Chess Steps is making me wonder whether it's worth it to try to ever reach low club player level

Adult learner here, who's played at a raw beginner level for decades of my life, on and off.

For those unaware, the Chess Steps system is an extremely thorough Dutch system of teaching chess, through thousands of curated problems and exercises dealing with all stages of the game. I recently picked up the program version of it, Chess Tutor. Which is excellent. No cause for complaint with the software or teaching system. (The problem, as it turns out, was the user.)

Seemed perfect to finally get serious about the game -- at least serious enough that I could eventually, after years of work, reach the level of a low/average club player. I'd already gone through almost all of the Dr. Wolf exercises, and the first book of Polgar's "Learn Chess The Right Way," plus "Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess" and an older elementary checkmates book with 400 problems. Which I completed without any issues. Plus occasional games against the Kilobyte's Gambit and other chess programs. So I assumed I'd at least be able to learn some of the basics.

As I worked my way through the first step, though (designed for 800-and-below children who barely know how to play), I found by about 14% through the course that the Chess vision drills and exercises got quite hard for me.

Finally, I reached an exercise that I'm pretty sure is impossible for me. Not for other people; for me. Eight pawns on each side. No king. Race to pawn promotion. I've occasionally managed to win, but those "wins" were essentially by random accident. I have no idea how to repeat them. Worse still, I checked online, and there are explanations for how to solve the problem by people who seem to find it easy, but I can't understand why those solutions work, and they are of no help. Been at this for hours now. The computer opponent can accurately calculate out how to force me into zugzwang, and I'll tell you, I'm nowhere close to being able to calculate that out. Not if my life depended on it. I don't think I will ever be anywhere close to being able to do that.

So my worry is this: If there's this much of a mental gap between me and the sub-800 kids who are taught on this program, where I can't even understand how to get past this elementary problem, or calculate deeply enough to solve it, that is designed for complete beginners, should I really ever be expecting to get decent at this game?

That is not a sub-800 level problem.

No worries. I'm not claiming to be 800 myself on Chess.com. I'm saying that I solved a bunch of problems oriented toward 800 players, and that I play with friends and bots occasionally.

I guess you raise a good point, though. For all I know, I play at the equivalent of 100 ELO or something. Which would explain why I can't solve this problem, but would also raise its own set of questions about whether I should be aspiring to ever get to a competent level.

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Whether my inability to solve this problem suggests that I lack the capacity to ever get beyond a beginner skill level.

Because if so, it might not be worth continuing.

Are you actually supposed to be able to "win" all of the "Play" challenges before being allowed to continue? Because the Chess Tutor software doesn't prompt me to retry the "Play" parts after my numerous losses to the computer, in contrast to the regular exercises, where it'll prompt me to repeat if I miss enough stuff.

The exercises are all easy, and I complete them with few or no points lost. Some of the "Play" portions, though, like the 8 vs 8 pawn puzzle or R+B+K+pawns vs 2 rooks + pawns, are impossible for me, leaving me with deep feelings of stupidity, frustration, and anger at myself, but no progress or learning.

The only question that I can answer is yes, you should be capable of getting to a low level club status, as long as your mind hasn't started to deteriorate where you are finding it difficult remembering things. I suggest getting there should not matter, you should be playing because you enjoy playing, along with any steps you take learning/studying. I may be mistaken, but I am thinking you are doing a lot of studying and very little playing. If so, you need to play regularly, analyze each game (which can be time consuming), and then studying things which are most helpful at your rating. Along with reviewing things you have learned such as KP vs K if you have not seen it in a game for some time. Your scenarios about rooks and pawns, and pawns are more advanced. from your described abilities.

I agree with #11. How many games of chess do you play a week? You don't have any game history on chess.com. Maybe you are using a different chess website or playing multiple games a day in person.

All the study in the world won't get you very far if you aren't regularly putting it into practice and thoroughly reviewing all of your games. And in regards to puzzle rating - the number doesn't correlate to a person's chess rating. For example, my chess.com puzzle rating is around 2500 but my chess rating is in the 1300s. So using puzzle ratings as a metric isn't useful. You'd need to play a dozen or so rapid games for chess.com to give you an accurate rating.

you are different from the kids for whom that program was designed. Kids learn through concrete repetition. You can use your verbal and conceptual skills to learn!

Why not try reading the classic instructional books by Chernev and Reinfeld. You can understand the concepts in books better than kids. Use your advantages.

i say this as a retired college psychology professor who has decades of experience teaching adults.

Sorry I missed your post first time around, I was on vacation. Glad somebody bumped it.

justbefair is correct, this eight-pawns "puzzle" is hard. Also it's more like a game to be learned than a puzzle to be solved.

FM Boorchess showed it to me some years ago when I was visiting a Columbus tournament. Even though I was seeing it for the first time, I managed to win one of the games because it's so tricky it takes a long time to know it perfectly, and Carl didn't know it as perfectly as he thought.

Maybe the people who seem to find it easy are wrong about that. Maybe you can't understand why their solutions work because they don't, or not always.

mikewier is also correct. Adults need to learn differently than children. Also the brain is less plastic, changes more slowly, and it takes longer for new skills to seep in. But you _can_ teach an old dog new tricks. Be patient with yourself.

Finally, look online for tips from adult learners on what learning methods worked for them, also non-chess learning. Then beware of frauds and wishful thinkers, and look online some more for corroborating testimony.