stuck at 1100

I’ve been stuck at the 1095-1110 for about a week now and I can’t understand why I keep losing I’ve beaten players rated almost 100+ points higher than me so why am I losing to other 1100s and high 1000(1080-1100) players what am I doing wrong I am a 1600 in puzzles do them everyday and I don’t just guess either I properly calculate the moves b4 hand everyone I ask just says keep studying tactics which I do all the time and I’m not improving at all I also analyze my games after to see why I lost could someone explain what I’m doing wrong what am I not doing that’s hindering my progression

Do you analyse you games with help if the engine or not?

Using the engine doesn’t do much for me but analyzing without must point you the direction were you need to focus i think?

Ah wait, in two months you went up from 700 to 1100. Hard to call that ‘stuck’ :-).

Getting better is for most players a slow proces with ups and downs. Could that be it?

If I’m at a rating about a week a more I’d call it stuck ik progression is supposed to be slow when your learning but the reason I skyrocketed in points was because I didn’t understand something and was doing things wrong once I understood this and first fixed it my rating skyrocketed that’s why I’m asking is there something I’m doing wrong or not getting is there something I’m not considering when making moves and I do use the engine sometimes but some of the moves it recommends are weird like one time it told me allow my rook and bishop to be taken so could push a pawn I was very confused it wasn’t even in end game either and there was nothing for the pawn to do no pawn forks or attacks or anything but I see you are 1500 in rapid could we play a match together and after the game tell me what I need to work on srry for the long post I also just hit 1700 in puzzles :)

I also see that you are 1700 in puzzles but our ratings a different by a huge amount so there has got to be something or somethings your doing better than me

I think what you should do is have a good look at your last 10 lost games. See if you can find a pattern. I had a quick look and I was not sure. If you want we can Zoom and have a look together.

It's fine to your puzzle rating to be 500-600 points above your strength. It's normal

That would be awesome I would prefer discord if you have it as I rarely use zoom but if not that’s fine we can zoom call whenever your available it would have to be tmr or a different day tho as it’s really late where I live

I don’t have much experience with discord so you need to guide me there a bit. Nothing better then mutual learning.

Couple of comments. Progression to 1400+ generally means not blundering material regularly, pieces or pawns. I briefly looked at a couple of your recent loses, it seemed yoy are quick to trade when there is tension so consider whether you are evaluating all your trades. Also, complete development before launching a serious attack. It looked like you were 'playing with your best pieces' rather than developing your position. If you dont see an advantage for yourself, consider whether you are better off improving your position rather than trading off material. In a recent loss you seemed to go to considerable effort to win the bishop pair but in the process gave your opponent two central pawns and an open file for his rooks. I didnt think there was any advantage in the exchange, given the outcome, and the couple of moves invested in your knight just got traded off the board with the bishop, you could have used those tempo to improve a piece. Generally, my suggestion is to look much more critically at your position, your opponent's position, and the outcomes of exchanges and moves. I read The Amateur's Mind by Silman last autumn. I thought it was a good introduction to critical evaluation of a position. Its pitched at 1200-1400ish players.

Thank you so much for the insight and advice I’ll try to use this information in my games and thanks for the book recommendation 

Just to add, John Bartholomew's Chess Fundamentals series on you tube is very good. One of the videos is on Trades. I think there are 5 in total. They are all worth watching.

Yep when I first started playing chess back in February somebody actually recommended this in a Reddit post and I watched all 5 but I’m considering rewatching the trades video as it seems like that’s where the main problem in my game is and it’s somewhat hard for me to find and pick a candidate move