IgnoratioElenchi33’s Intermediate Adult Improver Plan

Yes, happy to help if you ever want to DM me!

Thanks retroplato. Ranting may occur  

ThanksSmarterChess. Do you do DMs here or on Discord only?

Here is OK, but Discord is easier for me

Ok, so I tried out a new response in the Italian, the Traxler. Everything was going well until I forgot the move order with the knight trying to come in and check the king. If I had played this right, this would have been completely winning for me, but alas, I did not. I didn't expect to play this the best way the first time, but I'll keep at it. 

Today's Rapid games went MUCH better. I focused on calculating, though I did make one big blunder. It cost me the game, but even with the blunder I still somehow squeaked out a 96.3% accuracy rating. I just didn't calculate correctly with a rook sacrifice. I needed one more prep move or a different rook move and I would have won a rook or a queen.

I decided to play another Rapid game, but this time a 20|0 game. This one went way better. I didn't have the accuracy, but I was never in trouble and ended up winning by resignation.

I really like the new Library update chess.com has made. I decided to create three libraries for myself. The first is for my annotated games. I thought that would be a good one so I can go back and look at my annotations and see if I can find even better moves. The second was high accuracy Rapid games. I think these are instructional and help me remember the tactical and strategic ideas I saw so I can replicate those in future games. The third is low accuracy Rapid games. I think this is probably the most important for improving in-game tactics and strategy. I decided to go with an accuracy of lower than 40% as that's where I can make the most improvement. I figure if I can push all of my games to be greater than 40-50% accuracy, it means I'm not making dumb one-move blunders and am becoming consistent with my play.

This week went much better. I really took the time I needed in my Rapid games and even in my blitz games. I got down to under a minute in some of them but had great moves that created decisive wins.

I also purchased some opening books and the Woodpecker method on Chessable, and have been going through those courses on a rotating basis when I have extra time. I feel like thiat is helping a lot. 

The other thing is that I tied my previous best from before this plan on Survival Puzzle Rush, though the Rated puzzle score went down a bit. Nothing I can't gain back with 3-4 high rated puzzles correct in a row

Here are where my ratings are sitting right now:

This week went fairly well. I lost a few games in the blitz format that dropped my rating but I kept close to where I started the week. My Rapid rating is steadily climbing again, which was a nice change of pace. I didn't do a ton of puzzles on Chess.com since I finally purchased the Woodpecker method and have basically been working through that daily using the cyclical method since I usually have extra time each day for chess play.

Week 6 was opening study week for Saturday, so I did 40 minutes of opening review on the Kaleidoscope of Openings course. To be honest, some of these feel out of my depth, but I think it's still been good to go through so I at least have looked at a myriad of openings and can try to come up with some ideas against each.

Below are my rating results from the end of week 6:

Finally at 1300 again in Rapid! Played a 15|10 game and found a lot of very good moves easily. I think the tactics training is helping along with being able to think about moves before I play them and not worrying about time until I have to. I ended up getting a really fun discovered attack on my opponent's queen in this game.

Welcome back to 1300 rapid

Another week bites the dust. I'm seeing improvement in just about every area as far as ratings go and I think I'm getting the hang of time on Rapid. I lost one of my Rapid games this week but won the other two, which put me over 1300 and kept me there. I'm in the 2nd round of the Woodpecker method cycle since I'm only doing the beginner exercises. I'll continue to add a new section (there are five on chessable) each time I go through the 7 cycles until I complete the full 1128 puzzles. Since I've been doing those, I've done less puzzle rush and Rated puzzles on chess.com, but I want to change that up for the remaining five weeks. I want to spend 20 minutes on the woodpecker method, 20 minutes on rated and survival puzzles, and then the games each day. Depending on the games, that should only take me 1.5 hours a day.

Here are my results so far (pre-plan plus last three weeks):

Congrats on getting back to 1300 rapid! Your new tactics plan sounds good to me.

Woodpecker training continues to go well. There are a few puzzles I am just struggling to remember the ideas behind, but I am going quicker at about the same or slightly better accuracy. My Rapid dropped again this week but I found myself really trying to workout the position more and so it's not an issue of rushing; I just need to focus more on strategy and looking for better tactics. In my last two games, my endgame is where I lost. I miscalculated a passed pawn push and then missed a winning tactic that would have put me in a Q+R v Q endgame which I feel I could have won.

Anyways, my Blitz rating is the highest it's ever been and I'm above 2000 on the puzzles as well so this last week went well over all. My Daily game rating has stalled but that's because I haven't introduced any new games as I'm waiting for the results of two tournaments and my current games are going on much longer (I'm in a winning position in most and think my opponents are stalling). I also didn't do as much Survival Puzzle Rush as I thought I might, so I only scored a 22 this week.

Results continue to be amazing other than my Rapid score (which I'm holding stead at around 1300). I'm almost at 1300 Blitz now and am confident I can reach above that by the end of the 12 weeks if I keep up my studying. Daily games continue to go well and I have had a string of great wins with a single loss on my last game where I got caught in a bad endgame. Before that, I actually hit 1490; so close to 1500!

I'm also up to an all-time high of 2100 on rated puzzles and kept Survival Puzzle Rush high again this week. Woodpecker training is really helping with my eye for tactics. 

For Woodpecker training yesterday (week 9 day 7's base work), because I'm doing the cyclical woodpecker training, I instead did a lot of Survival Puzzle Rush and Rated Puzzles. I did at least an hour total of puzzle training with at least 25 rounds of puzzle rush and 25 rated puzzles. I might have done more but that's as far as the history will show on chess.com.

For the courses I set out to complete in this study plan, I have finished both the "Name Your Pawns" from GM Simon Williams (https://www.chess.com/lessons/name-your-pawns-the-queenside) and "Pawn Structures That Win" from GM Aman Hambleton (https://www.chess.com/lessons/pawn-structures-that-win). In addition, I have completed 51 of the 90 lessons on A Kaleidoscope of Openings (https://www.chess.com/lessons/a-kaleidoscope-of-openings).

For the last three weeks, I want to start work on (and complete) the other two courses: The Drawing Zone, Part 1 (https://www.chess.com/lessons/the-drawing-zone-part-1) and Master Material Imbalances (https://www.chess.com/lessons/master-material-imbalances). 

I've also started coursework on a number of books on Chessable.com; probably too much. Thinking about HOW to study, I'm going to cut back to an endgame book (100 Endgames You Must Know), a white opening (Short & Sweet: The Ruy Lopez), and a black opening (GM Avrukh Against the Scotch Game). I chose the black opening because I love to play the scotch as white and want to understand the ideas from the other side so I can ensure a good middle game and endgame.

Quick update since I'm late:

I didn't get a chance to do opening review yesterday nor did I get to play today. However, the previous week I think I kept up with all of my games in addition to the Woodpecker training. I actually got up to 1305 on Blitz, but lost my last four games on 5|5 which dropped me back down. Still, I'm way above where I thought I would be and am expecting to increase that score again.

So this week went kind of off the rails with life so my playing and plan kind of went out the window. The only thing I was really able to stay consistent with was the Woodpecker training. Still, here's my results for last week with what I was able to do.

To make up for not being able to play a whole lot last week, my plan is to play three 5|5 games each day as well as one 15|10 game each day this week. In addition, I'm really trying to finish up with the Kaleidoscope of Openings course. After doing quite a few today already, I've got about 20 more lessons to go. 

I'm also in round 5 of the Woodpecker method and should be completed by next Tuesday. Time to finish strong!

It's the end of the 12 weeks and what a time! I think I did really well overall in following the plan. The last few weeks became a little more difficult due to work and family life. I also ended up getting the 2nd vaccine shot this last week and was basically down the entire day this Friday.

I was able to complete the "Name Your Pawns", "Pawn Structures That Win", and "A Kaleidoscope of Openings" courses on Chess.com.

In addition, I studied the Ruy Lopez, Queen's Gambit Declined, Caro-Kann, and the Scotch Gambit on Chessable.com. For endgames, I started the "The Drawing Zone, Part 1" course, but wasn't able to complete it. But I work through the first 21 endings (all positions) in "100 Endgames You Must Know" on Chessable (which comes out to 73 variations).

For tactics, I ended up making the purchase of the Woodpecker Method on Chessable and have been through five cycles of the "Easy Exercises." In the five cycles, I went from completing the 222 puzzles in roughly 5 hours at >80% accuracy to completing them in just over 2 hours at 90% accuracy. While I am scoring very high on the accuracy for these, I'm in trouble with the next exercises if these are supposed to be easy LOL. I also did quite a bit of work on the Survival Puzzle Rush and Rated Puzzles.

Going back to the goals I had for this course, I wanted to get to a strong (consistent) 1250 on Blitz, 1475 on Daily Games, and beat my previous best at Survival Puzzle Rush of 31. Below is where I ended up:

Needless to say, I crushed my goals and then some. I pretty quickly beat my Puzzle Rush score and came close to the same a few more times, destroyed the Blitz game score, and even beat my Daily Game score with a high rating of 1490!

While my chess certainly improved, where can I improve the most? Calculation. That is evidenced by my Rapid games. On those slower time controls, I really need to review all of my opponents attacking chances and review a few moves deep on several variations before I make my move. I tended to lose a lot of these games by not calculating enough and blitzing out my moves.

What's up next? I'm going to give this course another shot but really keep a focused study area each week. I also plan on including an extra Rapid game each day, so that I'm getting in at least nine Rapid games each week. Any additional studying will be kept on the focus of the last day of the week (Woodpecker, Opening, Strategy, and Endgames). And for that, I'm going to focus on a single course for each of those areas for the entire 12 weeks (two courses for openings - one for white and one for black). I just started looking at too many courses to really dive deep into any of them this go-around.

Congrats on completing 12 weeks and the progress! Your consistency is very impressive, and I like your adjustments for the next 12 weeks. I'm sending you a message now to see if you want to do an interview for the website :-)

ROUND 2 .... Fight!?

I crack myself up.

ROUND 2 WEEK 1 DAY 1 and 2

As stated above, I'm doing a second round of this training plan. True to my word, I completed a 15|10 game yesterday as well as a 30|0 game. I wanted to try the slower time control but without the increment. I won the 15|10 but drew the 30|0. Today I did four 5|5 games and went 2-2-0. I also lost my 15|10 game. I lost to a tactic with my knights. I thought I was going to win a pawn (which I did) but ended up losing a piece because I attacked with the incorrect knight. 

15|10 Yesterday:

30|0 Yesterday

15|10 Today:

"ROUND 2 .... Fight!?" :-D