Path To Chess Prosperity #8: An Update

Hello, loyal readers!

Well, as the title may hint, this post may be somewhat on the boring side.

Or, it may be a little bit interesting (depending on the reader).

Anyways, once again, I do not have tournament games to analyze/brag to you guys about (I am on a bit of a tournament drought, which is an understandable circumstance over the holidays). I, however, will be playing in a small local chess club tournament on Thursday, December 14th. The format is three rounds of G/30, and I will likely be the top seed (or somewhere close). I will disclose more details on that as the date gets closer.

The clock makes a bit difference in G/30. I will need to make some adjustments!

As far as my study plan goes, we will not be making any drastic changes. So here is a breakdown of the areas and my plot from there:

TACTICS:

As some of you are aware of, I am on sort of a streak on Chesstempo (20/20 my last twenty standard problems. I have not missed a standard tactic in about a month, and rose my rating from 1840-1968 in the process). However, I will not lie, but as my rating raises, the problems get excessively difficult, and I often find myself spending days solving a single problem! (20 problems in 30 days will tell you that). Many of these tactics are hard to find when solving it live, but once you realize the solution, it looks quite simple! Here is my most recent example:

All that to say, I'll be working on standard tactics this week (once again, with the goal to go perfect and increase my rating), and I'll mix in blitz tactics as well. More on that later.

ENDGAMES:

I've been working through the Drills on chess.com, and just got through the first 25 drills on endgame fundamentals (which are all of the King and pawn endgames). Most of them I knew, though some of them, I didn't. My goal for this week is to review all of them, and separate the ones I don't know and spend some time studying them next week. I'll probably post some endgame examples next week.

TRAINING GAMES:

I have been getting in some good training games on chess.com, though, to be honest, I have been pretty lousy about analyzing them. This week, I will focus on playing fewer games and doing more analyzing.

Believe me. It is much better to play three games a week and look through them somewhat than to play ten games a week though not take a peek at them after playing them! My current plan is to play two or three G/30 games this week on chess.com, and possibly one longer one (G/45-G/60) over the weekend, and analyze them by the time of my next blog. I am looking forward to playing these games and analyzing them afterward!

OPENINGS/MASTER GAMES:

As far as those go, I won't quite reveal my plan for them yet because they can be slightly unstable areas of study, so I can't guarantee to follow it 100%. I will include that I will likely use chessgames.com for master games and chessable.com for opening work.

MISCELLANEOUS READING:

In order to increase my positional understanding, I will start taking a few random books from my bookshelf and start reading through them. The books are as follows:

• Capablanca's Best Endgames
• Bobby Fischer's 60 Memorable Games
• Soltis' Pawn Structure Book

I may add one more down the road, but these are the three I am starting with. This will be done during my free time (I am about to unveil a schedule below), so I may not get that much reading done. We'll see!

THE SCHEDULE:

Yes, I will give you guys an approximate schedule (and plan to stick with it!). I may not follow through perfectly, as school and other potential conflicts could get in the way, but here is my current plan:

Monday:

• 30 minutes standard tactics 
• 30 minutes endgame drills 
• 30 minutes master games

Tuesday:

• 30 minutes standard tactics
• 30 minutes endgame drills
• 30 minutes opening work

Wednesday:

• 30 minutes standard tactics 
• 30 minutes endgame drills
• 30 minutes master games

Thursday:

• 30 minutes standard tactics
• 30 minutes endgame drills
• 30 minutes opening work OR one G/30 game on chess.com

Friday:

• 20 minutes blitz tactics
• 30 minutes endgame drills
• 40 minutes master games OR one G/30 game on chess.com

I don't really have a plan for the weekend, though I wouldn't imagine it would be much different. 

I think that about sums it up! As always, feel free to comment or message me if you have questions/suggestions/ideas, etc. 

Until next time...