Good luck!
CSpump's beginner study plan
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Mar 4, 2021
0
#3
1000+ let's go!
It might be nice to add a strategy resource down the line, but I think you could definitely run the plan with the tactics book as your Chess.com lessons substitute.
Day 1
Started 5 daily games, going with Vienna system on white side and caro kann on black. Will check through the day to finish the basic opening moves/few theory moves I know.
Puzzles: 4/5
Rapid game: Draw vs BRD28
Initial thoughts: For all intents and purposes that was a loss. The opponent played the queens pawn into Queens gambit accepted. I've got very little experience playing against D4 so just tried to develop my pieces and not completely give up the middle. I believe I did that fairly well, but should have castled instead of trying to use my slight development lead to pressure him since I was in an awkward position. I definitely had the lead mid game, but a couple 1 move blunders lost it for me.
Analysis: Played through the key moments. Missed a knight & bishop mate in 1 out of the opening. Wasn't book/theory moves on my part, an inaccuracy on move 3. Afterwards the engine liked the moves and took a winning position by move 8. This is where I should have castled and pressed my advantage. Afterwards through the midgame(outside of the missed mate) there were no obvious mess ups. A couple inaccuracy and "good" moves, but running the line the engine wants are subtle and hard to notice. Close to the end of mid game I had a few chances to activate my second rook that I didn't take. Which ultimately ended up in blundering it. Leading to the endgame of just trying to survive. Almost created a promotion opportunity, but I over thought it causing another 1 move blunder and sealed away any chances. Tried to get too creative with it, and should have stuck to the simplistic approach.
Positives: Proud of myself for coming out of an unknown opening with a lead by punishing his aggression.
Good use of queen side pawns to force a queen trade which allowed me to be up a piece and take away his whole attack. Both pawn pushes showed up as "Critical move" in the key moments.
Negatives: Mate in 1....
Outside of that, just not getting complacent with a lead in development and ignoring the lonely rook in the corner that never got moved. Need to remind myself to complete development as long the opponent hasn't played a forcing move or I don't have a clear cut attacking plan.
IgnoratioElenchi33 wrote:
Good luck!
Thanks!
SmarterChess wrote:
1000+ let's go!
It might be nice to add a strategy resource down the line, but I think you could definitely run the plan with the tactics book as your Chess.com lessons substitute.
Hell yeah!
Sorry what do you mean by a strategy resource?
My thought process on the tactics book was that as far as the chess.com lessons go, I finished the lesson guide all the way through. I know there is more lessons than that and I should revisit some of them, but sorting based on level all the next stuff is on openings. So I was going to incorporate the opening lessons into Week 2 with the opening day.
Mar 4, 2021
0
#6
I was thinking since the Chess.com lessons have quite a bit of strategy content it would be good to have a strategy replacement. But it's not critical to do right away and I think your plan is good.
Day 2
Daily: Got out of the opening on a few of the daily games. Made a few moves throughout the morning, will keep checking back throughout the day. Will slow down and make less moves on the games that are out of the opening to really think about each move.
Puzzles: 3/5
Rapid game: Win vs CamTuck1
Initial thoughts: Overall I feel that I played well. I messed up on my move order to check mate, but the opponent didn't pick up on the mate threat which allowed me to get it off anyway. I think if I moved bishop before sending the rook it would have been forced? Another game where the opponent came out with a weird opening, started with G3 and transposed into the Kings Indian Attack. I feel like I came out in a losing position, but managed to find a way to attack his queen, potentially trapping it which led him to blunder it. Led to a quick finish after that.
Analysis: Played through key moments. Not many in this game, the main takeaway was a poor pawn capture on move 9. It wasn't a move I was sure of myself, with the best move being a retreating knight move. Feel like it was hard line to notice, but after seeing it it makes a lot of sense. Early game I did much better than I though, had a -.1 lead and kept it til the pawn mistake. He didn't take advantage of my mistake which led me to keep the lead. For the most part the rest of the game were all great moves. Only other takeaway would be that I missed a fully trapped queen and could have taken it 2 turns earlier with a knight fork. I didn't even see the knight move as an option. Which is funny since I finally saw the same move a few turns later just when the queen was on a different square.
Positives: Good use of piece trading(after taking their queen for free, I traded my queen for a bishop and rook that ultimately led to checkmate.
Good opening moves to keep the position even against an opening I've never played against before.
Negatives: Overall knight awareness. Missed a backwards knight move that cut off a pin allowing me to win a trade. Missed a knight move two turns in a row that would have captured their trapped queen. Ultimately saw it on the third time but only because he moved his queen to the same row as his king.
Day 3
Daily: I'm going to have to turn notifications off. When I see the notification I just feel obligated to make a move. Made a bunch of moves through the night and today, some of which were when I was focused on other things and it ended up with a bad move. I do like making moves through out the day, so might be more active in the daily games rather than adding extra rapid games. Just need to be more conscious of not making a move when I'm busy with something else. Turning off notifications should help with that.
Puzzles: 4/5
Rapid: Win vs alex25x06
Initial thoughts: Ended up playing 3 games, the first two were write offs. First game I blundered in the first few moves, kind of got me mentally so I just resigned. I do feel like I missed something so will still go back and look at the game. Normally I would play those games out, but honestly just didn't want to play my first game stressed from move 5 in a terrible position. Second game opponent blundered their queen in the first few moves and abandoned. Third game was the real game. Ended up winning on time, but feel I was in a easily played winning position. I am already scared to look at the evaluation line, definitely felt like a very swingy game. From the first game played I could already tell I wasn't seeing the board well today, and it definitely carried into this game. There was a handful of moves that looked good from my evaluation then when they played their move it wasn't a good move at all. However the upside is that they weren't just outright blunders.
Analysis: Looking at the eval line, played a lot better than I thought. In the key moments I did miss a common tactic to check on H4, sac the knight for a pawn on g3, and win a rook. Kind of painful to realize as I've been having this tactic popping up like crazy in my puzzles. Also missed a pretty obvious pin. Outside of the key moments there wasn't too much to look at. Slow on a pawn push, missed a prophylactic move, and missed a battery tactic.
Positives: Good job in the opening, keeping it even and coming up with a solid plan to take an advantage.
Overall made solid moves that didn't give up any advantages.
Negatives: Need to do better at looking at what other pieces can do when one of mine gets attacked. Missed the queen check tactic and the pin tactic because of a piece getting attacked and moving that piece to safety.
Day 4
Daily: Played my daily games through the night yesterday and finished 4. All with a win. Rematched with one and starting 3 new ones now. Not much to take away from these games so far, the skill difference is too wide. I felt bad in a couple of them so I didn't try too hard to play the best moves and blow them out even worse. Hopefully the next batch of games is closer.
Puzzles: 3/5
Rapid game: Loss vs FanieMalherbe
Initial thoughts:Rollercoaster of a game. I blundered a knight fairly early through a discovery I just payed no attention to. I was already on the back foot, opponent played the Sicilian(which has been common in the past half a dozen games) which I am not too sure on the line for. I feel through the mid game I was doing decent in a complicated position and didn't make my disadvantage any worse. Right near the end I missed my come back chance. Opponent played the botez gambit, I declined it through sheer excitement that the opponent blundered perpetual check. Turned out because of my decline I offered a botez gambit myself. He accepted and it swiftly came to a loss.
Analysis: Played key moments. A couple nifty ideas in there, using the A pawn to protect an over extended knight would have left me in a great position instead of retreating the knight to A3 and being terrible. Also just being okay with putting another plan on hold, went with following through on the fianchetto instead of rerouting the rim knight which ultimately led to my knight blunder. Move 5 caught my eye. Something I will have to pay attention to in the future, pushing the D pawn. Gives me an easy set up to play with in the next few moves. Also noticed another game where I could have moved another piece to set up a higher threat level than moving a piece under attack. I'd say this one move is ultimately the one that spiraled me down in the game. I wasn't in a losing position right away, was just very difficult to play through based off my current level. Need to note that I'm still in a level where everyone will blunder. If they move their queen I need to make sure it's not something I can take before I make a move. As well as not tunneling on playing for a draw in a similar position. Focusing too much on the draw is what made me miss the winning chance of taking his queen.
Positives: Playing decent moves after being down so heavily and not giving up.
Outside of that it was just a very mediocre game all around. No real plans, or anything really positive.
Negatives: Messed up which piece to move a couple of times. Moved a knight to a square the bishop protects, instead of moving the bishop to that square. Re-captured a piece with the queen instead of king blundering a rook.
Day 5
Daily: Been playing daily moves consistently over the last 24 hours. Finished a couple games and restarted a few new ones. This rounds are much more even. Have 2 games going where I played the caro kann and they didn't exchange or push. Didn't really know what to do in that position and went full meme mode. Ended up making an arch in both games simply because I thought it looked funny. Might incorporate looking into that caro kann line tomorrow with the lessons.
Puzzles: 3/5
Rapid game: Loss vs jboganey
Initial thoughts: Rough game, was feeling exhausted mentally today. Definitely carried over into the game. Kind of happy the plan is shorter today, no analysis. Going to do a quick scan just to see the glaring issues. Overall I think I just got too aggressive with no concrete sight behind it. Would have needed a lot of play with the knights, and it just wasn't the day to do that kind of mental gymnastics.
Quick run through: Didn't do nearly as bad as I felt. 2 key moments, both revolving around poor knight moves within a few moves of each other. Overall not really sad about this loss now, did well in the opening against the Sicilian again, and got into a solid mid game position. Totally winnable game.
Day 6
Daily: Been going strong in the daily games still. I feel like some moves I've been playing too fast. Going to try and get more conscientious about taking more time on each move. I am someone that inherently likes to play fast, so I need to break that habbit
Puzzles: 2/5
Lessons: Spent 10 minutes quickly looking at the Caro Kann lines. Mainly 1.e4 c6 2. d4 d5 with white on turn 3 not capturing or pushing with the e pawn and developing a minor piece. Read the pin chapter in "Chess Tactics from Scratch". Don't have much going on today so may read some more or play a couple rapid games.
Also was wondering @smarterchess or anyone else, if they read these. I see in other peoples logs and they've been going through the "Logical Chess Move by Move" book, and it's briefly name dropped in the beginner study plan in the Daily games section. I do have that book, I got it a while ago when I also picked up the tactics book. Would it be more beneficial and a better strategy resource to use this book instead of the tactics book off the start?
Mar 9, 2021
0
#12
I think that the book would be a good resource for you.
Do you have time to add reviewing those games in addition to your full plan? If you find the daily games are getting too distracting, you could replace daily game time with reading the Logical Chess book and then try to add a rapid game or two each week.
Starting ratings:
Rapid 942
Blitz 799
Puzzles 1307
Overall Goals:
Break the 1000 rating and keep the rating above it.
Improve with black side opening
Play slower
Cut down on 1 move blunders
Stay consistant
Week 1 ideas:
Potentially add an extra rapid game.
Try to get the first few moves of the daily game out of the way on day 1 and 2.
Puzzles will be done rated
Instead of chess.com lessons(already gone through the majority of them) will ready a tactics book for 45minutes. Book will be "Chess Tactics from Scratch" starting at chapter 2 "The Pin".