Warm ups before rated play

One round of 3 minute puzzle rush helps me before a game.

Dear Christopher,

I'm a certified coach, so I hope I can help you.  I recommend you to do around 4-5 puzzles before playing games. It's not the best if you solve too many puzzles (e.g. 20-30 pcs) because you'll be too tired for the game.

On the other hand, doing too many puzzles can be dangerous because you can lose your patience quickly and you won't think on the right way. The quality is more important than the quantity! It's much more useful for you to solve only 10 puzzles per day with at least 80% accuracy than solving 50 puzzles per day with 60% accuracy.

You have to think ahead without moving the pieces and make your move when you see the solution from the start till the end. This is very important! That's how you can improve your visualisation and calculation skills on the most effective way!

And that's why I would never recommend you to play too many Puzzle Rush or Puzzle Battle games because they are time-limited, so you have to make fast and superficial decisions. And this is very harmful if you really want to improve at chess.

Of course, you can try this '4-5 puzzles before the game' method and if you feel that you are able to solve more without being too exhausted for the game, you can increase the number of the puzzles. But again...quality over quantity!!

I hope this is helpful for you!  Good luck for your games!

That sounds like great advice. I never thought rushing through tactics was a good idea. No clock or with clock?

No clock, with unlimited time! So you have enough time to calculate a lot of variations ahead, that's the most important!