I peaked as a USCF A player. My opening prep consists of...well...pretty much nothing.
I am technically a USCF B player all I do is prep openings (it does help get me good positions).
Do you mean you don't practice tactics at all?
I do practice tactics. I'm less of a tactical player, though.
ok but actually here is some of my prep in Caro as black
im too tired to put more of it right now.
So what's the best way to learn the main ideas in a line? Review GM games, books, or just experience from your own games?
So what's the best way to learn the main ideas in a line? Review GM games, books, or just experience from your own games?
All three.
So what's the best way to learn the main ideas in a line? Review GM games, books, or just experience from your own games?
Take lessons from a FM or IM. A cheaper alternative is to just buy a premium membership to Chessable.com and then purchase a course on an opening of interest. Some of the courses can cost $150 or more if you buy the video package, which includes multiple hours of narrated and detailed instruction from GMs. That may seem pricey, but believe me, if you take the courses seriously, you can study them for several months and start to see great improvements in your game. Also, private lessons are a lot more expensive over time, but there is not substitute for a great teacher.
How often are you facing IM/GM talent that you need to spend that kind of time and money on openings?
yeah, i agree with @knife_fork
but I am a hypocrite because I spent about 4 hours studying not very common lines in the caro-kann advance variation :/
I've never really believed in this "one opening in depth" stuff. That limits the variety of middle-game positions to which you are exposed, which in turn limits the variety of plans that you learn and experience from both sides of the board. In the short term, that might gain you a few points... but in the long term it can only stunt your growth as a chess player.
HERE IS MY BEST LINE IF I HAD 4 QUARTERS TO GIVE TO THE 4 PRETTIEST GIRLS IN THE WORLD
YOU WOULD HJAVE A DOLLAR.][ PS SORRY FOR CAPS I HAVE MEDICAL CONDITION.]
Not enough, I will tell you that.
I've never really believed in this "one opening in depth" stuff. That limits the variety of middle-game positions to which you are exposed, which in turn limits the variety of plans that you learn and experience from both sides of the board. In the short term, that might gain you a few points... but in the long term it can only stunt your growth as a chess player.
Actually, that depends on the opening.
London System? Yeah, what you say would be true.
French Defense? You can EASILY get away with this as your only Defense to 1.e4. But notice I said "French Defense", not French Defense, Winawer Warsaw Variation (7.Qg4 O-O).
When I say I play the French exclusively, I play the Winawer with 7...Qc7, Winawer with 7...O-O, Winawer with 7...Kf8, Classical, McCutchen w/ 8...g6, McCutchen w/ 8...Kf8, Rubinstein, Open Tarrasch w/ 5...Nf6, Open Tarrasch with 5...Nc6, etc.
Where people get into trouble is following the same narrow path every time.
Where people get into trouble is following the same narrow path every time.
Such as pontificating about the French defence ad nauseam.
I know more lines than Hunter Biden!
So what's the best way to learn the main ideas in a line? Review GM games, books, or just experience from your own games?
Here is what I have found to work best:
Get your feet wet with a video, say from Chessbase or iChess. The real stuff by an IM or GM that tend to be 4 to 8 hours long and usually about $30. Not the stupid 15 minute U-Tube videos created by some noob.
Invest in a book or two, not necessarily reading it in order, but rather, how the video is arranged. Keep in mind the video will be a repertoire, and the book may be too. Make sure the 2 have some overlap before you purchase both items.
Next, find additional annotated games, like Megabase 2021 or the applicable section of chesspublishing.com or even the videos often have a supplemental collection of games to go with it.
Lastly, expand on the opening you are studying. Learn to understand the lines not covered in the original repertoire. So if you are studying the French Defense, and the repertoire recommends 3...Nf6 against 3.Nc3, learn the Winawer!
Another important item. Do not cherry pick Black wins and do not try to use statistics to validate or invalidate the use of a line. Just because White scored 72 percent amongst annotated games with say, the McCutchen, does not make the McCutchen bad. Many times the mistake made is so deep into the game that it has nothing to do with the Opening.
In my case, I am set basically for life with Black against 1.e4. The rest still needs work. Right now I am going through a video that was published just under a year ago on the Benko Gambit. It also comes with about 350 games that I will be analyzing, and just for a supplement of games, when I am away from the computer and at a board, I am going thru the old book by Jacobs and Kinsman from the late 90s, starting in the back with the declined lines, especially 4.Nf3 and 4.Qc2.
Hope this helps.
HERE IS MY BEST LINE IF I HAD 4 QUARTERS TO GIVE TO THE 4 PRETTIEST GIRLS IN THE WORLD
YOU WOULD HJAVE A DOLLAR.][ PS SORRY FOR CAPS I HAVE MEDICAL CONDITION.]
What medical condition makes you need to type in allcaps?
Nearly 50 years ago, there was a player in Canadian OTB tournaments who ALWAYS blitzed out his moves as if he was playing bullet. Naturally, he had a lot of lines memorized many moves deep.
Back then, there was no digital clock, we used ordinary mechanical clocks to regulate the time control, and the Tournament Director would set the clocks at one minute before the hour at the start of the game... so that nobody could complain that they hadn't been given the full two hours thinking time.
This "speed freak" player once beat an IM in a tournament game before the flag had fallen to signal the START of his allocated two hours of playing time.
That strategy does not always work.
Case in Point. I played in the Atlanta Class Championship in October 2019. I was on board 2 in the final round. If I win on my board and Black wins on board 1, I get clear first (the small size lead to weird scenarios because of who had already played each other by round 5).
I had won my first 2 games, both on the White side of the Sicilian Prins Variation. I lost a Kings Indian Defense round 3 that I was totally winning but got in severe time trouble, and beat the London System round 4. So I had White in the final round and the guy I played spent no more than about 5 minutes on his clock in any game. I knew he moved fast.
A book had just come out that July on the Elshad for White. Knowing that he moves way too fast, I decided to throw it against him. The time control was 40/90, SD/30, d/10, and he was moving rapidly until he was dead lost in the endgame and only then he spent 6 minutes on a move.
Here is a link to that game, annotated.
http://charlottechesscenter.blogspot.com/2019/12/game-analysis-atlanta-class_17.html?m=0
ooh, I was going to play in that tournament, but I didn't
Sometimes Super GMs (like Hikaru) will intentionally play 'bad' openings and even odds games that have never been seen before and wins them with ease. I don't think he has incredible 'positional understanding' of these new positions, he just has a great understanding of how the pieces move. Is that all the opening really is? How the pieces move?
why are we doing
look at my prep.
amazing right?