What Horrible Chess: Coming Back to Blitz after a Long Hiatus

I've been playing chess for almost forty years, but I probably stopped playing 5-minute blitz about ten years ago. Because I leaned toward in-person chess and didn't have easy-access partners, blitz lost its appeal for me. I still played a lot of 10-minute and 4-player on Chess.com and other services, but I let my 5-minute game die.

Enter the pandemic. Talk about having time. Holy cow. There is so much of it, coming out the seams of every day.

So I'm back in the blitz ring, trying to catch my breath and keep up with this new generation of players, many of whom grew up playing nothing but virtual chess. And the truth stung me like a thousand hornets: I sucked at blitz! Maybe I'd always been a mediocre player, I don't know. But for sure, I learned very quickly how bad I'd become in ten years of lackadaisical play -- brutally awful.

I decided for some reason I have yet to understand to try to improve my 5-minute blitz game, and I think I lost something like 25 games in a row. I dropped from the 1600s to 1200s. I had previously sworn off blitz because I just couldn't think fast enough, but during this era dripping with free time, I decided to revisit the decision. How hard could it be?

400 points hard. I told myself over and over, am I really this bad at blitz? Yes. Holy schnikes, yes. 

Years ago, I recall a nice fellow, a Greek professor, who I played chess with back in Montana. He was beating me in this one game, and we both knew it. But I was hyper-focused, not at all distracted by the clock ticking down. He made an error, and I punished him and won. I always viewed this as a sad victory because the clock was his undoing and the associated nerves. With infinite time, no doubt, he would have taken victory. And now this same scenario (with me on the losing side) was happening over and over.

But I've learned something swimming on the kiddie side of the pool. A lot of it is just nerves. Familiarity. Just being able to keep a clear, focused mind. I must have stayed at 1200s for weeks. Worst time in my life, as far as chess goes. Up and down. Horrible, miserable, thumb-sucking games. There was one game where I won the queen early and still lost. I was fumbling over and over, banging my head against the table. I tried playing at different times of day, wondering if each came with a different level of alertness for me, but it didn't matter. I lost morning, noon, and night in all sorts of disgusting ways.

And then I wasn't anymore.

My descent just stopped. It's hard to explain, but the constant barrage of games, while anxiety-provoking, helped reduce my over-the-virtual-board anxiety. I have started to think more clearly in the midst of a difficult position. I can actually be spoken to while playing (usually by those who have little idea about my own personal uphill battle with chess improvement) and still win. I'm starting to avoid the bad plays or catch myself missing something obvious. I still waste too much time on some move or other, but I'm getting better at just choosing a plan and sticking with it. 

I'm not back to my old rating yet. I still yo-yo throughout the course of a day. But I'm climbing. I'm up in the 1500s as of today, and I'm still pushing back to "average coffeehouse player" level within the realm of blitz. I hate the idea of losing to my 10-, 15-, and 20-year-old self because I've put so many hours into learning the game. But I have to work with the tools I have right now. In fact, my chess studies are pretty much my only edge, but I'll take it! As I ease back into the rigors of blitz combat, I know I'll never calculate like my younger self. But I try to stick with the fundamentals, do my best to make decent moves, avoid blunders (which I still make frequently), and try to improve.

But it's about the journey, right? BLEH! Whoever said that never lost 400 points in a few days. But I'm grateful nonetheless for the opportunity to rise again, to infuse this old brain with confidence and try to learn the intricacies of a beautiful game within the confines of a 5-minute timer.