Chess Training Methods for Rapid Improvement

@first post
What is the book in reference?

Originally posted by TK80
@first post
What is the book in reference?

The first post in this thread has been deleted by the Mods or Admin as it broke the Terms of Service.
If we tell you what was in it we would have to kill you 😛

Originally posted by TK80
@first post
What is the book in reference?

The first post in the thread was I'm guessing a link to some pretty obvious scam. For sure, you'll learn more from the comments here than you would from that fellow's Get Rich Quick From Gullible Patzers business! ;-)

Hi GP

OK I tried this puzzle. I did it in less than one minute using a pocket set. I find it "easier" to use a real set than the computer style 2D. As far as I can recall I do not believe I have seen this before but I cannot be certain.
As far as I am concerned I "calculated" how to cover the squares and protect all the pieces. My first position allowed the king an escape square on f6, but then the correct distribution occurred to me after a few seconds analyzing what was necessary - cover f6 - keep the rooks protected etc. Of course I still had the pieces on the board in the first trial position, before replacing them in the solution position. My first position was legal the second was not.

I reckon I lose most games OTB because:

1. I do not fully appreciate the possibilities available to my opponent.
2. I wrongly assess a future position as more favourable to me than it actually is
3. I miss opportunities presented by my opponent.
4. When my opponent makes a move I believe to be weak I rush in to exploit and dissipate my "advantage"
rather than build with restraint.
5. Various tactical miscalculations which arise from the above.
6. An all too close horizon effect, where it all goes misty however long I stare at it.

Here is a game I lost against a stronger player earlier this season:- (my opponent has already boasted this on another chess forum which I found out by accident)



After the game I rushed to my copy of Combinative Motifs by M BLOKH (the guy with the huge head that can hold all these combinations) and in the section "Three pawns protect the king (f7,g7 and h7)" There is one diagram (based on Stein Portisch Stockholm 1962 Pb7 added) where this Nf5 Bg5 followed by Nxg7 is given at difficulty 8. One diagram out of 1200!!



And whilst the key move Nxg7 is similar, the position is not really the same and any pattern recognition would have to be in the form of chunking. The answer is 1. Nxg7 Bxc4 2. Bf6!! Be7 {Bxe2 3. Nf5+ Kg8 4. Nh6++} 3.Qf3.
I had more to distract me on the Q-side than black in the book, I was coming from a position where I had felt I was better, and all the other things that desensitize you to looming danger.

So is this ineffective pattern recognition training given that I had the resource of the book available? Is the position in the resource too different or is the motif similar enough to cut through the excuse of ignorance? Irrespective of that, should the position in my game at my 23rd move been within my capability to calculate?
Is it switching off a sense of danger. Is it over optimism or other failure of assessment of the position?

Hey, the blood is pumping, the clock ticking, he's looking calm, what am I going to do? I'm attacking on the queenside, can I win this pawn, what's he got against me - is it any good? Gotta find a move... That's what OTB is about...

Hey Rag,

all the things you say about OTB games are important - you are a different player and might miss/might not miss certain moves just because the game is live and the heat is on.

As someone who has not seen the game you just posted and the diagram you digged out again, I must say the pattern is fairly similar. Pattern recognition is a difficult subject, it is also about finding structures (the knight in this case) inside other structures (all the other guys rambling about on the queenside, e.g.). But I guess you know that anyway...

By the way, is funny how that diagram out of 1200 reminded you on your game...so also for you the pattern was easily recognizable, or? Anyway, pattern recognition is not all in chess, but it certainly helps a lot.

Originally posted by tharkesh

By the way, is funny how that diagram out of 1200 reminded you on your game...so also for you the pattern was easily recognizable, or? Anyway, pattern recognition is not all in chess, but it certainly helps a lot.

Hi tharkesh,

I don't think I can have explained myself very well. The book is the paper forerunner of what is now know as CT ART. What I meant was when I said I rushed to my copy was to see if anything like that combinational motif was in there, because I didn't think I had seen it before. To find the diagram I used the index! If I had looked at that one before it had not stuck or I was too distracted by other areas of the board for the threat to appear on my radar.

Would I have learned the motif better if I had bought the Stokholm 1962 Tournament Book and worked through the games?

At first I reckon I lost that game because when I took the knight at move 24. although I had calculated most of his sequence I had not been able to see 29. Rxf8 at the end. So I can see five moves ahead. So does that mean I should now work on six move tactics problems?

In general terms it is well known strategically speaking that if you can break down the protecting wall around the king, even at the cost of a piece, and your other pieces are positioned to flood the gaps you have very good chances at winning the battle. This has been known ever since the inventor of the battering ram first showed up at a city wall in classical times! That is seeing an idea that is applicable in a set of circumstances not just recognizing a pattern. With that to guide you may not need the pattern recognition.

ah, ok. i regard pattern recognition as a kind of short-cut. i am not so good at thinking many moves ahead, except in the endgame, where possibilities are less. from your thread i have learned to be even more aware of a couple of pieces plus a queen pointing at the wall in front of the king. i think the sense of danger already increases at a certain point, when a piece crosses the middle. i mean, there is a white side and a black side. it is suspicious to cross that line, especially when they start to stare at protection pawns.

however, my pieces are ok to cross. is simply preemptive defense, so the other guy doesnt get bad ideas....

edit: more to your point: if one knows only one pattern, it will be found almost all the time. the more patterns you know, the more difficult of course it is to find them every time. so, studying more doesnt automatically mean you see more of them. however, it is a perfect example for looking across your own dish-edge: i believe that somebody practicing pattern recognition in completely different sports (like memory, e.g.), will also advance in chess...

Hi Raggers.

The alarm bells should have been ringing before reaching here.


A Knight on f5 v a Black castled postion can hold all kinds of tricks.
And the Bishop coming to f6+ with a check is doom.

Your King is naked. Armed with a just a few very standard mating
ideas (You don't like patterns - I won't use the word) any reasonable
player would go for the g7 sac.

Wether or not he admits it your opponent visualised this common mate
when saccing the piece. He had too. Why sac if you have no follow up.
Rook lifts are part of every players armoury (or should be)



Then this.


Throws up all kinds of back rank tricks, especially with the
active heavy pieces knocking about. (I've added the Queen because
she covers a flight square) it's little wonder White saw the final
position when he played Rxf8+

Put the Rook on h3 and it works with White saccing his Queen.


1.Qh8+ Bf8 2.Qxf8+ Kxf8 3.Rxh8 mate


And that is mating idea you will find in a kids book.

Looking at what happened Black should not have taken the Knight
when it went to g7. (move the Queen and get that Knight to d7 to
nobble what is ever on f6.) Black would have a wretched position
but no quick mate containing two basic mating motifs.

I've no idea what the other lad was thinking but two minutes to
see that 23.Nxg7 Kxg7 works and a couple of minutes looking to
see what happens if he does not take it should suffice.
(is there a sac-back, your are opening an file against your King etc. But here it sound).

Don't fret because you never saw the mates.
We seldom see them against us, we don't study like that.
When was the last you saw a 'White to Play and Defend' puzzle.

The big lesson in that game was beware the Knight on f5.
White never saw all the tricks when he got his Knight to f5.
He just knew Pandoro's box would open and ideas would start
producing themselves the moment it landed on that square.
Ideas he got from other games and study.

Especially with a Black Queen on d7.
(though in this case she is defended but I clicked onto it right away).

EH?

Ideas from other games. Patterns (sorry, it's late I can think of no other word).


1.Qg4 mates or wins the Queen.
A tactical motif I have used often enough and seen 100's of times.

And I've seen them missed.

Perhaps if Kapelan (White) when he was playing you Game 7030003
in this postion with him to play...


....had played 16.Nh6+ winning your Queen you might just have had
a wee alarm bell ringing during your OTB game as to the dangers
of a Knight on f5 against you.

Instead he missed it. (check all checks) 😉

You won this game. Nothing to learn there then.
We only seem to progress with the bitter sting of a defeat.

Originally posted by Ragwort
The first post in this thread has been deleted by the Mods or Admin as it broke the Terms of Service.
If we tell you what was in it we would have to kill you 😛

That makes more sense. I was referring to GreenPawns post. Didnt know about the original post.

Originally posted by Ragwort
So drinking tea is bound to help your chess too - Hurrah for Science!

If this were true, I'd be a much better player.

No, strike that. If it were true, I'd be a [blink]MUCH!!![/blink] better player.

'Strue.

Richard

How do you know the tea hasn't helped!

Originally posted by greenpawn34

Wether or not he admits it your opponent visualised this common mate
when saccing the piece. He had too. Why sac if you have no follow up.
Rook lifts are part of every players armoury (or should be) ...
I've no idea what the other lad was thinking but two minutes to
see that 23.Nxg7 Kxg7 works and a couple of minutes looking to
see what happens if ...[text shortened]... rom other games and study....
We only seem to progress with the bitter sting of a defeat.

OK GP

Many thanks and an excellent piece as always. I think you always have to unpick something then build it up again with the new understanding to make progress towards the next level. My opponent in that game has certainly done this. He came from the US with a USCF rating of 1517 which is just over the 100 ECF, was 135 after his first season with us, then up to 150 and last season 166. It was interesting to speak to him after the game to see the sort of things that were going on in his mind, and I remember discussing various types of "stock in trade" sacrifices with him, particularly in relation to the openings he played. (and for those reading - this is one of the great values in regularly playing at an OTB club)

You probably won't shake me from my belief that pattern recognition on its own as tool to improve is an over simplification of what is required, but maybe it is the language of the times. I think we can argue when a white knight appears on f5 whether that is an "accumulated advantage", a portent of doom, a culmination of a strategic plan, or whether a player sees it more directly in terms of latent patterns in the position as he attempts to maneuver his other pieces into position. In truth it is probably something of all these things.

In respect of the last time I saw a white to play and defend puzzle I recently bought the Quality Chess Puzzle Book by John Shaw which I am slowly working through, and it contains a whole chapter of them! It also contains a chapter on missed opportunities. In fact the whole book is very well laid out and all the examples seem to be quite complex and all from games in the last few years.

I know John Shaw very well, trust him to have chapter of
'White to play and Defend' modules.

I bet he got the idea from me because I've been ranting on for over 30
years that attacking is easy because that is how we study.
'When was the last time you saw a White to play and defend puzzle."
is an oft used quote of mine. Usually followed with 110 examples of
White attacks that should never have succeeded due to sloppy defending.

I've not seen the book but have seen first hand how methodocical
he is at his work. I'm sure it will produce dividends and those patterns will stick.

(don't plug the book it too much - players who cannot defend against
wing and a prayer attacks are my bread and butter). 😉

The ChessCafe Puzzle Book 3,Test and Improve your Defensive Skill

Friend of mine bought it.As the subtitle suggests the entire book is about defense.

Originally posted by torten
The ChessCafe Puzzle Book 3,Test and Improve your Defensive Skill

Friend of mine bought it.As the subtitle suggests the entire book is about defense.

I look it up. Thanks.