Need a systematic intense tactics study plan

I am sick of being stuck in my low rating. I want to focus on tactics and do it in an intense consistent way. Here is what I 'm thinking and I would appreciate your feedback.

I'm going to focus each day on a certain tactic. For example on Friday (today) I will study and work on pins. Sat. Discovered attacks. Sun forks. Mon Removing the guard. Tues deflection. Wed. Skewers Thurs review .

My plan is to use four books Susan Polgar, Nunn, Seirawan, and (God help me) Weteschnik. I will the chapter in those books that focus on the tactic of the day.

Then I start the week over repeating my previous week's plan.

I will amplify my study with Chess Tempo and Tactics Trainer. As well as choosing puzzles that are focused on the chosen tactic.

And just to keep me balanced I'll be reading Coakley's Winning Strategy for Kids and Seirawan's Winning Chess Strategy.

I know there are more tactics I have not mentioned but will save them until I have a good grasp of the ones I mentioned.

I would like your feedback please . My chess study up to now has been haphazard and undisciplined.

Grit

Sounds fine imo. I wish you much success.

Originally posted by grit
I am sick of being stuck in my low rating. I want to focus on tactics and do it in an intense consistent way. Here is what I 'm thinking and I would appreciate your feedback.

I'm going to focus each day on a certain tactic. For example on Friday (today) I will study and work on pins. Sat. Discovered attacks. Sun forks. Mon Removing the guard. Tues deflect feedback please . My chess study up to now has been haphazard and undisciplined.

Grit

Hi, i also did this but i spent much longer than a day on each. For example like you i studied discovered attacks, looking at the four principle points that make up a discovered attack, i looked at examples, looked at games and then and only then, once i had the pattern in my mind i went to chesstempo.com and practised discovered attacks in a range that was practical (i believe it is a waste of time, impractical and counter productive doing tactical exercises that are way too hard. why? for we get so disconsolate when we get them wrong again and again and again, better to stick to ones within our range and increment the difficulty as we learn and progress, for we enjoy the exercises). It seems to me that this is half the battle. If you burden yourself with too many exercises that are too hard, you will become disconsolate. How many weightlifters can lift their optimum weight first try off? Once you have convinced yourself that you can spot and create the necessary environment for a successful discovered attack i would move on.

Hope this helps, realise that everyone is different, be patient with yourself, take your time to understand the dynamics of the patterns, if you fail an example, go over it gain to see why you failed it and YOU WILL PROGRESS. All the best Robbie.

I would think doing only one theme at a time would be less effective than mixing it all up. you certainly shouldn't do it training an artificial neural net, and the brain is not that much different. in theory there would generalization errors, but the brain is probably more resilient to that than artificial nets. still, something to consider.

besides that, the most important thing is to stay on a steady diet of tactics, every day. it's much better to do less daily than a lot with long breaks. the more the better of course, but beware of burnout, which is your worst enemy and can stop your training for months.

aim for accuracy, don't give up before you're absolutely sure you got it right. pain is your friend.

Just go to Emrald Tactics trainer and solve some problems when you take a break from work.

Everyman Chess published a little book called "Rapid Chess Improvement." It's a tactics study plan for adult players. The book was written by a non-master named Mike de la Maza who claims an OTB rating increase of 700 points in 2 years using the methods in his book. It may not be exactly what you're looking for, but who knows? Might be worth checking out. Good luck.

Originally posted by dkurth
Everyman Chess published a little book called "Rapid Chess Improvement." It's a tactics study plan for adult players. The book was written by a non-master named Mike de la Maza who claims an OTB rating increase of 700 points in 2 years using the methods in his book. It may not be exactly what you're looking for, but who knows? Might be worth checking out. Good luck.

My guess is that the general idea of "Rapid Chess Improvement" is good, but I think de la Maza's approach was just too intense. Too much studying for too long, potentially causing burnout. The book actually began as a couple of articles (available for free on Dan Heisman's web site). Imho, the core of the book is just these two articles, with a bunch of filler and fluff. If you're curious, just read the articles and don't bother with the book.

BTW, it's not clear to me how much repetition you plan to use for any particular problem. I subscribe to the Heisman philosophy of fairly easy problems (I agree with Robbie here) looked at multiple times, so that you can memorize them cold and see the answers quickly. I don't know that this approach is best, but it's what I believe. Heisman lays out this basic approach on his "Recommended Books" web page, in the section about Bain's "Chess Tactics for Students". But you can use this basic approach for any problem set.

Erik has developed a terrific tactics trainer at chess dot com. For a modest fee you can have unlimited access that always feeds you appropriate level problems.

If your eyesight is better than mine, you can try CTS, but it develops only quick recognition of short combinations. Erik's trainer has many that are nine or more moves deep an reach a theoretically won endgame rather than checkmate.

My favorite tactics book because it is challenging is Imagination in Chess.

Folks here should lobby RHP to develop effective and interactive tactics training. Erik's and Tryfon Gavriel's sites both have this feature.

Thanks to all of you.

I like your suggestions. I just ordered Rapid Chess Improvement from Amazon for $2.08 !

And I went back to Chess Emerald.

My plan was to read as much as I could on a specific tactic in a day from the four books I named.
Hopefully there will be many problems in each book about the tactic. if not I have other problem/puzzle books .

That is day ONE . The next day I pick another tactic and repeat method and so on until I cover six important tactics.

7th day. Review plus maybe Coakley's kid's strategy book (for variety and fun)

Then 8th day becomes the first day and go back over each day and tactic of first week.
And keep on this way for a good while until those tactics are a real part of me.

Then add tactics not covered in first set and go the same with those.

Does that sound like a good plan? I hope I can keep it exciting and not get tired. I will be spending several hours each day this way.

Grit
And yes I do go to chess.com and workout on the tactics trainer.

Originally posted by grit
I am sick of being stuck in my low rating. I want to focus on tactics and do it in an intense consistent way. Here is what I 'm thinking and I would appreciate your feedback.

I'm going to focus each day on a certain tactic. For example on Friday (today) I will study and work on pins. Sat. Discovered attacks. Sun forks. Mon Removing the guard. Tues deflect ...[text shortened]... feedback please . My chess study up to now has been haphazard and undisciplined.

Grit

I think you are on the right path...just remember to balance your playing time with your study time.

have you ever cosidred to just play some more chess ? I see you have only 9 finished games here...

That's true. But I also play on other sites.

Grit