Originally posted by byedidia I think Lasker said it first. The way I always quote it is, "When you see a good move, sit on your hands and look for a better one."
The version I heard is slightly more aggressive, but I don't know who said it first:
'Found a good move? Good for you. Now find a better one'.
Originally posted by byedidia I think Lasker said it first. The way I always quote it is, "When you see a good move, sit on your hands and look for a better one."
A lot of advice has been given here, much of it very good and practical. When we leave a piece enprise its usually the result of a faulty thought process. We have failed to discern the danger. When we miss a mate, its usually the result of a faulty thought process, not looking at the most forcing continuations first and foremost. There are as far as I can discern, very few books dedicated to the thought process and the ones that are, are either two difficult, Abrahams the chess mind or Silmans reassess your chess which is a little patronising and not very helpful at all.
Personally I have found that self analysis is the best. Analysis of ones games and the thought processes which led to the loss. I have found it very very difficult to discipline my mind during a practical game of chess and to follow a systematic way of looking at the game, evaluating the position. The result is a kind of aimlessness and making sub optimal moves.
Originally posted by robbie carrobie A lot of advice has been given here, much of it very good and practical. When we leave a piece enprise its usually the result of a faulty thought process. We have failed to discern the danger. When we miss a mate, its usually the result of a faulty thought process, not looking at the most forcing continuations first and foremost. There are as far ...[text shortened]... ame, evaluating the position. The result is a kind of aimlessness and making sub optimal moves.
Yes, a good and clinical thought process is key. This can always be improved by taking a little longer over move selection. An awareness of the whole board is critical. (Forget about the fianchetto bishop at your peril).
I was just reading an excellent review by Jeremy Silman this morning (the review is excellent, the book probably not). I think it sums up exactly what you need to do to become a better player:
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Move-First-Think-Later-p3741.htm
Originally posted by Data Fly I was just reading an excellent review by Jeremy Silman this morning (the review is excellent, the book probably not). I think it sums up exactly what you need to do to become a better player:
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Move-First-Think-Later-p3741.htm
I was reading this review up to the point where he says
"... and if you have aspirations to become an IM or GM, you need to look at 100,000 (preferably lots more than that) games."
How true is this?
To me it just seems like.... well, a lot.
I may not even have played or looked through 100,000 moves since I started playing,
yet my game's improved quite a bit (ok not exactly master level, but still).
This raised my eyebrows as well, but you have to consider:
- he talks about acquiring patterns and just means flipping through the games (probably spending only a few minutes per game)
- this is the method for professional players who can (or want to) spend their full time on study.
Spending 2 min. on each game, you would need about 3,333 hours, which is about 2 full-time years of study (assuming 200 8-hour working days).
I am actually wondering how one would go about selecting games and keeping track of which games already looked at in an efficient way. But probably there will be some tools out there, as well as the input from a teacher.
I'd never heard of this technique before a few years ago (i.e. many decades after I started playing chess) but I stumbled across something similar by myself when I was trying to learn a new opening (the Kings Indian in this case). What I did was play through lots of games on chessgames.com without trying to analyse the positions too deeply, or indeed at all, and I found that I sort of got a feel for what sort of plans Black tried. I must admit that I only looked at Black wins, but that was because I wanted to learn how to play the opening as Black and I didn't want to learn how to lose!
Originally posted by tvochess This raised my eyebrows as well, but you have to consider:
- he talks about acquiring patterns and just means flipping through the games (probably spending only a few minutes per game)
- this is the method for professional players who can (or want to) spend their full time on study.
Spending 2 min. on each game, you would need about 3,333 hours, which ...[text shortened]... cient way. But probably there will be some tools out there, as well as the input from a teacher.
The idea has merit.
Indeed, the single best predictor of an individual’s chess skill is not the amount of chess he’s played against opponents, but rather the amount of time he’s spent sitting alone working through old games. - moonwalking with einstein
Originally posted by 64squaresofpain I was reading this review up to the point where he says
[b]"... and if you have aspirations to become an IM or GM, you need to look at 100,000 (preferably lots more than that) games."
How true is this?
To me it just seems like.... well, a lot.
I may not even have played or looked through 100,000 moves since I started playing,
yet my game's improved quite a bit (ok not exactly master level, but still).[/b]
1 or 2 high-level games picked apart to the point of understanding are worth 1000 high-level games just breezing through the moves as fast as possible.
Originally posted by BigDoggProblem 1 or 2 high-level games picked apart to the point of understanding are worth 1000 high-level games just breezing through the moves as fast as possible.
My advice would be to go after the low hanging fruit, ie find the weaknesses in your game responsible for many of your losses and that can be remedied with the least substantial amount of effort.
The way I would do it would be to have someone I respect chess-wise and who can see the wood from the trees, look at your games, and see where you are fundamentally failing again and again.
Make a shortlist of the most important and more easily rectified failings and work on those one at a time until that aspect is no longer a very weak element of your game, then pick another area to improve on.
25 Apr '15 18:16
How do I get better?
Back to Top