First Ten Moves Memorized?

+1 Absolutely brilliant!

Are you a teacher?

As a music teacher, I tell my elementary band and orchestra students to do exactly the same thing: take it slow at first, and then gradually speed it up. If my students attempt to play a new song too fast, the play is sloppy, and bad habits are formed along the way. Nothing is gained. Everything is lost.

Why do I play sloppy chess?

I had an instructive chess.com chat with Ajedrecito, and he also suggests the same thing, that I play slower, with 15 15 being the fastest time control.

My tactics trainer rating of 1293 is much stronger than my blitz rating of 968, so something is clearly wrong - with the idea that chess is 99% tactics.  I do get into time trouble often, and must win most of my games with checkmate, because my opponent's always seem to have the luxury to run me out of time. They play much faster than I do.

I'll try 15 15, and put in a seek for players all the way up to 1200. If I still get into time trouble, then I will try 20 20, etc.  Over at ICC, they have a time control league of 45 45!  Dang!

Looking at my Live Chess stats, my percentage of fast to slow games, relative to what I want my music students to do, is way off!

Blitz: Rating = 968  1,087 games

Standard: Rating = 1098  156 games

Basically, 10% of my games are slow. If I practice what I preach/teach, it should be the other way around, with 10% of my games being fast! Good grief!

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Wouldn't it be something that after three to six months of 15 15 games, I finally get to playing with the big boys and girls, those rated above 1200? Maybe it all boils down to taking more time over each and every move? Hmm...

I just played three 15 10 games against the same opponent. There were brain draining! I am all worn out.

I'm sure you have had one of these. In game two, I hit myself hard in the head right after I made a stupid move, when I could easily have won a piece instead. Arg!

I am definitely going to go over these games with a fine tooth comb since I felt like I put so much effort into each one. I can't imagine what chess players feel like after playing just one 4-5 hour tournament game. It must be completely exhausting.

"I am definitely going to go over these games with a fine tooth comb since I felt like I put so much effort into each one. I can't imagine what chess players feel like after playing just one 4-5 hour tournament game. It must be completely exhausting."

It's just like anything else. Once you get used to it, it isn't that bad. Walking around during the games makes it a lot easier.

Good point!  Some of my best games resulted from walking around briefly mid-way (stirs up the brain's oxygen supply).

sftac

+1

I never would have thought of that! Get myself off of my lazy butt and jump up and down to wake up the brain. Geez...I feel so stupid sometimes.

Yep. I definitely play chess in zombie mode way too often.

You could bring a 'jump' rope, and do a brisk 30-60 seconds of skipping beside the table, that should get your heart racing (during your move of course, as you mustn't disturb your opponent during their move).

sftac

I'm not sure about jumping rope, lol.

However, a lot of hotel tournaments have fitness rooms on-site (though I must admit I have never taken advantage of this...)

If I'm playing Game/30, I pretty much don't walk around during the game at all. For Game/60, I might walk around a couple of times for a few minutes. For a 5- or 6-hour game, I walk around quite a lot (when I'm playing a 6-hour game, it's in a big tournament, so I watch the IM/GM games to intentionally distract myself a little).

My doctor does want me to do more cardio. I may as well kill two birds with one stone.

A 15 10 time control has definitely done wonders for my playing strength. 

Houdini gave me big high fives for playing correct moves in an off beat Phillidor, and when it went off book, I nailed it, hitting top engine choices. I have never made a chess engine that happy before, always getting lots of (?), and (?!) and (??). 

Well, I did miss one move, 12.Nxf6+, but I DID consider it, however I couldn't see the tactic at that time. Always gotta keep working at tactics puzzles.  

This is all very helpful, getting a better understanding of what it takes to play a better game of chess besides the obvious stuff like tactics training.

Regarding time, when you say Game/30 and Game/60, do you set your chess clocks for a time delay, an increment?

Just a guess, but if squeezed for time with a winning position, it would seem that even a 5 second delay could help when all you need to do is win a K + R vs. K ending. It would be terrible to lose on time having a totally winning position, one where even I could beat a GM, blindfolded.

For Game/30 and Game/60, we would use delay. So, 25 minutes plus 5 sec delay in Game/30, and 55 minutes plus 5 sec delay in Game/60. 

If I had K+R vs. K, I could win with 1 second on my clock and 1 second delay, and I'm far from alone in that. 

By the way, your most recent game is a big improvement. Just be disciplined and stick to playing 15-minute games, and you will improve a lot.

Thank you.

And I just had an itch to get in a few fast games. Discipline!