April 2018 Update: Defensive woes, I could be +8 and if my opponent gets any chances... I often implode!

When I played Hampstead a couple of months ago, I dropped a won game against a higher rated opponent. I have not had the chance to play another congress, but I decided to play some Rapid games online and take them extremely seriously.

Out of 6 rapid games, I won 3 (vs average rating 1700) and lost 3 vs average rating 1860 or so. Two of my lost games happened due to mishandling pressure by my opponent. As soon as my opponent gets any sort of serious counter play / pressure, i crumble - i seem to misjudge positions where my opponent is getting any sort of active play.

After taking that knight with my bishop, my opponent had the initiative and i slowly, failing to find good moves... lost the game.

A few moves earlier I could have won a second pawn and had a great position, but I didn't go for it even though I saw the line seemed good for me, I thought it'd be greedy and I should consolidate what I have, but dxc5 was the best move and I had two or three moves to take it!

Before analysing with a computer i annotated the games and caught all my mistakes... so i know... i know what the problems are, and despite practicising calculation... I go wrong!

I'm thinking of working through the following books (once I can get them on Chessable)

Grandmaster Prep Attack and Defense by QC.

Practical Chess Defense by QC.

Secrets of Chess Defence by Gambit.

If any one has any recommendations on a set of exercises that can teach me to withstand pressure I'd gladly take some tips and try to bring it to life at Chessable! :) I've dropped countless games from +1, +2, +3, and sometimes even more, simply because my opponent is getting play and under pressure , despite calculating some lines, i fail to go for the best defence!

I am aware of trading pieces, removing my opponents best piece, and other principles, but sometimes that's not possible and I guess I just don't have enough experience when my opponent applies such pressure. If the pieces could be traded, I'm good, but what if they can't!!

I need more defensive calculation, desperately. Am i missing any other books? Looking for some advice, and once they are on Chessable, I'll get to it.

My other plan is to solve more tactics, simple tactics, complex tactics, work on my calculation. Of course, all within Chessable. Currently I'm working through:

https://www.chessable.com/tactic...

Oh, and here is that woeful game... yuck!

February 2018 Improvement Update

It's been three months since my last progress update, so it's time for a new one. Progress? There is no progress! At least in rating. However, I feel that I am slowly identifying the weaknesses in my game better and coming up with stronger study plans. It may just be that one day everything will click together and all my hard work will have paid off with a meteoric rise? Who knows? Typically, I don't have enough time to work even harder (although I'd like to), so I really got to make sure my one or two hours a day count.

I have almost completed my entire black opening repertoire. I have some 200 out of 800 variations to go. I feel like I have to learn these last variations, at least the mainlines missing, (100 or so). However, I am taking a break from learning new lines for at least ten days to prep for the Bristol Spring Congress with a different kind of training as much as possible. I want to study more tactics because both tactics books on Chessable are awesome. I've begun with Improve Your Chess Tactics by GM Neishtadt. I felt like I was missing out. I have been dropping too many blitz, rapid and classical games in time trouble missing simple one move blunders! Always in time trouble, but this is no excuse. I even lost one completely won game in time trouble last weekend vs a 1915 player. Ahh! I have to work on my time management and will adopt GM Colovic's ideas of a game plan. Where you limit the time, you give yourself per move, purposefully. Let's see how that works!

I've also been playing a bit more blitz and being massively frustrated that my rating hovers around 1,800. It seems that I have forgotten what I said in my last post, that I need to slow down my Blitz controls and play 5+5... at least once and for all I know that my ELO is 100 points lower if I play 3+2 as opposed to 5+5. After a week of study, preparing for the Bristol Chess Congress, I will treat myself and allow myself to play a few more 5+5 games and see how that goes. Maybe I'll finally break and settle above 1,900.

I played the Hampstead Chess Congress a week ago, and I found the time control really hard, 60 min + 30 sec per move. I blundered in time trouble (pawn move in a K+P endgame), vs a young kid rated 1,500. That was tough! I am very much looking forward to getting back to 90 min + 30 sec. Alright, I will keep working hard and smart, and hopefully, in the next update I can show something for my hard work :) After all, it's now a year where I took two 2,100 ELO scalps in a single tournament. It's about time I start showing that strength regularly and my ELO should follow!

Winter 2017 Chess Improvement Update

Back in June I mentioned how tiring it is to be playing regular tournament chess, when so many other life responsibilities seem to be there, waiting for your attention. However, that specific tournament I made a fatal mistake. I refused to take a bye and tried to play all 3 days, despite the Friday game being very challenging, you really have to be local to play a 4 hour game at 7PM as driving either side of that tends to be pretty bad. On the way there it's traffic, on the way back it's diversions, Friday night's party traffic! That night I ended up getting home way past midnight, shattered and that resulted on me trying to play less OTB chess, I even withdrew on Sunday. Ouch. Well, I think I learned my lesson and I am finally ready to get back to OTB classical time congresses. I am playing one next weekend and I am looking forward to it. I'll control my eagerness and take that first round bye... 4 games is enough. Even that is a lot. I got greedy when I tried playing all 5 and was rightly punished by Fortune that night. I think I was simply too eager to replicate my Frome Congress success.

Earlier in the year I also questioned why I hadn't learnt John's Scandinavian repertoire yet. I set this right and have picked up IM John Bartholomew's Scandinavian repertoire. I think I can play 90% of the lines with confidence, and this is an IM level repertoire so these days I really look forward to facing 1.e4. The more I play it, the more I study it, the happier I am that I finally learnt it. Based on this, my opponents would do well to take notice and play anything else really. However, I am also slowly picking up a GM level repertoire for Black against everything else. My goal here is to fully sort out all my openings as Black and really really learn them well. Then I can compare my results as White versus my results as Black where I know the openings. This would finally settle the debate about how important it is to know or not know the opening at our level of chess. Honestly, I might be biased, but whenever I play within the opening I know it's just so much more joyful. I faced an IM in my first ever rapid chess event and he struggled so much because I blitzed out 18 moves of theory that led to a drawish position. Yes, he did win in the end, after 70 moves in my heavy time pressure, but since he was 500 points higher than me I consider this a big result. He even thought he was losing at one point where he went a pawn down. Unfortunately, he had more than enough compensation and in the complications my time pressure was the most telling factor.

Aside from finishing up my Black repertoires, I want to note that I did have a complete repertoire as Black and White before, but it was very shallow, without going into too much detail and this was often telling. I got tired of being outplayed by people who knew a bit more theory, a few more plans, which is why I am putting the work of learning 300+ variation repertoires instead of the 100 lines I used to know. I think 100 lines is useful up to 1,800, but playing at 2,100+, or higher, people just know theory, whether they read it, or figured it out through self study, they are aware of the best moves and if you go off they punish you. My game against Koby Kalavannan in the Bristol Summer Congress, showed that clearly. I played a normal looking move which 4-5 masters have previously played (in the database), and it just turned out to be giving White a seriously big advantage... which my 2300+ rated opponent pounced on.

Once I sort out my Black repertoire, my plan is to focus on tactics and strategy only and see if my results as White catch up too. I might also try various Short & Sweet repertoires as White, maybe the London System, to try and find what openings I actually enjoy playing as White. I do love the Italian Game but most people will play the Sicilian against me, so maybe the London System would be good to avoid those sharp Siclian lines.

Another thing I've done lately which I feel has improved my game is to slow down my blitz time controls. I was playing 3|0, then 3|2 and struggling, getting frustrated, timing out. I had not time to think ever. I switched to 5|5 and really enjoyed it. My Blitz rating went up and the games I lost had clear reasons why, reasons I could work on. I think my rapid has benefited from that too and I am on my all-time high at chess.com. I honestly think I'll hit a 2,000 rating somewhere. The goal I set myself, but maybe, it will happen sometime next year :)

Of course, I'm also somewhat of an endgame Master and can mate with Bishop & Knight! This is thanks to completing 100 Endgames You Must Know on Chessable. It's awesome, but in my games I don't get to benefit enough, or at least I don't think I do. Not too many endgames yet, but when one happens, my opponents usually pay... I had several games where I rescued them and won in the endgame.

Alright, I just wanted to log some of my progress and plans, so that it's there in writing documenting my chess improvement. See you soon!

Hmm, will have to play less tournament chess.

So this is an entry to log the fact that I plan to play less tournament chess. I entered the Bristol Summer Congress 2017, but I had to withdraw for the last day. It's simply humanely impossible to raise a kid, grow a start up and make time for monthly tournament chess.

Due to my last awesome performance, I really wanted to play. However, each of my games took four hours, and after the second game (4 hours and 30 minutes) I was absolutely knackered. Not to mention I only had 3 hours of sleep that night (driving to the tournaments is quite the extra energy sink, especially due to bloody diversions!). I messed up a won endgame and gave my 2,100 rated opponent the draw. Shame. I think having a won position got to my head; I got over-excited. Good for my opponent though as to be honest, I miscalculated in the early middle game and only got an advantage due to a cheap-shot tactic (due to a mistake by my opponent!). Would have been nice to bring home the win. I also drew with black vs. an opponent rated 1630, again I felt like I messed up the endgame. I had a good knight vs. bad bishop which quickly due to my mistakes turned into a good bishop vs. bad knight. How ironic. Held the draw.

Finally, for my third game, I think I must have had a mating combination somewhere, but honestly, all I wanted is for the game to be over quickly and messed it up along the way. Ironically it still took 3 hours.

So this entry logs my intention of abandoning my 2,000 rating goal this year, seeing as that would take at the very least three more five game tournaments for which I currently do not have the energy. Instead, I will change my goal and aim to improve my online rating and play some online games again. Maybe one serious game once a week recorded and straight away analysed on youtube. Analysis is important, and after playing for 4 hours, I admit I have not analysed any of my last 10-12 tournament games... shame on me. I think it's a good goal and definitely possible. I'll do that instead! Then, if my online rating increases I'll go for some OTB tournaments next year and hopefully finally hit 2,000. The problem with that is I need 10 wins vs 2,100 opposition which is tough; then I'd hit 2,000. The time commitment is just pretty big, 4 hours per game x 10 games (at least...), more like 15-20 games... and you can start to see why I am hanging up the gloves for this year!

Its not like me to withdraw or give up. Hence I will start posting videos on my Youtube channel, and of course, I will continue to study on Chessable where my streak is looking pretty impressive. Fortunately, pretty soon we'll offer some serious endgame study on Chessable so as to broaden our offering, I can really use studying some endgames. :)

Sorry if this post doesn't read well, I'm too knackered to refine it :D Just wanted to log what's happening and my plans so that I can refer to it in the future when I look at my path to chess improvement.

New accomplishments, winning at 2,000+ level regularly, rating to follow?

So I played the Frome Chess Congress 2017. I took one bye and had four games. I won 2 vs opposition rated nearly 2,100 FIDE and drew one vs a 2,000 FIDE. I lost the last one vs a 2,100 FIDE because I played out of my knowledge, instead of sticking to my chess openings going for an attack completely out of my book. Serves me right, for getting to greedy.

Pretty proud of my other games though:

As white with the Bishop’s Opening at I played a lot of “Excellent” moves. It was a difficult game, to see the full game please scroll down.

My other win seems even more impressive to me considering I was playing an opening I don’t know very well (and hate). However, I had previously lost by pushing d5 so I was keen not to repeat that and came up with a funky imbalance that the PC doesn’t mind too much. I think black does have the advantage at one point but once I get it back I don’t let go. Really happy!

The other two games are not that noteworthy, I am sure I made some mistakes and missed winning chances in the draw. The loss, well, don’t play out of your opening repertoire as much as I did. For some reason i went into a Stonewall Dutch… never played it in my life, misplayed it. Blundered, lost.

All in all my two wins should spice up my ELO but one of the players was only ECF rated. Still, this is my third 2,100 scalp out of the last 4 2,100 players I faced. I need to face some more and my ELO will follow. The 2,000 goal seems closer, i just need to maintain this form.

Will try to play some more OTB chess soon so I can update you all on my progress :)

By the way, the only studying I’ve been doing is Chessable, so something must be going right :)

Spring 2017 Chess Update

It's been a while since I posted so I thought I'd write a quick update to keep this blog alive and well. The main reason I've been so inconsistent is that I have not been able to make much time for learning chess. Instead, I have been busy raising funding for my start-up, Chessable. We just completed our first round of funding, so even though it took a while, we got there!

Regarding learning, despite not having much learning time, I have kept a 100+ day Chessable streak, so I am very sharp on my openings. I have made some time for some endgame studies and am also pretty sharp on tactical patterns. Lately, I've been trying to pick up an improved French repertoire as White, although I have been questioning the reasons why I never decided to learn the book by Chessable co-founder John Bartholomew on the Scandi!

I am playing a congress next weekend, and hopefully, after that and after a few things post-investment settle down I will be able to dedicate more time for improvement. Nonetheless, I feel that at long time controls I am currently under-rated at 1,817, after all at a tournament I played a few months back, I beat a 2,100 FIDE rated player as black. Except, he was only ECF rated, so I didn't gain any rating for that. I hope to continue such performances, and hence my rating should stabilise around 1,900.

2,000 is still my goal this year, although it does seem somewhat remote.

Stay tuned :)

PS.- Here is a game, just because.

I used to suck at chess openings, now I just suck at the other bits (at least my openings are awesome!)

It’s been a long while since I have updated everyone on my own chess improvement. This is mainly due to bootstrapping our startup Chessable and a little secret I seldom mention, having a sleepless baby in the house! Therefore my daily life can be summarised by:

1. Wake up very early (3–4am) to help with baby (work/study/read if she sleeps further)
2. Study on Chessable about 15 min/day
3. Work on Chessable about 10 hours/day

Anything else fits around that schedule, including playing chess. This is a shame because to get better you need to be playing at the longer time controls. Hence, last month I started making more of an effort, sleepless or not, I want to keep improving.

I started playing a few 15 | 10 games on the chess server, and I am happy to say that my rating holds at a very pleasant 1,850ish, with a new highest at 1880 (Sep 23, 2016). I am very happy with this as you can see just around 3 years ago I just started making my way from 1,250 and it took some work to get to 1,400! It has always been a challenge to consistently perform above 1,800 but I think I am finally part of the club! :) My own self-analysis of these online games shows that my chess openings have stabilised and I almost always get a playable and/or great position out of the opening. I have also begun exploiting my opponents weak opening moves as I can now recognise they have played a sub-optimal line and I then opt for more active/aggressive continuations.

Of course, a few 15|10 games (must be 10–12 in a month) is not enough to improve. One of the best correlations obtained by scientists interested in chess is that the more OTB games you play, the higher your ELO gets. Really you should be playing at least 50 quality OTB chess games yearly if you hope to get to master level. While 2015 (and the first part of 2016) lent itself well for that and I even went above 1,900 FIDE, lately I haven’t had the energy and time to play OTB!

Nonetheless, for diary logging purposes I will relate that I gave two OTB games a try recently (90 minutes no increment)! Again using my chess opening knowledge, I sailed through the openings and build a 30 minute time advantage. This should be enough to win, just keep the position solid and your opponent will blunder under time pressure or time out. I am sad to report I gave both winning positions away. But hey, at least the problem is no longer the opening?

Yesterday I spent 3 hours driving (total) to make this ECF league chess game, and I was up way past my bedtime. I put the loss to a lack of concentration at a crucial moment where I thought I had the game won (I was at +2), all I had to do is trade Queens. My opponent correctly avoided a Queen trade and made life difficult. Wanting to get on with the drive home, I got frustrated, I did not check for opponent counterplay after I compromised my King Safety a bit and boom, enormous blunder, game lost.

Now being a trained psychologist who has read plenty around expertise, learning and also chess performance, I am happy to say I have some awesome ideas on how to stop these kinds of errors from occurring in the future. Obviously, not being exhausted is one of them, maybe drinking a coffee would have been another one, but I am of the belief that once you get a process from conscious to subconscious routine then those things don’t matter. This is why a GM would never make such a blunder, they’ve trained so well that even when they are exhausted they would automatically check for counterplay and convert the win. My conscious overlooked that for a second and my subconscious has no clue about that stuff yet, hence, the blunder!

Fortunately I am also a computer scientist so I look forward to implementing some novel ideas that will help us all (or at least myself ;-) ) to improve and cut these kind of errors out of our games. I can happily say that I am always happy with how I play the opening, and I know that a few months back I still suffered during openings and got sub-par positions. Since that doesn’t happen anymore, it’s time to focus on the other bits! Stay tuned.

—

Here are the pictures of my performance over these last 2 OTB games. I played White on both. Both games against stiff opposition ECF 160ish (1900 FIDE). Game 1 I blundered after squandering a 30 minute time advantage. Game 2 I blundered after having a won position and a 40 minute time advantage. Oh the shame. Good material to improve on ;-) Again, at least the opening went well huh? After all, that is the sole thing I have been having a chance to study. Time to build some more kick ass chess tools :D

Game 1:

Game 2: