Blitz 1900!

First of course, let me briefly summarize my Blitz career since this is my first blog about it. I didn't play Blitz when I joined Chess.com, I played Rapid for about 4 months to get some feels for chess. When I was finally familiar with this great game, I started to try 3 min Blitz. It was successful at first, my rating increased very rapidly to about 1600 since I already have a solid understanding of chess and I was at my "Gold Era". But then, unfortunately, I sucked at it mainly because 3 min is too fast for me and it depends too much on your experience rather than your skills. As someone who have only played chess for half a year, I was naturally outplayed by those experienced players. So I entered my "Sucky Era" of Blitz and I chose to focus more on Rapid instead. I'm having great successes with Rapid until I break 1800 in Rapid. I had to give up Rapid for two reasons: there are too few high rated players and too many cheaters, and I never broke 1900 in Rapid. Since I completely suck at Bullet I have to return to Blitz. I still suck at 3 min so I decided to try 10 min and it worked out pretty well, I entered my second "Gold Era" and broke 1800 easily thanks to the knowledge my Rapid career gave me. I could write a blog about it then but I didn't mainly because I was enjoying my "Gold Era" and thought I would reach 1900 soon but, well, for some reasons (be to explained in a moment!) I can't! Yes, I simply can't even though I played and beat many players above 1900. That's strange but I had to be at this "high level" for quite some times. But now, perhaps because I am going to enter (or already entered, I hope!) my third "Golden Era", and because I finally found my chess weakness I managed to break 1900 after two years (total) of my chess career! It may sound hard, but of course my chess career is much smoother than most players, as indicated by my (approximately) increasing rating curve compared to those violently oscillating sin rating curves of many players. Breaking 1900 is quite a milestone for me and obviously it deserves a blog! Ok, following the old saying: "A picture says a thousand words", less talking and this is my rating curve:

Now that you got some feels for my Blitz career, let me share with you some keys to my successes! (I emphasize here again that I don't have any coaches and learn chess all by myself)

1. Endgames

"What?!" You said, "Endgames???". Feeling mind blowing? Well, I put endgames first for obvious (at least obvious after you read this section) reasons: this is the secret key that helped me get rid of 1800 and also this was my weakness! "Wow! Are you kidding me?! Endgames??". You would likely repeat at this point...

Anyway, let me show you a game (without analysis) first:

So you see, the starting position is as dull as any dead drawn endgames, yet I managed to win it. But how? It's simply because I have much more endgame knowledge than my opponent and completely outplayed him in the endgame. Here is the full analysis:

"Okay." You said, "I got your point, but that's just a game, it can't help you to break 1900, right?" Yes, a single game can't help me to break 1900. However, a whole series of games in which I win similarly is a different matter. It's far than enough to get me to 1900. Consider a simple argument: You love to do tactics, right? However there may not be tactics for you to find in most of your games. On the contrast, there are endgames in most of the games, and this makes a huge difference. Plus the fact that most players (even high rated ones) ignore endgames almost completely, all this makes me have a significant advantage over my fellow players and this obviously plays a key role in getting me to 1900. I admit I was once such a player who throws away wins or draws in almost every endgames. But this is no longer the case and it is my opponent who is going to suffer in the endgames!

So let me present you with several similar games with analysis to further demonstrate the importance of endgames:

The next games plays a key role in my tourney to 1900, it was a hard battle with a player over 2000. I was completely losing with 2 pawns down. However, I managed to set up a blockade which is hard and tricky to crack (but still possible) and the game is drawn because of 3-fold repetitions.

"Ok, I really got your point." You said, "But how on the earth did you learn all this? You said you have no coaches and almost no knowledge of endgames before." Well, that's true. I admit it's hard to learn endgames all by myself, I try to learn it by reading a chess book before, but I didn't learn much from it because it's not very practical... However, I found a great book on endgames by IM Jeremy Silman later. It's a very practical and well written, Jeremy emphasized the importance of endgames many times in this book and it's also appropriate to players of all levels from beginners to masters. It makes the seemingly boring endgames pretty interesting and explains in details only those practical endgames. You might have heard this book before, its name is: SILMAN'S COMPLETE ENDGAME COURSE: FROM BEGINNER TO MASTER. If you haven't read this book, I strongly recommend you to read it. Like I said, all my endgames knowledge are gained from this great book and it's easy to read all by yourself, you won't need a coach to teach you this book.

Okay, there are still a few games involving endgames which I would like to share with you.

This game is the one that got me to 1900. I managed to win it despite being down two pawns. It's one of my greatest save ever! Well, actually it should be a draw if my opponent doesn't make that horrible blunder but drawing a game when down two pawns is still impressive. Anyway, this game is an excellent demonstration of key ideas in endgames: blockade, king activity and opposite colored bishop. I hope you will find it instructive!

The next one is also instructive:

The next two games are both interesting. In both these games, I was losing (or I thought was losing), but I manage to win one and draw one thanks to my endgames technique!

This is the other game in which I managed to draw a "losing" (Well, I thought it was losing, but it's actually a draw!) game:

Ok, so I have show you 7 games, most of which are dead draw or even losing for me, yet I managed to save or win all of them. By now, (I hope) you should know the importance of endgames and read that great book I recommend. But now, let's proceed to something that you think makes much more sense: tactics!

2. Tactics

Most players love tactics, but as I have emphasized, there may not be tactics in every game for you to find. However, a solid understanding of tactics is obviously important if you want to climb the rating ladder. I keep doing some tactics here every day to keep my tactical eyes sharp, now I have reach 2400 in tactics. As a result I have done some little but nice tactics in my own games! Here are some nice tactics from my games which I share with you:

Enough tactics? Alright, let me show you some "dirty" techniques that saved me many games. (IMPORTANT: IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO THESE CONTENTS, JUST SKIP THEM)

3. Flagging and Other Lucky Games

Talking about Blitz, I must talk about flagging, it's much more common in Blitz than in slower time controls. You might think this is dirty, but I don't think so: time is yours, if I can flag you, why can't you flag me? This argument is simple enough...

Anyway, I am always the one who flag others, so here I share you some game where I played for "the flag" rather than for the win.

Now that you know some dirty techniques, here are more such games:

Something went horribly wrong in the next game. It was a dead draw. However, seeing that only 45 seconds are left on my opponent's clock, I decided to "go for it" and entered a completely losing pawns endgames. Well, I managed to flag my opponent, but it's still a draw because my opponent have snapped off all my pieces and it's a draw because of insufficient material. Sigh...

Ok, I have shown enough flagging. There are still a few more lucky games I would like to show you. Sometimes luck can simply play a key role in your victory. Flagging counts as a type of such lucky games. However, unlike flagging, the following lucky games are solely caused by my opponents. They try to troll me a bit before they finally decide to checkmate, yet the checkmate never comes! They simply stalemate me! You may ask: But you are simply wasting time! Why don't you just resign and play some other games? Well, normally I would resign, but seeing that my opponent want to troll me, I decide to troll back by playing on! Also such stalemates happen ridiculously often if they want some trolls, but in the end they just trolled themselves! Here are some typical examples:

Well, you don't want to be the players above!

4. Conclusions

Hmm... Did you mean there are no more tips to share? How about openings, or even strategies? You may ask disappointedly... First of all, I know little openings and strategies and I definitely don't want to talk about it here. Second, if you follow my advice above, you can get to 1900 too! How is it possible though, you may still ask. Did you mean if I just master endgames and do some tactics I can also get to 1900? Come off it, you must be kidding me. Well, I am not. Just I said, I really know very little openings and strategies. I know these stuffs are definitely important, but it's simply not the right time to learn them yet. You see, if you choose the mildest openings possible, and with a quiet middle game, you suddenly reach endgames! Now you rule the board if you have learned endgames thoroughly. I am doing this all the time! Of course, on occasions, there might be some tactics to earn you bonus points. You don't want to miss them, so you should do tactics every day to keep your skills sharp! Anyway, I just reach 1900 this way and I believe you can too! One day when I get to even higher levels, I would need knowledge of strategies, they will play the key role to increase my ratings, just like endgames play that key role now. So if you want to improve, please follow my advice and spend some time learning the endgame book I mentioned above and doing some tactics every day. Then you will suddenly find that you completely outplay your opponents and enter your "Gold Era"!

Thanks for you readings!
Hope you enjoy it!