Stupidly blundering after year of playing chess in range 1400-1500 (Rapid)

Hi everybody!

This topic is something very frequent and I've also asked about the situation some time ago. I'm playing actively somewhat over one year and I got to 1400+ rating in Rapid. My problem is, I'm unable to improve further, as I'm blundering in almost every game and basically all my losses are because of something incredibly stupid I do, like hanging my queen, rook, etc.

The problem is, that it seems, I'm having these concentration lapses randomly and for shorter intervals from like few hours to few days. I can be literally playing with a winning streak, knowing my line, having an advantage... And suddenly falling because of literally moving my queen in front of opponent's rook. It's really frustrating, as it seems, that while I learned a few openings, some middlegame strategy, I've improved in endgames, I'm still struggling with this aspect heavily. Even worse, I am training tactics everyday, doing both ranked puzzles and unranked ones, doing several tens of them everyday. In ranked puzzles I have a rating over 2400 with my record being close to 2600, so I should be well over the phase "don't hang your pieces", if I understand it correctly.

Is there anything you could do to improve specifically this? I acknowledge, that I'm used to work in "spurts", having quite a lot of "free time" in my job and then suddenly intervals of feverish activity taking from several tens of minutes to many hours overnight.

With all that said, I tried to play only Rapid 15+10, going back to combining Blitz 5+5 and Rapid 15+10, because of lack of time and finding out, that I don't improve at all, literally because I lose almost half of my games due to these stupid blunders. To make it worse, I do really try to compute the lines and focus on the game and it seems, like if my brain sometimes simply doesn't let me see some simple tactics, while sometimes (even in the same game) I'm able to see 5+ moves best lines ahead, only to lose my rook/queen two moves later...

I'm really frustrated with this, as I'm feeling, like it's something I'm simply unable to improve, unlike theoretical aspects of the game. Is there anything I could do myself to diminish this problem systematically? I'd love to go to a club to play OTB with some coach, but I'm unfortunately unable to do it now, due to huge time-demands caused by my job.

Thank you very much for all the advice!

And here are my few last Rapid games to illustrate my point:

Thank you! How specifically, do you mean? Like, "hanged piece", "overlooked fork" or something more detailed like "hanged queen in 25th-30th move on black diagonal"?

I'm not joking, I'm really trying to understand, how to do it efficiently.

If I were you I wouldn’t be too specific in the beginning. As soon as you have your top 10 it is probably useful to look closer to your number 1, see if you can find a pattern.
I discovered for example that I tend to miss forks on an exposed king. It was then useful to see that I was not only loosing pieces to this pattern but I was missing them in attacking sense too.
Normally I am not very fond of engine analysis but in this specific task the eval bar can be useful: if it swings more then let’s say 3.00 points you probably have a blunder :-).

I found mij initial post about this, my list is there too: https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/i-saw-the-light#comment-65790617

Maybe study your openings. The few games I looked at you misplaced the opening followed by the blunder. Getting the attention not to blunder takes a lot of work but is a key skill to get to 1800+

Improving at chess can be quite challenging, but there are various ways to enhance your skills.

For those looking to improve without coaching, here's some valuable advice:

1. Play Frequently: The more you play, the better you'll become at recognizing patterns and making strategic decisions.
2. Analyze Your Games: Review your past games to identify mistakes and areas where you can improve. This self-analysis is a powerful learning tool.
3. Focus on Tactics: Tactics play a crucial role in chess. Spend time solving tactical puzzles and exercises to sharpen your tactical skills.
4. Learn from Masters: Studying grandmaster games can provide insights into advanced strategies and tactics.

Feel free to check out this article for more in-depth advice: https://www.gautamnarula.com/how-to-get-good-at-chess-fast

Additionally, I have a YouTube series where I share chess insights and strategies, which you might find helpful: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUrgfsyInqNa1S4i8DsGJwzx1Uhn2AqlT

Best of luck with your chess journey! If you'd like more personalized guidance or coaching, please don't hesitate to reach out to me. I offer one-on-one coaching sessions where we can dive deeper into your specific needs.

I think one good idea might be to do a lot of puzzle rush also. Not only rated puzzles, which get quite complicated at 2400+.

Those easy puzzles hammer in that habit of checking for hanging pieces pretty good, when you do thousands of them.

I am also only in the 1300s now with a peak at 1441, but my biggest problem is not hanging pieces, even though I still hang them sometimes. At least according to the ”insights”, my opponents hang much more, but I just mess up in the endgames I think, too often, so that is where I think I need to focus more.

I get the bad focus streak. I was up to 1190 just a few games ago, then starteddrpping pieces... etc.