How My Best Game Messed Me Up...
Hey Impressive Chessers!
How many of you have played a great game, maybe it ended with a beautiful Queen sac for mate, but somewhere in the game, you played an inaccurate move in the opening or had a non-ideal strategy? What does our brain usually do? It throws out that mistake, and you keep playing inaccurately. Why? Because that game gave you such an aesthetic and good feeling that you chase it.
This is exactly what happened to me. I won an important game, by winning this game, I qualified to play in an International Master (IM) norm tournament*, and in a beautiful way.
*“In general, an IM norm is defined as a performance rating of at least 2450 over 9 or more games. In addition, the field must have an average rating of at least 2230, must include at least three International Masters or Grandmasters, and must include players from a mix of national federations.” From wikipedia.org/wiki/FIDE_titles—so basically, it’s a whole ordeal to just get 1 IM norm, much less 3, and also acquire a FIDE rating of 2400←that’s how you become an IM.
Click on the image 👆🏻 or --> here to go directly to the puzzles
The Game that Messed Me Up (With Analysis)
Ok Craig, so you’re just showing off. Wasn’t there supposed to be an inaccuracy somewhere? We, the readers, demand justice for our time being wasted!
Yes, yes, there were no inaccurate moves in this game, but let’s go over a critical part of the game, move 16:
In this position (above), I spent 55 minutes* on my move! What happened?! Well, my intuition told me to play 16...a5, “tickling” White’s Queenside pawns. But the move I was concerned about was 17. b5, and if I had to back off with 17…Na7, I’d be in real trouble, I’d probably just be pushed off the board. So, I had to be ready for 17. b5, and I started calculating my 17…a4!! response and my 18…bxc6! response. After about 20 minutes of thought, I had prepared 17…a4!! and 18…bxc6! and was confident that they worked. But I decided to double-check because if I was wrong, I was lost; at least that was my reasoning. So, I spent another 10 minutes or so double-checking. And now, I was ready to play 16…a5! But then I saw the line 19. Bxh7+ Kxh7 20. Qd3+ Kg8 21. Nd4 Qxb2 22. Rfb1—oh no, my Queen is trapped! In a panic, I luckily saw that I was doing well after 22…Nxe5! That was when, after some more double-checking, I confidently played 16…a5 after 55 minutes of thought!
*For context, the game had 90 minutes +30 second increment for the first 40 moves. After the 40th move, 30 minutes is added to the clock. After my 55-minute think, I had a little over 25 minutes for the next 24 moves, until I would receive 30 more minutes for reaching move 40. My opponent had 70 minutes on their clock at this time.
You can find more about Bent Larsen here --> wikipedia.org/wiki/Bent_Larsen
This is way too long, and that was the inaccuracy, or rather, the non-ideal strategy. While this strategy of spending 55 minutes on one move worked in this game, in future games, I found myself spending loads of time on a move, hoping to chase the great feeling that I got from this game. It did not always, or even usually, turn out as well as this game did. The variations that I calculated didn’t appear on the board, or because of the length of the line, I made a mistake in my calculations. Even if I was right, later in the game, the loss of time and energy was too much to overcome, and I’d have to accept draws in better positions or just lose the game entirely.
How Do I (Try to) Play Now?
Going into a game I already know what 10% of my time is. So in the case of the "game that messed me up" I had 110 minutes* for 40 moves. So for the first 40 moves I'd like to use around 10% of my time in ~4 positions that I deem critical. So I can use 10% of my time or 11 minutes, 4x/game. It turns out that if I use 44 minutes on those 4 critical positions then I'll have just under 2 minutes/move for the rest of the 36 moves until the time control at move 40.
*90 minutes + 30 second increment over 40 moves or 20 minutes = 110 minutes
This means we better correctly identify when it's correct to use that 10% of our time. There's bad news and good news and then really good news when it comes to identifying critical positions.
The bad news is that you're rating might go down when first trying to play in this 10% 4x/game way. This is a sacrifice that I had to make. I used to get in severe time pressure every game. Sometimes you get a psychological edge with your opponent trying to run you out of time. But getting in time pressure is not a recipe for success. Your opponents will eventually get good enough to put extreme pressure on you while you don't have enough time to handle it. You might win a few games but overall you'll drop more half points and full points than you are gaining.
The good news is you get better and better at identifying the critical positions and you can even study to get better right away. Either by trying out these puzzles and/or by doing a game review and trying to figure out where each blunder, mistake, great move, brilliant move and miss is; do it for your opponent too!
The really good news is that if you can correctly identify critical positions your rating will skyrocket! It doesn't even have to be every time, just by getting better at identifying critical positions and using your time on the right moves will set you up for huge successes.
- In sharp openings I will spend some time on my move, once I'm out of book. Hopefully if it's a sharp opening you know the line pretty well and so this doesn't happen until move 10 or later. Even in "quiet openings" it could be useful to spend 5-10% of your time coming up with a loose general plan of action. Just make sure it's not written in stone, a flexible plan is much stronger than a rigid one, in chess at least.
- If your opponent is sacrificing or threatening something--attacking a piece, launching a pawn storm, sacrificing a knight, etc. This could easily be a make or break situation, definitely time to use 10% of your time.
- You might have a win--Your "spidey senses" are going off because your opponent's King is unsafe and/or they have multiple exposed pieces--pieces that are attacked the same amount or more than they are defended.
This is just a couple of common situations that could indicate that the position is a critical one. Let's practice with a 3 puzzle series (below)!
Identifying Critical Positions (3 Puzzle Series)
My advice for doing these 3 puzzles is to set a chess clock for 15 minutes. Have a pen and paper ready to write down your thoughts, any candidates moves (2-4 at the most) the move that you'd play and any justifications for that move. Since you have 15 minutes for 3 puzzles, you could do 5 minutes for each puzzle, but I wouldn't do that. One of these puzzles is a critical position where there is one move that stands out amongst the rest. The other two or less critical, it would be nice to play the top move but it's not as necessary. Ideally you'd want to spend ~2.5 minutes on the non-critical puzzles and ~10 minutes on the critical one. Do all three puzzles and then check the answers for your score! Good luck!
Puzzle #1 Answer
Puzzle #2 Answer
Puzzle #3 Answer
Total Possible Points: 20 How did you do? Let me know in the comments!
Conclusion
So, what’s the takeaway from "The Game That Messed Me Up"? The truth is, sometimes a great game can lead us astray, tricking us into bad habits* like spending too much time on a single move in the hopes of recreating that perfect feeling.
*Yikes! Another song stuck in my head😔
But improvement in chess isn’t about chasing one incredible moment; it’s about consistently making good decisions, including how we manage our time.
By structuring your thinking around the "10% rule" and sharpening your ability to recognize critical positions, you can take control of your clock instead of letting it control you. At first, your results might take a hit, but long term, you'll gain a massive competitive edge. Imagine having enough time in the later stages of a game to convert winning positions, find defensive resources, or capitalize on your opponent’s mistakes, rather than scrambling against the clock.
Chess improvement isn't just about calculation or tactics; it's about discipline, self-awareness, and learning from both successes and setbacks. So, embrace the challenge, refine your time management skills, start turning those critical moments into game-winning opportunities and most importantly...
…Stay impressive!
NM Craig C.
linktr.ee/ChessToImpress
