Originally posted by GrandmousterPlaying with a hangover improves your concentration no end.
Im doing some research on focusing at the board. What do you do to maintain a good brain for chess? Excercise, vitamins, diet, etc. Or do you just concentrate on studing and getting better that way?
OK, but doesnt caffeine burn you out? maybe sap your energy if you take too much. I get a bost from a tea beofre a game, but get tired later.
I was thinking more along the lines of trying to mantain concentration by using legal suppliments, like ginko, caffeine, dmae, etc. Or is this something you dont care about?
Take a bottle of vodka with you and pour tots from time to time. It irritates your opponent because it looks like you're having more fun than him and sharpens your game ... or at least it just appears so. You can then console yourself later that he played better than you. You have the tools and you know what to do ...
Seriously, fitness levels are all important. Bobby Fischer in his prime was an ace table tennis player and could give the US champion a good game. The brain is the most energy hungry organ in the body and a grandmaster can easily lose a couple or kilograms or more in the course of a game.
For us mere mortals, I would suggest stay off the hooch for a few days, avoid coffee and carbonated drinks, have lots of fruit juice, fruit and food that your body can burn for energy, like pasta. Fruit gives you sugar, pasta gives you carbohydrates that your bodies converts to sugar. Oh, and complex carbohydrates like rye bread that your body takes longer to convert so you don't burn out.
Me? I prefer the cheap sugar rush of a bar of chocolate, followed by a slug of whisky. Just joking .... or maybe.
Originally posted by buffalobillno booze? drat, confined to mediocrity for all time...😞
Take a bottle of vodka with you and pour tots from time to time. It irritates your opponent because it looks like you're having more fun than him and sharpens your game ... or at least it just appears so. You can then console yourself later that he played better than you. You have the tools and you know what to do ...
Seriously, fitness levels are al ...[text shortened]... cheap sugar rush of a bar of chocolate, followed by a slug of whisky. Just joking .... or maybe.
Originally posted by TestriderNope. Time controls were introduced sometime in the '20s or '30s (can someone correct me here?) partly in response to some GM spending at least an hour over his opening move. And he was playing white. Again my memory over length of first move and date might be hazy, but it's genuine. The guy was notoriously slow - maybe he went to sleep. I've got it in a book here somewhere.
You must be talking about the period before they introduced time control ;-)
Originally posted by GrandmousterDo you have sugar with your tea? If so, that could be the cause of the rush and the reason for the tiredness, Your body converts the sugar quickly, your sugar levels in your blood can peak and then quickly come down again. If the body over-compensates, your sugar levels run low and you get tired and shaky. Sometimes this condition can be called hypoglycaemia.
OK, but doesnt caffeine burn you out? maybe sap your energy if you take too much. I get a bost from a tea beofre a game, but get tired later.
I was thinking more along the lines of trying to mantain concentration by using legal suppliments, like ginko, caffeine, dmae, etc. Or is this something you dont care about?
Eat a chocolate bar and have a drink of your choice 8-)