Thanks! I have a couple of Couch's books (which, of course, I have not read), but not "Pawn Chains". Basically I have lots of books, lots of videos, a fair amount of knowledge, and lousy execution, which is getting worse. The free version of the Stean book was scanned really badly (I tried the first few pages of the Kindle version they offer for free, but hard to read because of the errors), so I splurged $10 and ordered it from Amazon (the physical book from Dover; looks like readers weren't happy with the "official" Kindle version, either). Thanks for the recommendation.
Coaches' Lessons Took Years to Sink In...
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Sep 4, 2021
0
#3
I had the physical paperback of Simple Chess and carried it everywhere :-) It's a very short read and packs a punch; you'll like it.
Your game list shows you're pretty active. Can you describe your biggest frustration with your execution?
Sep 4, 2021
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#4
Stupid mistakes. Bad calculation. I either miss an alternative move by my opponent, or overestimate their response, not seeing that I could answer it okay. In the first case I make a move I shouldn't make, in the second I don't make the move I should. Sorry, I realize that's very fuzzy. "Simple Chess" is due Monday.
Sep 5, 2021
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#6
BTW, a large part of missing an alternative move by my opponent is not seeing the whole board. A definite weakness of mine. Not so sure that studying pawn formations will help with that, but maybe Simple Chess...?
Sep 5, 2021
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#7
Simple Chess is a place to start, not a destination. Stean will definitely get you thinking about lines and diagonals (that stretch across the board!) and outposts, so it might possibly help you.
As an anecdote, it was very common for me to get "surprised" by a bishop "way on the other side of the board..." taking ridiculous amounts of my material off the board at seemingly random moments..." Now, not so much. Difference? Probably two things:
- Tactical awareness
- Look for loose and undefended pieces!! Always do this. If you do, then (by definition) you will scan the entire set of pieces across the whole board. This is one of Dan Heisman's top rules. For example, see the next two links to Dan Heisman videos on this topic.
- Seeds of Tactical Destruction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaQh4mQSUJQ&t=8s
- More Seeds of Tactical Destruction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqTCoxEGgv0
- Lines, diagonals, and outposts
- Look for your lines of control (over squares not pieces!) across the whole board
- Try and own the majority, or at least (more or less) half - if you don't you are in trouble
- This should (at least it did for me) get you to look past one move to threats, and focus on your actual control over the squares on the board (like my coach insisted...)
Hopefully, this helps give you a different perspective. Maybe one that is helpful to make you games more purposeful, and get a few more points on the board.
Take care
- Lines, diagonals and outposts
Sep 5, 2021
0
#8
Thanks. I had a copy of his Seeds of Tactical Destruction on my wall for a long time. Need to print it out again. And good idea about the lines of control.
This post is for @tewald.
[Note: my work (like for many people) is demanding with too much travel (at least before everything going on now) and little time for chess so my progress is slow. However, over the years, their lessons have started to sink in to my chess brain.]
Valery Frenklakh was a great coach. First lesson he had me bring a pad of paper and a fistful of game scoresheets. He quickly read through the game scoresheets (no board or pieces) and shouted out where my chess was broken - "you are afraid of ghosts!" "you are too timid!" "you do not want to win!" "don't chase pieces!" In all, had over 25 pithy ways to describe how I sucked at chess (essentially he did a quick psychoanalysis of me). He was determined to correct the situation. In a later lesson, he tossed all the pieces to the floor in a dramatic bid to get my full chess attention on the board, on squares, lol... He did.
Igor Foygel was another great coach. He took me for a few lessons. Went like this - similar drill with reading my game scoresheets. He was desperately looking for a game where he could help me. He ended up looking at me and said "I can't help you get better in chess because I can't tell how you play chess!" Of course, I replied "What do you mean? There are all these scoresheets..." He replied "I can't tell how you play chess because you lose so many pawns and pieces starting at the beginning of the game!" "You don't have an army to play chess!" He was right. I knuckled down and improved my tactics (long process), and now I'm better. Later, he was in the area and asked if he could come to my place and look at my chess library - goal was to recommend what I should read before the next lesson (he suspected - correctly - that I was reading above my level and not understanding anything. I brought him to my chess bookcase (this is before ebooks) and he ran his finger across all the titles, sometimes taking the book out to look closer, and read the table of contents, flip through pages, saying "hmmm', "hmmmmmm." Finally, he reaches over and took one book off the shelf, looks at me very seriously... and hands it to me and said gravely... "here is the only book you should read, ignore all other books"... : The book was Colin Crouch's "Pawn Chains". I wrote about it at the time (getting better at tactics, reading the pawn chain book: https://quest-of-the-chess-novice.blogspot.com/2010/03/acis-notes-003-im-back-part-2.html )
Point is that at the time my brain didn't absorb, so I thought. But every now and then, one of their lessons comes back to life, and I guess that means I'm integrating the knowledge.
Back to the squares thing. Squares, squares, squares...
If you control a file, you control squares. If you control a diagonal, you control squares. If your knight has an outpost you control a square. If you checkmate you control squares on and around the opponent king. If you have a strong point on the board (over protected), you control squares.
One of the most eye-opening books on this "simple" way to think about chess is in the book "Simple Chess" by Michael Stean. It is a Dover book (old and out of copyright protection) and available in internet archive for free here:
https://archive.org/details/Simple_Chess_New_Algebraic_Edition/page/n1/mode/2up
Lately, I am starting to understand things like "if you have two bishops and your opponent has one bishop and a knight then..." color complexes. Not that I can execute that well, but I get why they are important.
Please reply below, and we can start a discussion about squares which will inevitably lead to pawn formations...
Thanks!