Hello, chess.com players.  I am once again taking the mighty mantle of chess.com teachership. 

I am offering chess lessons at $10 an hour.  You can pay me via paypal, cash, personal check, money order, credit card, or even cigarettes!  Yes, I am offering cigarettes as a payment option. 

There are several ways you can attempt to pay me.  You can go to my website http://www.zenchess.com and click on the "donate" button, or you can send a paypal payment for services directly to my email jacob@zenchess.com  . 

Do not let that email fool you - the best way to get ahold of me is through my email zenchess@gmail.com .

I live in Omaha, NE where I am the 2 time city champion, and Nebraska's newest Expert class player.  My USCF rating is 2002.  You can check on my tournament results at this link:

http://main.uschess.org/component/option,com_wrapper/Itemid,181/

Search for Wagner, Jacob K   (exactly like that) or you can enter my uscf id # which is: 12717383

An analysis of my recent tournament performances is as follows:

Floor: 1800.

Regular Rating: 2002.  Quick Rating: 1726.

Here is a rundown of my latest tournaments:

2009 January Swiss Open : 4-0 1st Place.  Wins against masters Bob Hollimon and Ron Luther. 

1 Game match against Tony Dutiel : Lost the match.

2 Game Match against Don Shennum: Won both games.

2008 Great Plains Open:  Win Draw Win Win , Qualified for the Nebraska State Championship

2008 Omaha Championship:  4-0 First Place

2008 1ST ANNUAL SPRING OPEN (NE)  4-0 First Place

2008 MARCH PLUS SCORE  4-0 First Place

So as you can see I have been rather successful lately in tournament chess, and at one point I think I went 19 games in a row without a loss. 

How about online chess?  On chess.com my ratings are not very high.  The reason for this is that I did not care much about those ratings, also many of my games timed out and I got a loss because of that.  I am however working on getting my rating back up.  It's going to take months probably unless I start multiple games at the same time, which I don't feel like doing right now.

In the one venue that I cared about, ICC, I have been very successful.  My high 5-minute rating, a rating that is very difficult to get high in, was over or at 2100.  When you get that high you are regularly playing masters and Im's, and I beat quite a few IM's and many masters to get rated that high.  I also beat Eugeno Torre, Bobby Fischer's friend and famous grandmaster who was rated 2300 at the time.  You can look at the game in my chess.com blog.

Normally I can maintain a 5-minute rating of over 1900.  However I feel that my strength of late has gone way up and I'll soon be competing to try to get over 2200, which if maintainable, I am told is equal to master level strength in 5-minute blitz chess.

Ok, enough about my qualifications, how can I help you?

I am a fanatically devoted teacher with a lifetime of teaching experience in chess, martial arts, video games, and math/computers etc.  I can identify your learning style (visual, auditory, verbal) and gear the lessons towards that.  My lessons are not pre-canned, and vary based on the student.  In the beginning, we will work on finding out what your unique strengths and weaknesses are. 

I have read literally hundreds of chess books on all topics ranging from psychology, theory, game theory, chess engine programming, opening study, etc.  I am well versed in a number of openings and can usually find a suitable plan in any opening. 

When you take a lesson with me, I will be asking you many questions in the socratic style.  I will be giving advice and teaching as well.  We can do lessons via voice through skype, or another VOIP system, or we can use the voice features on playchess.com.  I will be drawing arrows during the lesson to indicate diagonals and key squares. 

If you have seen my chess lectures, you can get a pretty good idea of my style, but keep in mind I have learned alot about chess since then and am far more powerful in teacher style, confidence, and knowledge and understanding of the game since then. 

What I really want is dedicated students that wish to enter competetive tournament chess and become successful, but I will take all students because I am BROKE.  I do have a contract for video game development, but in the meantime I need supplemental income. 

Remember, chess improves your mind and fights alzheimers, and you can easily convince your parents to let you take chess lessons as an extra-curricular activity. :)

If you are interested, please message me here, or email me at zenchess@gmail.com .  I apologize to all coaches who charge more, I am broke right now, and once I have some more solid success stories I will definitely be raising my rates.  If my financial situation improves I will be raising my rates as well. 

If you would like to talk to some of my previous students, the best one I can think of right now would be the famous Rael, chess.com celebrity extraordinaire.  He can give you the nitty gritty details of my videos and teaching style. 

Please check out my website http://www.zenchess.com , register to the forums, get your own yourname@zenchess.com email, and play some real time chess as well.  Thank you and goodnight.

-Jacob Wagner

Please elaborate on how you propose to actually 'do the teaching'. Online is what I'm presuming>?

Online, on a chess server such as ICC, FICS (free internet chess server), or playchess.

With your option of voice chat during the lesson.

On a normal chess server, you can "takeback" moves, or move through the game with arrows to go back and forth and show alternative moves.  Similar to some of the chess videos that are on the net.

Some questions:
1) What would the programme be? Work everyday with you for an hour, for example?

2) How long can you work with me for, 3 months, as long as I need?

3) How long can you keep your price for?

Thanks for posting RainbowRising. 

I am willing to give as many lessons as I can possibly do in a day, however I also have computer work as well so the times would have to be negotiated. 

I prefer longer sessions, say 2 hour blocks or more if you are dedicated.  You could do as many or as little lessons as you want, obviously more time equals more time for me to impart my knowledge and advice.

So, you could do 2 hours twice a week, or 2 hours once a week, or whatever you wish within reason and the response I get. 

I can be your coach for as long as you need.  I need good examples of students that have had their rating increase for my local teaching as well.  Ironically I can teach children in the Omaha, NE area for $20 an hour which is why I try to not tell them about this offer. :)

For anyone that signs up with this $10 an hour deal, I promise to keep my price for at least 3 months of lessons, and then raise it to $15 an hour if for some reason I find more students locally willing to pay a high price, or I am successful in my internet/games development businesses.  Depending on the situation it could remain at $10 an hour. 

I don't just use lesson time to work on your chess - I also try to get you to play a lot of games, and send them to me for analysis or pattern detection on common mistakes.  So I will be doing research off hours, recommending books/software, recommending places to play, running your games through tactical blunder analyser with chess assistant, looking at your games, emailing you advice or analysis.