Tools and Training - Endgames!
It’s funny how when we can slow down and think properly, when we can quiet our monkey brain and look at things objectively, we often know what we need to do.
My first priority is to improve my endgame skills. Yes...it's pretty damn clear...
Not because the books say so…
Because I can feel the hesitation in me when I play! I can feel the doubt and how I am often at a loss of how to continue, even though I am convinced that there is a good (probably simple) plan that I should be following.
We’ve outplayed an opponent and won that rich prize…a nice, juicy, free pawn. That’s supposed to be it! We have done it! Then you just shepherd that pawn to a win…right? Wrong!
It’s often FAR more difficult than it should be, and this state of affairs offends my sense of order. There’s something that isn’’t working as it should…yep my endgame skills.
I’ve heard people say that they don’t like endgames…but I actually do! They are like puzzles. Tricky, frustrating puzzles!
It’s like cutting your way through a thick middle-game jungle…and you finally arrive at the other side. You raise your eyes and the landscape around you is dry and uncluttered.
Sparse vegetation.
Quiet.
Calm.
DON’T BE FOOLED! You can die at almost every step. Poisonous stuff everywhere. Nothing to keep you alive if you don’t know how to live in such an arid climate. Sheesh…I want to be like an endgame Navy SEAL, not like Pinocchio’s (stupid) little (wooden!) brother!
So here’s what I’m working on.
I want to feel confident transitioning into the endgame, so that it syncs up properly with middle game plans.
I want to have the same sort of landmarks in endgames as I do in the Opening and Middlegame.
I want to practice until things click together tightly and I can count on them in important games
I want to win games that are won (or drawn!) and draw games that should be lost! (aim high, aim high!)
I want to improve quickly and efficiently.
I don’t want to pay much at all!
Okay…how!?
Here’s how I’m attacking it.
First the first time perhaps in my life, I’ve just paid for the full version of an app. I think it was about 8 euros. It has 679 explanations of opening theory and 2272 problems to solve. An integrated engine will show you why things are as they are, and let you try other lines. It’s simple, rapid and actually quite fun. It’s called Total chess endgame training by Chess King (Nope, not a paid ad, no commission, just a cool app that I appreciate).
I’m working through a section, then creating another profile and going through them again, seeing how sure I am, seeing what I can see when I’m solving them. I find it pretty easy to try the positions, go back and read the theory, try the positions again, then do them again the next day. It’s actually quite fun and SO MUCH more complicated and beautiful than I remembered. Here's one that I had already seen...And this kind of stuff makes me realise how much I must be missing in EVERY GAME I play (boo!)
Over the years, I’ve started to realize that for some things, brute repetition is the best way. Do it, try to understand, then do it again, and again and again…
Here, you can quote me on this…THE ONLY PATH FROM WHERE YOU ARE TO WHERE YOU WANT TO BE IS A PATH MADE OF MISTAKES!
That IS the only path! Avoid the mistakes and you avoid learning.
So…I don’t know about you, but I’m going to skip lightly and happily from one mistake to the next like on stepping stones that lead a cheerful way across a burbling brook in a beautiful high mountain valley!…no cussing or moaning or groaning.
I made a mistake…okay, so what!?
Bet I don’t make the same one again!
Oh..I did! Okay, bet I don’t next time!
Rinse and repeat until the colours have faded and you can see bulging muscles through the worn-out bits of endgame!
I have the book 100 Endgames you must know by Jesus de la Villa. I bought it, but never got started.
I’m going to master two endgames every week (on top of the stuff I’m doing with the app…I think there’ll be a fair amount of over lap). I’ll be finished in a year! That’s not so long when you think about trying to make a quantum leap in your chess that will serve you forever! (yep, even old dudes can play good endings :)
Anyone out there want to tag along with me!??
After that I’ve got ‘Technique in Chess’, ‘Endgame Strategy’, ‘Capablanca’s best chess endgames’ and several others..they can wait!(for a year or so!).
Come join me if you want...last one in is an Endgame wimp!
Catch you next time..
Inch (!)
