coriollis' beginner study plan

W4D5 (Blitz):

• Daily 
• Puzzles (80%)
  • From now on, I'll do at least 10 (preferably 15) puzzles per day, with the objective of scoring at least 60% correct each day.
• Live games:
  • https://www.chess.com/a/3CKgHJ1u8q9rE (win)
    • Improvised an opening against the London, and managed to do ok.
    • I don't understand the engine reccomendations very well.
  • https://www.chess.com/a/yCyosS9Lq9rE (win)
    • Nice short attacking game. Opponent didn't develop and played too slowly, allowing me to sac and win the game.

It's a little late, I've got to stop for now, but I enjoyed what I did today.

W4D6 (Blitz):

• Daily 
• Puzzles 
• Live games:
  • https://www.chess.com/a/BsSWMCUWq9rE (loss)
    • Did not concentrate fully and blundered pieces.
    • Did not take advantage of full pawn center.
  • https://www.chess.com/a/wzTEACaSq9rE (loss)
    • Did not take advantage of passed pawns
    • Learned a trick for the queen's gambit declined
    • Blundered a rook
  • https://www.chess.com/a/31qkZz7Yrq9rE (win)
    • Opponent blundered a piece and a rook.
  • https://www.chess.com/a/3534xQse6q9rE (draw)
    • Almost remembered correctly the response to the Vienna gambit.
    • Stalemate! 🤬

W4D7 (Blitz):

• Daily 
• Puzzles  (67%) (14, 16, 12)
• Endgames:
  • Having trouble mastering Q v. N drills. Will keep trying tomorrow.

(also will do week overview tomorrow)

Week 4 overview:

Stats:

•  Rapid: 1037 (=)
•  Blitz: 811 (+30)
•  Daily: 1183 (+18)
•  Puzzles: 1829 (+42)

Good week. Stats are improving. Life got in the way in the last few days, but will try to go back to normal tomorrow.

1st Monthly Overview:

Stats:

•  Rapid: 988 -> 1037 (+49)
•  Blitz: 709 -> 811 (+102)
•  Daily: 1264 -> 1183 (-81)
•  Puzzles: 1686 -> 1829 (+143)

Not bad at all! Let's start month 2!

Lots of green! LFG!!!

W5D2 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles 
• Live games:
  • • https://www.chess.com/a/uv3HKfYiq9rE (loss)
      • Played the opening well.
      • Gave away an important bishop in the middlegame, losing my advantage.
      • Gave away too many pawns and made an unsound sacrifice for the illusion of activity.
      • Traded my queen when I was on the offensive.
      • Bad time management.

Rough start, but that's chess for you. Let's keep going

W5D3 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles  (59%) (14, 14, 14)
• Live games:
  •  
  • https://www.chess.com/a/WyQsjqxJq9rE (win)
    • Opponent didn't develop and hung two pieces.
    • Much better time management.
    • Nice win, but not as satisfactory since my opponent was 40 points below me. Gotta double-check settings next time.

W5D4 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles  (67%) (14, 14, 9)
• Live games:
  • https://www.chess.com/a/2FdhJ63jtq9rE (loss)
    • Allowed my opening advantage to vanish by releasing the pressure on my opponent.
    • Did not look for mathe threats.
      • Only defend if you can't create a bigger threat.
    • Blundered a fork.

Really should've won that one.

W5D5 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles  (80%) (15, 14, 12)
• Live games:
  • https://www.chess.com/a/2L8zW3e3pq9rE (loss)
    • Rarely but sometimes moving the king early can be good
    • Must not evaluate pieces or positions based on ideal attacking positions; instead, must remain flexible and evaluate mine and my opponent's pieces objectively (did not trade an active enemy knight for my not so active knight because I hoped to use it in a king attack; but the attack wasn't close to ready)
      • Relating to the previous point, must not undervalue pawns.

Learned something that could become an important thing to focus on: I must not keep making decisions based on fantasies and instead focus on what's really on the board.

W5D6 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles  (50%) (15, 20!, 13)
• Live games: Today I played 8 games in a school tournament. Will publish some analysis tomorrow.

• Tournament game 3: https://www.chess.com/a/9J3Pnsbtq9rE (loss)
  • Must not allow opponent to get the full center uncontested.
  • It is better to gain space for my own pieces with tempo.
  • Must not follow a plan blindly. Must be flexible.
  • Must check for checks and captures.
• Tournament game 4: https://www.chess.com/a/2sx2xNu2vq9rE (loss)
  • Must centralize pieces and look for captures that alow piece centralization
  • Must make sure attacks are prepared before sacrificing pieces
  • Must double check calculations when opponents threaten forks.

W5D7 (Rapid):

• Daily 
• Puzzles 
• Study

Week 5 overview:

Stats:

•  Rapid: 1021 (-16)
•  Blitz: 811 (=)
•  Daily: 1183 (+53)
•  Puzzles: 1829 (+104)
  • Puzzle Rush new record: 20 (+2)

Rough rapid week. Maybe because I was so tired and busy all those days. Very happy with my abilities in puzzles, though. Let's try to have a nice and succesful blitz week

I'm afraid I will have to turn mondays into rest days. Still, I made some prep to start playing the Vienna this week. https://lichess.org/study/8OBkoZ5E (in spanish)

W6D2 (Blitz):

• Daily  (~3 mins)
• Puzzles  (50%) (13, 17, 10) (~ 38mins, but I solved them too fast)
• Live games: (~1:34h)
  • https://www.chess.com/a/BDorvLvJq9rE (loss) (cheater?)
    • Did not look appropriately for checks and captures from the opponent
    • Must coordinate pieces better (i.e. I had a knight move that reconnected my other knight and my queen)
    • Generally I feel like I played with my brain turned off.
  • https://www.chess.com/a/2EottSRskq9rE (win)
    • Made a bad sacrifice but opponent didn't respond correctly
  • https://www.chess.com/a/2ywxUpSwpq9rE (win)
    • Played a King's Indian for the first time. Did pretty well.
    • Was able to take advantage of my opponent's blunders.
    • Missed a lot of tactics
  • https://www.chess.com/a/75Zmy68Eq9rE (win)
    • Played the Vienna for the frist time, and remembered my lines.
    • Managed to spot my opponent's blunders instead of playing too fast.
    • Must allow the pressure to deflate.

I feel like I had to readjust to the faster time controls. We'll see how we do tomorrow.

Only skimmed first game. What move(s) made you think they might be cheating? Was it the timing of the moves or anything in particular? I don't play 1.e4 but things seemed fairly fine to me for most of the game. Do you remember your thought process when you played ...h6?

Not any specific moves, but the speed; as if he could see the best moves always in 2 seconds. But maybe he's just that good.

I played ...h6 without thinking, out of habit, not realizing ...Ng6 was better, but I made a note of of that, so hopefully it won't happen again.

Well, it's not even that ...Ng6 is or isn't better. It's knowing that you need to have concrete reasons to allow Bxf6 gxf6, destroying your King's pawn cover. The same for f3 if you're White. It's a very common theme. And in your position there's no good thing or concrete continuation to allow him making you play gxf6 there. So, by process of elimination you know that you either need to move the N on f6 or reconnect the Q and N on f6.

What I'm trying to say is that you won't avoid the mistake again by thinking ..."ng6 is the right move here" but instead thinking "wow, ok, I need to be careful to not let my king cover get blown unless there is a very good reason for it."

Yeah, you're right. I'll be mindful of that next time

W6D3 (Blitz):

• Daily  (~3 mins)
• Puzzles  (50%) (13, 17, 10) (~ 38mins, but I solved them too fast)
• Live games: Played a blitz tournament organized by a local club. Got 4th place.