counter play for the material.

Shirov – Kramnik, 2000
With 20…d5!! Black was able to transfer the b8 rook to the kingside via b6, and again – obtain enough counterplay.

Leko – Kramnik, 2000
with 36… b4, Kramnik puts more pressure on White’s tangled position, although in time trouble the game ended as a draw after Black missed a win.

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.

The Road to Chess Improvement – Revisited

I picked up the “The Road to Chess Improvement” once again and was struck by a thought that this book’s title may be interpreted as the reader’s road to improvement.  That may lead to disappointment as the book does not present the reader with a structured plan of what to do in order to improve their chess.  What it actually is is author’s road to improvement.  The author documents all the ups and down that he had as a chess player.  Those include experiments with different openings and different strategic ideas, as well as playing styles. For example in the beginning of his chess career he did not played many gambits mostly preferring closed openings.  That led to his playing style being somewhat limited. Expanding his opening repertoire later on with the openings that involve sacrifices added to his practical strength.  It is up to the readers to judge how this applies to their chess path. As for myself, I feel more motivated to look at my own games, realizing that I had spent very little time actually analysing them.

Moro, You’re Simply the Best

Who said there are no real attractive fans in chess? Moscow 2012, Tal Memorial, Round 8. A picture is worth a thousand words.

I just came across it as I am watching the recorded broadcast of the round months later (around minute 11). Did he notice?

Anand on Studying Chess with Computers and Memory

I usually don’t post links to videos that were not created by myself but this video seemed particularly insightful and revealing of how the current chess world champion, Viswanathan Anand approaches opening preparation, memory and computer’s influence on the game

The video may be relevant and of interest not only to chess players but as a chess player, I especially liked Anand’s comment that a few years ago he would trust the computer saying that White is better in a given position, and later as computers get "stronger", he would trust the computer on the updated, completely opposite opinion on the same position. I believe he also implied that a few years later the computer may come up with yet another “true” evaluation. Where that leaves us as chess players is up to you to decide …

He also made a few other comments about his own preparation to tournaments, in particular that a few days before a tournament he would put the computer aside and just study chess with a board, with no engine to rely on being forced to use his own head just like in a tournament situation.