Im thinking of improving my mating net skills by doing the whole Polgar book (chess: 5334 problems) ... in a week.
is it even possible? I think it would also help my tactical stamina, which kills me at OTB. Im trying to do an OTB tourney sometime next year so that would help.
has anyone even finished this book before? when I was just starting out a few years ago I did maybe 1000 from it and it helped, but I was way too weak to get the mate in 3s without taking 20 minutes for some of the harder ones
Originally posted by AlexanderAlekhine Are you going to set them up on a board, or just solve the diagrams?
I have that book in paperback. I use it to workout it's so heavy.
Im going to set it up on a board. I havnt played OTB in a while, and my calculating abilities are way weaker in 3d than 2d (as both chesstempo and corr. games are both 2d)
today I just did some assorted tactics, and it took a bit of getting used to having it set them all up but it became fine after a while. If I remember right most of the Polgar book has not too many pieces on the board.
and yes, the book is the biggest in my collection by about 10 pounds! 2 of the 7 days will be needed just to lift it to my chess table 😉
Well if you are setting them up on a board, I think 1 week is not enough time.
Yes a lot of the positions have only a few pieces, but as you progress you get more and more pieces on the board.
Also...that book isn't as easy as people think.
Ya it's mate in 1...easy...but the mates in 2 and 3 are harder than you would think.
I think you would need 3 to 4 weeks of atleast 3 hours a day to do the whole book if you set each position up on a board.
I've never done that much tactical study though so maybe ask someone else.
It may be possible to do it in 1 week but it will be tough.
yeah, for sure.. the mate in 3s get fiendishly hard in that book. I might have been 1500 when I last did some from the book and I got stuck on one problem for 3 days. It was a king in the center and you had a rook and 3 minor pieces. it looks easy as if youre going to just bully him quick, but he slips out of the net everytime, so I started trying dozens of in-between moves.
Originally posted by irontigran Im thinking of improving my mating net skills by doing the whole Polgar book (chess: 5334 problems) ... in a week.
is it even possible? I think it would also help my tactical stamina, which kills me at OTB. Im trying to do an OTB tourney sometime next year so that would help.
has anyone even finished this book before? when I was just starting out a f ...[text shortened]... t I was way too weak to get the mate in 3s without taking 20 minutes for some of the harder ones
Do 5-6 a day, and SLEEP on them! Much more useful than doing a whole bunch in a week. Most of the time, you'll forget the patterns if you do too many in a day, so bring the number down a bit. Remember, cram studying never works!
Originally posted by irontigran Im thinking of improving my mating net skills by doing the whole Polgar book (chess: 5334 problems) ... in a week.
is it even possible? I think it would also help my tactical stamina, which kills me at OTB. Im trying to do an OTB tourney sometime next year so that would help.
has anyone even finished this book before? when I was just starting out a f ...[text shortened]... t I was way too weak to get the mate in 3s without taking 20 minutes for some of the harder ones
I really dont think you could go through it in a week if as you say the in 3's take 20 mins. And your plan is to set them up? OK go through them in a week because now you can, and with all the time left over you could also go through Comprehensive Chess Endings, by Yuri Averbakh.
Originally posted by irontigran Im thinking of doing the whole Polgar book (chess: 5334 problems) ... in a week.
Im trying to do an OTB tourney sometime next year so that would help.
mmmmh... somewhere next year is in a week?
set up every board in 10s taking 20s to solve each, will keep you busy close to 7hrs a day the whole week. And to remember what ?
Haven't heard such a silly thing in a while. But then...
A few years ago, a non-master named Mike de la Maza wrote a little book called Rapid Chess Improvement. In his book, he outlined a tactics-only study plan where, over a few months time, he built up to doing 1200 progressively more difficult tactical problems in an 8 hour period. He claimed a gain of 700 OTB rating points in 2 years using his method. This seems like an insanely heavy work load unless you don't have anything else to do. So is 5334 in a week possible? I suppose. If you've got the time and motivation, give it a shot. What have you got to lose?
suicide???
08 Dec '09 02:41
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