I broke my foot; check my plan for getting better at chess while laid up

Hello,

My kids have gotten interested in chess and I have coincidentally broken my foot. I'm very, very low level myself, I played my first game against an adult since I was like 12 years old and got annihilated by a guy in the high 300's.

Here's my plan for getting better in the next month or so, I was wondering if folks had thoughts or changes they'd make:

1) Play as many 15/10 time settings games with light review as I can without burnout/boredom.
2) Fill idle moments with puzzles
3) Grab one or two low level books - I was thinking Rozman's How to Win at Chess and Discovering Chess Openings

Does this sound good for rapidly building a foundation?

Sometimes joining a community can help

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/community/seeking-players-who-have-a-temporary-limp-in-their-left-leg-after-stubbing-their-toe

Sometimes joining a community can help

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/community/seeking-players-who-have-a-temporary-limp-in-their-left-leg-after-stubbing-their-toe

Checking to see if right foot breaks are allowed, brb

@1

"1) Play as many 15/10 time settings games with light review"
++ Better play fewer 15|10 games with heavy review of lost games

"2) Fill idle moments with puzzles" ++ Better start with 4 puzzles as a warm-up.

"3) Grab one or two low level books" ++ Better one good book at a time.

"Rozman's How to Win at Chess and Discovering Chess Openings"
++ An endgame book is more useful than an opening book.
There are better books:
https://rafaelleitao.com/chess-books-grandmaster/

The backbone of any chess book are annotated games.
Zürich 1953 Bronstein
My Sixty Memorable Games Fischer
My Life and Games Tal
Test of Time Kasparov

Might help to just watch some beginner videos on YouTube man, no need to crack open a book before you have an understanding of the principles.

No offense but I'm 40 years old I do not learn anything from youtube that isn't posted by a general contractor or HVAC guy

Maybe the bobby Fischer chess book then, can find at any barnes and noble or equivalent store.

All you need is the logical chess book . Its a collection of about 40 games fully anotaited and explained by strong master level players in a simple easy to understand way with minimal side lines.it will take you through the mindset of a top player in every part of the game, allowing you to adopt the mindset and step by step logical reasoning needed to to advance past beginner and hopefully to intermediate

I recommend playing time controls. Play slower time controls can help calculation, but faster time controls are really important for intuition.
Playing faster controls forces you to take less time on things you shouldn't be taking much time on, and that transfers to longer time controls to give you much more time to calculate.

Example: Say you can win a queen x king checkmate in 2 minutes, and you're playing 10 min. That leaves you with 8 minutes to "win" the game, and enough time to checkmate

If you can premove and do it in 10 seconds, then that gives you a extra 170 seconds.

This also transfers so much more, like capture exchanges, and seeing what is a "good" or "bad position".

Also:

- Don't think too much about improving: Play naturally, and you will improve, buying more books may help but realistically not necessary

- Ignore your elo number, play for learning, not for the number

What works for you works for you, but I'm 49 and there is a huge amount of excellent chess content on youtube! Maybe at least give it a small chance? HVAC and auto repair, though, are still the best use case!

I'm not very high myself, but I can tell you that only two things were needed to get from zero to 600's:

1. Stop hanging pieces and stop missing when opponents have hung a piece. (Realistically, work on doing it less, nobody stops completely until the very high levels.)
   1. What's helped me is to ask four questions for each move: can I check them, can they check me, can I capture anything, can they capture anything. In 15|10 games you have plenty of time for it.
2. Learn and follow opening principles.

That's all you need right now, I promise!

Someone said fewer games with deeper review, but I don't think that's best for your current level. You're not losing for subtle reasons yet. You're hanging pieces and missing when the opponent hangs theirs.

Best wishes for a quick and full recovery!

sounds like a good plan!

I personally wouldn't play too many games in a day tho, but do whatever feels best for you!

Here's a game of yours that illustrates the two points I made above (blunder less, follow opening principles):

• On move 4, your g pawn was attacked and you didn't protect it. To be fair it was a discovered attack which your opponent missed as well.
• On move 7, that same pawn was attacked directly by the knight and you didn't protect it.
• After seven moves, you've only moved one piece off the back rank (opening principle: develop your pieces). See how your opponent has four pieces (knight, both bishops, and queen) that are actively affecting the game, while you still have none.
• On move 19 you hung your bishop to their knight.
• On move 21 you hung your knight to their bishop.

Just hanging fewer pieces and developing better in the opening will, guaranteed, give you big and rapid improvements in your playing strength.

Why do beginners insist on playing blitz games?

Didn't OP say their plan is to play a lot of 15|10 games?

But yeah, I don't get it either. I don't play blitz at all because you have to move on the basis of experience and pattern recognition that I haven't built yet.

I didn't realize that the default was 10 minutes absolute, go has overtime by default.

Thanks kindly, I've been playing over the board with my kids each day and trying to focus on these basics!