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What has helped you improve?

What has helped you improve?

Only Chess

w
Stay outta my biznez

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I'm looking for feedback from anyone and everyone who'd like to put their 2 cents worth in here.

I'm in the process of building a website specific to the kind of chess played here, Internet-correspondence chess. I want to focus on what helps people improve the most in this style of chess. Doesn't matter what your rating is or anything else. I'm just looking for anything you've done that has helped your chess game and improved your rating. Could be a particular type of study, certain books, changing to a opening that you like, anything....

So if anyone has any ideas please post'em here. Or if you'd rather you can PM me.

And the site I'm building is a freebie/labor of love kind of thing. So there's no money involved other than the cash I'm spending to host it. I'm doing all of the grunt work myself. 🙂

All input is greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

Wib

A

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1. Online Lessons (1 on 1)
2. Switching to openings which result in positions I'm comfortable with.
3. Looking at Top Level games.

R

Edmonton, Alberta

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TACTICS,TACTICS....i'll get u till 1700 easily..... great article on chesscafe.com. 400 points in 400 days... u collect 1000 tactic puzzles and do them 7 times cus repetion is good... first round u take 64 days to them all. then 32,16,8,4,2,1...after that u'll see tactics instantly... i'm on round 3 right now...got to 1714 CFC rating in less then a year.....

Play openings u feel comfortable with....

read yasser seirwans books...6 of them...
play winning chess, winning chess tactics,winning chess stragery etc....

Marinkatomb
wotagr8game

tbc

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Playing here has improved my chess! I resigned 50 games a little while ago as a drastic measure to cut my games but now i have them under control i'm starting to feel the benefit.

By using the analyse board for 10-15 minutes per move (assuming that my opponent hasn't made a mistake, otherwise i just move) I've found that Playing and studying don't have to be seperate entity's!

Recently i started annotating a few games for my chess clubs magazine and found that i really really enjoy doing it. If i can get my games a little lower i think i'm going to actually do the analysis as i play! The act of putting your thought's into words for a third person actually forces you to check your analysis properly to illiminate as many errors as possible. I find when you talk about the position ie "the knight on h1 is out of the game which creates weaknesses on such and such a square" focuses your thought's and often you'll often find moves you wouldn't have considered otherwise. The game i was analysing was one i played a couple of weeks ago and i found a stronger moves left right and center! When i've finished it, i'll post it 🙂

w
Stay outta my biznez

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Excellent posts! Keep'em coming. Thanks to everyone!

K
Strawman

Not Kansas

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I think I play worse now than I did when I first joined, but I think it's because I rush too much. Gotta take the time to really look and think and to use the analyze board.

f
Quack Quack Quack !

Chesstralia

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Originally posted by marinakatomb
Playing here has improved my chess! I resigned 50 games a little while ago as a drastic measure to cut my games but now i have them under control i'm starting to feel the benefit.

By using the analyse board for 10-15 minutes per move (assuming that my opponent hasn't made a mistake, otherwise i just move) I've found that Playing and studying don' ...[text shortened]... ago and i found a stronger moves left right and center! When i've finished it, i'll post it 🙂
i am currently reducing my games ... i will use your tip: to annotate while playing the game, to try to improve ... thanks!!!!

AThousandYoung
1st Dan TKD Kukkiwon

tinyurl.com/2te6yzdu

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1) A while ago I began keeping my openings down to the absolute minimum. I memorize one and only one response for every move my opponent makes as deep into the game as I can remember. This way I keep the positions I have to be familiar with to an absolute minimum. I can always expand my repetoire (sp?) later.

2) When it's my turn, I started looking at every possible move I can make. Once I've picked a move that looks good, I look at every possible move my opponent can make. This has cut down on my really, really stupid errors 98%.

J

back in business

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playing 10-30 blitz games (<5min) per day on internet. Definitely that, but also playing blindfolded couple long games per week.

AThousandYoung
1st Dan TKD Kukkiwon

tinyurl.com/2te6yzdu

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Originally posted by Jusuh
playing 10-30 blitz games (<5min) per day on internet. Definitely that, but also playing blindfolded couple long games per week.
5 and 10 minute games did help me for a long time. Then I found I couldn't concentrate on longer games and stopped playing them. I think everyone should play such games at some point in their chess career.

X
Cancerous Bus Crash

p^2.sin(phi)

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Originally posted by AThousandYoung
5 and 10 minute games did help me for a long time. Then I found I couldn't concentrate on longer games and stopped playing them. I think everyone should play such games at some point in their chess career.
I play blitz (5 0 or 5 5 mostly), correspondance (obviously) and some classical. They are all different and all teach you something different. If you play one to the exclusion of the others you will struggle overall.

Marinkatomb
wotagr8game

tbc

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Originally posted by XanthosNZ
I play blitz (5 0 or 5 5 mostly), correspondance (obviously) and some classical. They are all different and all teach you something different. If you play one to the exclusion of the others you will struggle overall.
I think beginners benefit from blitz more than mid level players. You need to get a certain amount of games under your belt before you can even think about improving. The first 1000 losses are generally through the loss of a piece or two or insefficient knowledge of general strategy such as putting your rooks on the 7th when you can or when you should play a pin in the opening or not.

Once these lessons have been learnt i think CC is the best way to practice. In Blitz you can make the same mistake over and over again and never work out were your going wrong. To the student of chess (not just the casual player), CC is the way to the future! 😀

Ragnorak
For RHP addons...

tinyurl.com/yssp6g

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Apart from playing loads of games...

the first thing I did was read up on tactics; pins/skewers/forks/removal of defender/discovered attacks, then once I knew what they were about, I did the examples on this page; http://clubs.juniata.edu/chess/live/chess_tactics.html. Its very important if you have some tactics problems that u have the answers provided as well. I think this could be one of the most important aspects of your website.

I've started using databases for my openings, because I believe this is the only way I will be able to learn some. Unfortunately, I'm not the sort of person to sit down with a book (normally) and learn all the theory of an opening, so this is the next best thing (hopefully 😉 )

I've decided to try a book for the first time, and am reading The Art of Attack in Chess atm. There is a chapter on mating patterns in there, which is obviously quite important. Wulebgr has a section on his website under strategy... http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/wulebgr/

D

Marinkatomb
wotagr8game

tbc

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Originally posted by Ragnorak
Apart from playing loads of games...

the first thing I did was read up on tactics; pins/skewers/forks/removal of defender/discovered attacks, then once I knew what they were about, I did the examples on this page; http://clubs.juniata.edu/chess/live/chess_tactics.html. Its very important if you have some tactics problems that u have the answers provided ...[text shortened]... bgr has a section on his website under strategy... http://www.angelfire.com/poetry/wulebgr/

D
If you've got chessbase (or any of there products, fritz, etc...) you might want to check this site out. Books in chessbase format!

http://www.uni-klu.ac.at/~gossimit/c/book.htm

Amen 😀

w
Stay outta my biznez

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To all:

EXCELLENT! This is exactly what I need. Kinda nice to see so many different ideas and plans that have helped people. Ok, if anyone else wants to jump in feel free.

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