My Road to Master, Part 3 - Building a Chess Repertoire...?

It has been more than ten months time since I last wrote a blog post. Today felt like a perfect day to sit down, sink in and scribble down some thoughts on what I have been doing over the last couple of months...

Well my friends, I shall tell you. Of course, you could take an educated guess and say "Well, you've probably done quite a lot of studying on this free account of yours". In which case, you would be correct. I still maintain a daily structure of doing a lesson from the "Tactics" section, occasionally supported by doing a few puzzles. The underlaying project I've been working on (and yes, you correctly read the title!) is "Building my chess repertiore"!

For those who are oblivious to this strange term, I shall offer a short explanation in my own words. A chess "repertoire" is like your own mental playbook purely for the opening phase of a chess game. Imagine you're sitting down at a table. An opponent, unknown to you, sits across of you. You're about to play a friendly game of chess - but how to begin? Which piece do you start with? What move do you make? And more importantly, what move(s) will your opponent make? How do you respond? A chess repertoire, that mental playbook in your mind, serves as a guideline for yourself on how you want to play, or more importantly how you 'like' to play.

Part one - Playing as White

Let's continue down this thinking trail, shall we? I did the same when thinking how my repertoire should look like - I grabbed a chess board and my chess set, grabbed a cold one from the fridge, whipped out a pencil and a notebook and started thinking.

First, I started with White. I knew, from watching YouTube videos, reading blogs and articles related to chess and other sources, that there were numerous chess openings. Think of prime-time examples as "The Queens Gambit", "The English Opening" or "The Italian Game" (the last I played during my first few months of getting back into chess). Even more extensive, detailed and complex openings like "The Kings Indian Attack" or "The London System" came to mind.  I scribbled some names down that I liked and looked with awe at the moves that were made, but I made little progress. So I tore out my freshly written pages and started anew with one central question: "Which pawn do I want to move?" 

For those who don't know, there are several options for White to (soundly) open with: 1. e4 (King's Pawn), 1. d4 (Queen's pawn), 1. c4 (Flank Pawn) or 1. Nf3 (King's Knight).  And of course, for each of these choices, numerous options are wide open for Black to counter with. 

At the time that I picked up chess again, I was told to "stick to the classical way of playing". It meant I had to choose between e4 or d4 as my first move. I quickly made up my mind: I wanted to play e4. I disliked playing the Queen's Gambit and the positions that arose from it (for reasons I still can't comprehend to this day). I did, however, like the tactics that arose from the line [ 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 ... ]. 

Part Two - How to reach the Middlegame

So. We're still sitting at that chess board. It was decided: e4 was my main move as White. Now all that rested was looking at how Black commonly played against my King's Pawn. I narrowed down the responses and made a second list: 

• "The Open Game" [ 1. e4 e5]

Ah, yes... the Open Game. I hungered to learn about suitable moves to make in the opening of the Open Game. I soon learned that Black typically replied in two to three ways.

I looked at Black's second move [2... d5], called "The Scandinavian Defense", and [2 ... Nf6 ], called "The Petrov Defense". Both moves I did not analyse real deep - Perhaps something I will work towards later on again. For the time being, I focused on [2 ... Nc6] as reply to my Knight moving to the f3 square. This meant I had another choice to make on how to continue. I opted for the "Ruy Lopez", which meant I launched my Bishop to b5 and having the flexibility to 'spoil' Black's pawn structure if so desired. I'll add a diagram with thought processes, so you have an idea of how I worked towards learning this opening and assimilating it all into my repertoire.

•  "The Semi-Open Game"

"The Sicilian Defense" [ 1. e4 c5 ]

Let's talk Sicilian first. I love the Sicilian from Black's side and I'd love to learn playing the Sicilian from Black's side properly someday. But playing against it? As White? I shake and quake inside and out when I used to face that dreaded c5-pawn emerging from the fold. The Sicilian has many, many variations which can arise from the first few moves. I already hear you scream "But the Ruy Lopez has the same amount of bloody theoretical lines and knowledge!". It does, but somehow I found it easier to learn the themes, tactics and strategies of the Ruy Lopez over those of the Sicilian Defense. Plus, in the Ruy Lopez, I had the control over the game's course. The Sicilian turned those tables on me by deciding how I had to play on the very first move of Black!

Now I did some hard and deep thinking. Then I did some google magic and some binge-watching/reading online. And I emerged with a way to combat the Sicilian on my own terms. I found an answer to that pesky c5-pawn which could make toes curl and throw my foes into complete disarray. It is a topic which I will tackle in another blog post (in more detail than I can do right now!). I can say, however, that these two moves combined are my favorite moves to play in chess right now. I can hear Grandmasters Nimzowitsch and Larsen roar with pride when I combat the Sicilian and play the following moves: [2. b3?! ... ] and [3. Bb3 ... ]!

These moves indicate an a-typical variation, called the "Snyder Variation" (after its original founder, Robert Snyder). The variation's name lives in some infamy (I'll also cover that in that future blog), but that doesn't stop me from playing it. This variation stops Black dead in his tracks - it nullifies all their precious study on theory and tactical lines in the opening stage of the Sicilian and forces them to fend for themselves in new, undiscovered territory. On the flipside (if played correctly), it provides White time to work on a positional advantage over Black before slowly consolidating and building an attack. At the least, it provides an interesting game for two! I'll provide another diagram, but not as extensive as the one for the Ruy Lopez.

"The French Defense" [ 1. e4 e6 ]

Pesky French Defense. Also a reply I don't like. So in the same nature as the Sicilian, I decided to double down, do my research and look for ways to continue. And what do you know? Lo and behold! "The Retí Gambit" appeared! In a similar fashion to the "Snyder" Sicilian, White opts to claim the long a1-h8 diagonal through [ 2. b3?! ... ] and [3. Bb2 .. ], but in doing so enters a gambit by offering his e4-pawn up for quick development. I won't stand still too long at this part, since I've only recently opted for this approach to the French Defense and I'm still experimenting heavily with the lines and continuations for White and Black. A short diagram!