one of my many weaknesses is continually missing important pawn moves. even more so than with pieces, which I think is a side product of most tactical problems being about pieces. does anybody know of a collection of positions, where finding the right pawn move would be crucial? maybe a book, but online-resource of course would be even better.
I'm not thinking so much about winning tactics or endgames, but more middlegame positions where a single pawn move makes all the difference. the idea being, if I could collect a few hundred such positions, I could drill them over and over, and maybe start seeing those moves better.
I was also thinking about if it could be possible to extract them from a db, but I dont know if it's doable? moves winning material probably are easy, but moves simply strengthening the position would take analysing games move by move, so it would take a loooong time....
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'Pawn Power in Chess' by Hans Kmoch is a classic, although I think it's only available in descriptive notation.
A book I've seen recommended by many people is 'Winning Pawn Structures' by Alexander Baburin. I checked out at a few sample pages and read some reviews on Amazon and it looks superb. The drawback is it only deals with isolated queens pawn positions, although these can arise from dozens of openings.
If you don't want to buy a book, i suggest going through the games of some top positional players. I'm sure anyone who played through the annotated games of Karpov, Petrosian or Capablanca would learn a great deal about the way they use pawns and adapt their play around different pawn structures.
Originally posted by David TebbI've noticed when looking at opening databases that better (than me) players tend to sometimes not protect the pawn structure (eg in the queen's gambit) black playing Bb4 pinning the c3 knight. I am now thinking that I have to lose this obsession with keeping the pawn structure intact as it is probably costing me momentum defending the knight with a queen/bishop instead of relying on the b2 pawn.
'Pawn Power in Chess' by Hans Kmoch is a classic, although I think it's only available in descriptive notation.
A book I've seen recommended by many people is 'Winning Pawn Structures' by Alexander Baburin. I checked out at a few sample pages and read some reviews on Amazon and it looks superb. The drawback is it only deals with isolated queens pawn p ...[text shortened]... deal about the way they use pawns and adapt their play around different pawn structures.
Originally posted by stevetoddIt's my big weakness - not knowing when to push pawns to gain ground and put pressure. I tend to hang back and play forward with pieces. I need to work on this.
I've noticed when looking at opening databases that better (than me) players tend to sometimes not protect the pawn structure (eg in the queen's gambit) black playing Bb4 pinning the c3 knight. I am now thinking that I have to lose this obsession with keeping the pawn structure intact as it is probably costing me momentum defending the knight with a queen/bishop instead of relying on the b2 pawn.
thanks for everyone. I have the winning pawn stuctures, but have only skimmed through it a bit. I think I'm going to read it properly next. I see It even has some exercises along the lines of 'suggest a plan for white', but not too many. only 20 positions or so. but the answers to those seem to be very detailed... there's of course a lot of similar positions within the theory-part also.
I'd still like more exercises like that, although those will keep me busy for some time I guess...
Originally posted by wormwoodHeheh, join the club wormwood 🙂 I didn't want to make a thread on this subject because everyone would know, and I would be humililated 🙂
thanks for everyone. I have the winning pawn stuctures, but have only skimmed through it a bit. I think I'm going to read it properly next. I see It even has some exercises along the lines of 'suggest a plan for white', but not too many. only 20 positions or so. but the answers to those seem to be very detailed... there's of course a lot of similar position ...[text shortened]... ll like more exercises like that, although those will keep me busy for some time I guess...
haha just joking.
Originally posted by David Tebb"Pawn Power" is a good book. I found it very useful. My one piece of criticsm though: get ready to learn a whole new language. The author has a whole vocabularly to describe pawn positions "contender," "sweeper," "passer," etc. I found it a little hard to follow.
'Pawn Power in Chess' by Hans Kmoch is a classic, although I think it's only available in descriptive notation.
A book I've seen recommended by many people is 'Winning Pawn Structures' by Alexander Baburin. I checked out at a few sample pages and read some reviews on Amazon and it looks superb. The drawback is it only deals with isolated queens pawn p ...[text shortened]... deal about the way they use pawns and adapt their play around different pawn structures.
Originally posted by der schwarze RitterAnother good one is The Art of the Middle Game, by Keres and Kotov, translated by Golombek, the chapter on Various Pawn Positions in the Centre (Kotov) is relevant to this thread. The other chapters are Planning in the middle game (Golombek), Strategy and Tactics of Attack on the King (Kotov), but the two best chapters come from Keres - How to Defend Difficult Positions and The Art of Analysis. Time I read it again 😞
Recommended chess books: "Steinitz' Selected Chess Games," "Complete Chess Strategy, Vols. 1-3," by Ludek Pachman, and "300 Chess Games," by Tarrasch.