My Journey To Getting Better At Chess: An Overview
Hi, everyone. Happy Friday! It's been a while since I actually posted this series, lol. Welcome to my blog! As many of you know, I've been using my blog as a platform to update the community on my chess practice, as well as my tournament progress!
So it's been a little over six months since I started working with my current coach. Here's been my online progress since beginning with him:
Chess.com Rapid -- 1751 -> 1891 (peaked at 1918)
Chess.com Blitz -- 1765 -> 2014 (peaked at 2062)
Chess.com Bullet (for whatever it's worth, lol) -- 1756 -> 1836 (peaked at 1918)
Chess.com Puzzles -- 2388 --> 2713 (sitting on my peak, lol)
Now here is my OTB progress in that time frame. I outlined each tournament individually because I want to give a sense of my progress, as there were ups and downs:
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2021 DCC FIDE Open I (Dallas) -- 1790 -> 1787
SLOACT (Houston) -- 1787 -> 1791
2nd In Forever (Arlington) -- 1791 -> 1766
Texas Golden Open (Dallas) -- 1766 -> 1787
ACC Open 53 (Arlington) -- 1787 -> 1836
Memorial Madness (San Antonio) -- 1836 -> 1818
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So as you can see, I am coming off a rough tournament in San Antonio, however, I've overall made progress since playing in tournaments again! For those of you wondering about improving, coaching, etc, I do believe you can/will improve if you have good coaching, can play consistently, and put in a little work (and "work" does not mean an hour straight of puzzle rush, lol. Challenge yourself!).
In the future, I plan to make a separate post about how I changed my habits to get better. Hopefully, it can help you as well! 
Now time for an overview of how I've been training lately!
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TACTICS/CALCULATION
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For that area of my game (very important, so that one's chess brain is sharp!), I've been alternating between Aagard's Book on Calculation and doing Chesstempo puzzles. I created a new Chesstempo account (mainly because my old one was @EOGuel, but I wanted to change it to @DanielGuel, but I didn't know how to change username, so I created a new one).
Since starting back Chesstempo, I've scored 10/15 (67%), and my current rating is 1754. I hope it gets higher, as my rating on my previous account was in the 1900s, but I'm not too concerned about that, mainly learning from the puzzles. I also hope my accuracy gets higher. Here's a puzzle I got wrong on Chesstempo, feel free to solve!
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Here is an Aagard puzzle I got right! I do think it was one of the easier problems in the chapter...
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I was able to calculate (without moving pieces) pretty much all of those lines, except for missing Nd7. Sometimes, you can get away with missing a minor detail, but it is important to try and see every resource!
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ENDGAMES
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I've been suggested to read Shershevsky's book on Endgame Strategy. Many titled players have told me how it really helped their endgames. I've probably started it like 5-10 times in my life, but I'm hoping this summer to make it one of the rare chess books I read from cover to cover.
The first chapter is about endgame fundamentals, but I skipped it because it only has one example, kind of introductory, and I had already read it several times in the past lol. Chapter 2 is about King activity. Maybe in a separate blog post, I will recap what I've learned, but for this post, I don't feel like doing more annotating lol, so here's an endgame puzzle from one of the games! White to move and draw! (edit: I just put this on a tablebase, and realized that two moves draw, but the one referenced in the book is much more thematic).
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OPENINGS:
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Oh, so you were expecting me to finally release all of my opening preparation?? Well, sorry to disappoint you. No need for me to reveal my opening preparation, unless you are willing to pay me! 
As I always mention, my "prep" will show in my games!
I will say however that I did finally get Chessbase! I was able to install Parallels onto my Mac, and my coach told me I needed it! It's been VERY helpful organizing my opening files, and I hope I'm able to perform better in the opening (and ultimately in games) thanks to CB!
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UPCOMING TOURNAMENTS
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Almost forgot to write this part! It's been almost a month since I played in an OTB tournament, and I'm really starting to miss it! Well, I have a string of tournaments coming up in the future. I've included the dates, and a link to the tournament announcement, in case you are interested in playing as well!
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Dallas Chess Club Premier 5 (Dallas, TX) -- June 26th-27th
2021 Texas July Open (Fort Worth, TX) -- July 10th-11th
2021 US Class Championship (Houston, TX) -- July 23rd-25th
I might do a tournament in Fort Worth (I think it's the Fort Worth City Championship) July 17-18th, however, I don't know if doing three tournaments in a row will be wise, especially since I already have a lot of chess lined up this summer.
And tournament plans August and beyond are all tentative. The 87th Annual Southwest Open did just get announced (September 3rd-6th), and barring any conflicts, I plan to play, as it will be my first ever Southwest Open!
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I believe that is all, folks. Thank you for reading! Feel free to write something in the comments, and send me a friend request! My June AMA will be released probably within a week, so be on the lookout for that. See you for the next post!
P.S. Feel free to join my FAN CLUB! I may be having some thematic tournaments, so stay tuned!
