I just played through the first game in a book I just picked up ("Best Lessons of a Chess Coach"😉, which was recommended at this forum about a week ago. The book features 10 principal games, which have great annotations. I have not played through that many games (maybe 30), and am wondering: is there conventional wisdom about the ideal number of times an instructive game should be played through. Once enough? Two or three times better? In other words, is the limited time we all have to study best used reviewing, or going over new games? Wutcha think?
Originally posted by wormwoodPlaying through grandmaster games has been a critical step in my improvement. A book with good annotations is bery useful.
I don't know which is better, but grandmasters remembering vast amounts of games move by move seems to hint towards repetition. after all, if it works on tactics, why wouldn't it on other aspects of the game?
Play through the game once quite quickly to get an overall impression, then dissect it, move by move, making your own annotations. Finally, read the ones in the book and see how they compare.
Originally posted by WulebgrI find I end up being able to do that after just two or three repititions, and I can reproduce most of my own games without looking at the scoresheet.
With certain games, I'll play through them until I can play through the entire game without the book in front of me.
My big tip would be: Study the game until you can explain the purpose behind every move.
I say 2 maximum. I read over logical chess move by move by Chernev and went over it 2 times. After that you can't get much from it.
But I believe once should be good enough but if you still don't understand go over it again.
I thing I will suggest though is after the game is over, one side resigned then play the game out by yourself without any help and figure out how the winning side would win.
I do this will all the games I go over, unless they end in mate and it helps me win won games.
In his "The Soviet Chess Conveyor," Russian trainer Shereshevsky says you should go through master games three times and after the final time, write out the main idea of the game. He also says going through contemporary games is a waste of time for non-professional players since those games follow the experiences of countless games of the old masters. Indeed, the thrust and counterthrusts and the constantly changing plans that occur in contemporary games are too arcane for most students. Shereshevsky suggests instead that lower-rated players go through games by Rubenstein, Nimzovitch, Capablanca and Alekhine. The student is then able to see the realization of the master's plan in its most perfect form because the opposition is inferior. GM Babkouli Anankov agrees with this assessment. He told me that when he was being trained, the students weren’t allowed to look at anything but classic games for two years. This makes sense to me and I don’t go through any games post-Botvinnik.