ArielTzentner's Novice Study Plan

First 4 weeks - summary
I feel like I learned a lot about the game of chess, and I know some tactics better, but still it hasn’t converted to ratings, since I keep losing in fast time controls, hence my move to rapid games only.

Let’s review some stats:
Rapid: 806 ➡️ 801 (+10 games)
Puzzles: 891 ➡️ 1017 (+150 attempts)
The rapid games saw a dip down to 722, and then came a slight climb after 2-3 wins.
I was stuck around 900-930 in puzzles rating for three weeks, but last week I was really on point and I managed to climb 100 points, crossing the 1000 barrier for the first time!

I still feel slightly uncomfortable with a few things:
1. Finding the right move in an open position where everything seems balanced - “Strategy”
2. Convert a non trivial endgame (even though it hasn’t come to that so far in the games) - “Endgames”
3. Pressing a non trivial opening and finding opportunities - “Opening”
4. Starting games and putting myself on the line due to fear of failure
I know I have to get over the last bit, and losses are the only way to improve, but it’s still difficult for me.

During these four weeks I’ve acquired numerous books (digitally) to help me study and learn more about the game:
⁃ Logical Chess Move By Move
⁃ My First Chess Opening Repertoire for Black/White
⁃ Play Winning Chess
⁃ Chess 5334
The book “Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess” is also en route in paperback form

I fear the 1000 rating goal is quite overly ambitious, but I’ll do my best in trying to win games. Keep calm and carry on! 💪

Week 5 - Day 1

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 4/5
• Rating: 1017

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: lost by checkmate, really annoying game
• Link: https://www.chess.com/game/live/10673805625

Positives

• 57% accuracy, my moves throughout the game weren’t all that bad

Improvements

• Study my opening better! Know how to exploit weird moves by my opponent - instead I got stuck in a bad position

Week 5 - Day 2

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 4/5
• Rating: 1048

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 10 - Takeaways

• For every possible move, consider its strengths and weaknesses

Week 5 - Day 3

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1044

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: Won by resignation
• Link: ArielTzentner vs late8776 - https://www.chess.com/analysis/game/live/10827459385

Positives

• I played with confidence throughout most of the game, trying to gain incremental advantages, even though I lost the right to castle early on after queen trade caught me by surprise
• Engine shows no major mistakes! 87% accuracy

Improvements

• Should’ve captured the hanging knight... preferably as soon as possible

Week 5 - Day 4

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1039

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 11 - Takeaways

• Try to compel king defending pawns to step forward and attempt to exploit the weakness
• Look for strategic places to put your minor pieces, to contribute in a later attack

Week 5 - Day 5

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1056

Rapid - ❌

• Couldn’t get to it - will do tomorrow

Week 5 - Day 6

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1058

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: Won by resignation after 17 moves
• Link: ArielTzentner vs MintNerve - https://www.chess.com/live/game/11092422957

Positives

• I played cautiously, tried to capitalize on my opponent’s hanging pieces

Improvements

• Maybe I should be more aggressive, try to break open the position

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 12 - Takeaways

• Over and over, most of the games feature the same principle in various formations: weaken the pawn structure guarding the king - and launch an attack
• The light squared bishop is adept at creating threats and starting out an attack

Week 5 - Day 7

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1063

Openings - 👍

• Took a step back from “My First Chess Opening Repertoire” books, and started reading “Discovering Chess Openings” by John Emms

Endgames - 👍

• Queen and rook
• Two rooks
• Queen
• Rook
• Queen and bishop
• Queen and knight

Week 6 - Day 1

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1061

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: Won by resignation
• Link: ArielTzentner vs Aryandubey55 - https://www.chess.com/live/game/11267016135

Positives

• I’m gaining confidence playing chess, not second guessing my moves and overall playing good game - 85% accuracy!
• I played developing moves, defending my pieces and trying to attack other pieces whenever possible

Improvements

• Develop knights to f3 and c3, and let the bishop defend on e2

Week 6 - Day 2

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1079

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 13 - Takeaways

• Compelling the pawns guarding the king to move seems to be the way to win nearly every time here...
• Maybe the French isn’t that good of an opening for black... unless white makes mistakes

Week 6 - Day 3

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 2/5 (I knew the answers to the first two, just thought of something more complex)
• Rating: 1051

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: Draw by stalemate
• Link: Jits_1998 vs ArielTzentner - https://www.chess.com/live/game/11439206985

Positives

• Weird opening, but still managed to create opportunities for myself

Improvements

• Look at the board a second time! - I missed on move order a beautiful tactic that would’ve cost my opponent his rook
• I was winning but unsure of my endgame moves, then made a stupid mistake that caused stalemate

Week 6 - Day 4

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 4/5
• Rating: 1075

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 14 - Takeaways

• Again, chipping away at the kingside pawns causes colossal collapse
• If a sure-fire attack is refuted, keep pressure on the opponent! Don’t back down and give him time to recover
• Try not to move the same developing piece twice (and obviously not five times...)

Nice takeaway!  I think you'll like Alekhine in Game 15 too, which was a colossal king side storm.

Well I was about to point out that this was actually Alekhine’s game, but now I realize it’s game 15, not 14... Turns out that somewhere along the way I skipped a game 😅

Week 6 - Day 5

Daily - 👍

• A few days ago I resigned one game I started at the beginning of the program after a really bad position - also a few moves from being checkmated

Positives

• Not much really, played through it to see what happens

Improvements

• Missed obvious checks - I’m not looking at the whole boards, sometimes it’s hard for me to notice some moves, especially in diagonals
• I blundered my queen... I should know better

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 2/5
• Rating: 1050

Rapid - 👍

• Recap: Draw via stalemate, caught a break from a losing position
• Link: slomooncrack vs ArielTzentner - https://www.chess.com/live/game/11642005879

Positives

• Thought of resigning in the end but kept on playing, betting on the fact that my opponent doesn’t know his endgame... Turned out to be true

Improvements

• Blundered a lot in this game, was very lucky my opponent didn’t see mate in 2 in the middle there - But I didn’t see either... I have trouble calculating my opponent’s moves
• I really thought I had a checkmate, but missed the king’s escape square

Week 6 - Day 6

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1067

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game X - Takeaways

• Turns out I got the numbering wrong and I had an offset by one in the games to review, but I went through the book and didn’t find the missing game, since it seems I went through them all - so I reviewed the first game in the book “Chess: The Art of Logical Thinking” by Neil McDonald, which is of the same format
• The game was a 1978 game of the then World Champion Anatoly Karpov, a beautiful kingside attack

Week 6 - Day 7

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 5/5!
• Rating: 1121!
• Broke the 1100 barrier! 😁

Openings - 👍

• Continued reading “Discovering Chess Openings”, about grabbing pawns and moving pieces twice

Endgames - 👍

• Practiced more endgames using SimplifyChess.com endgame trainer
• Rook and Queen mate
• Two Rooks mate
• Queen mate
• Rook mate
• Two bishops mate
• Some pawn endgames - square, opposition
• I think I should study more pawn endgames, it’s very tricky

Rapid - 👍

• As a bonus - I played a 10 minute rapid game on lichess, to test my knowledge
• Recap: Won! my opponent resigned after 17 moves
• Link: https://lichess.org/SgJlgfRU

Positives

• I played with a lot of confidence, thinking longer about every move, looking to use tactics and develop my pieces to good attacking squares
• Only had 1 mistake and 1 inaccuracy, which my opponent didn’t convert

Improvements

• Ask myself “Why can’t I play my desired move? Should I play it anyway? Is it safe?” - I played a royal fork with the knight, but the opponent could easily take my forking knight... fortunately he missed it
• Look deeply for winning combinations - I don’t expect myself to spot 4 move combos this early in my chess career, but as it turns out, I missed a mate in 4 near the end of the game

Week 7 - Day 1

Daily - 👍

• Resigned the game with Jesse, he crushed me - 2 inaccuracies and 1 blunder cost me the game

Positives

• Most of my moves were actually okay moves

Improvements

• Look carefully for pawn moves that reveal pieces "en prise"
• I find myself really struggling in daily games, I can’t seem to form a strategy

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 1107
• Rating: 2/5

Rapid - ❌

• Participated in the ChessGoals simul instead
• Link to my game: https://lichess.org/go3icILg

Positives

• I tried to implement the checklist: checks, captures, attacks - cost me some time to calculate but overall was okay

Improvements

• Defend 1. Nf3 - I really didn’t know what to do in the opening, which caused me to make a blunder on move 2 (my fastest blunder yet)
• Always try to attack when possible - my bishop blunder was a result of miscalculation, I should’ve attacked the knight

Week 7 - Day 2

Daily - 👍

Puzzles - 👍

• Total: 3/5
• Rating: 1103

Logical Chess Move By Move

Game 16 - Takeaways (performed on day 3)

• In a cramped position try to relieve the pressure by forcing exchanges of pieces
• Always seek to seize open files for the rooks
• Try to add pressure on a pinned piece
• The center squares in the enemy camp are best used by pieces instead of pawns

Week 7 - Day 3

Daily- 👍

• Resigned one game after having king and 3 isolated pawns vs rook and bishop and some more pawns

Positives

• Overall my moves were quite solid, other than the rook blunder and slight inaccuracies

Improvements

• Don’t blunder away pieces!! Look for direct attacks on high value pieces - rook, queen - this cost me the game eventually
• Try spotting hanging pieces by my opponent - I completely missed his bishop - I could’ve initiated the exchange instead

Puzzles- 👍

• Total: 1/5
• Rating: 1081

Rapid- 👍

• Recap: Won by checkmate after a pretty wild game
• Link: fashkh vs ArielTzentner - https://www.chess.com/live/game/12064504015

Positives

• After I dodged some attacks, I looked for my turns to attack, stayed aggressive and resilient until the checkmate arrived

Improvements

• I could’ve lost my queen during the final sequence
• Look for not so obvious double attacks - this is one thing I have to improve on