1550 to 1800 attempt

Hi guys,

I've taken up chess after a long timeout. I began playing 10 years ago when I was at university.

I improved quickly, but university was also over quickly and I hadn't played much since. 

Anyway, the Chess Bug has bit me hard and I want to improve. My goal is to reach 1800 as quickly as I can. I'm going to post some of my games, mainly my losses and share my thoughts. Any pointers on my games, or pointing out any stupid thoughts I'm having are very welcome!

I've just analysed my most recent game, forgive my first post being a win.

Holy smokes, you recognize that your opponent wasted two moves and say "I needed to develop and attack the center due to his slow play" and then you play painfully slowly yourself.  No, no, no.  When your opponent screws around, you blast open the center.  Yes, 3. . . . nf6 was better, d6 is a total sin after white wastes a move with a3.  But worse is your plan of be7, bf8 and re8, which was just agonizingly slow to watch.  You have no advantage at all by move 9, stockfish rates the position a tiny bit in white's favor.  Play something like 6. . . . d5, rip open the center and black has a small advantage.  

11. ... a6 looks visually wrong to me, even if it doesn't offend stockfish that much.  It just doesn't do anything much, and you should know at a glance that it is wrong.  Moves like a3/a6/h3/h6 need a specific reason or they are just time wasters.  There are several better ideas, including nd4 (white can't really take it given the knights lack of a square) followed by c5 gaining space is the one stockfish prefers, but there are other good plans including the plan of g5, bg7 and nh5.  

12.  ... be7...a fine move, but I don't remotely understand your comment
13. . . . na7.  time waster, undeveloping a piece, don't do that without a compelling reason.  You had an advantage with nd4 or d5, ripping things open with white poorly developed.  White isn't even castled and his knight is on a silly square, so undeveloping your own piece is bad.  When you have a development lead, your default should be to blast open the center.  

I have to stop now, but from a quick look it seems there may be some deeper positional knowledge needed to advance.  If you are serious about reaching 1850, you'll either need to post games here regularly for help, or find some other source of study.  Going to a chess club, getting curb stomped and going over the game afterwards is oen great way.  

As Art says you just played too slowly and wasted a lot of moves. If you are ahead in development you want to seek pawn exchanges. I recommend watching this video below. It will show you how to take advantage of an opponent that plays passively.

The Element of Time in Chess - Beginner to Chess Master #11

Add me as friend. Same goals I guess. And I hate losing so losing to a friend will actually diminish my suffering lol.

Thanks @ArtNJ , those comments are really helpful. It all felt slow and I knew I was making mistakes during the game. I'm still struggling to see the correct moves quickly.

11... a6 was because I couldn't see how he could move his forces forward other than Knight to b5 so I wanted to prevent that. But this was probably a stupid thought, thanks for pointing out.

on 12...e7, the idea was to free up my knight to defend e5, or if opponent takes then  attack a useful looking diagonal. It felt necessary before pushing into the centre.

Thanks anyway, I will do as you say, join a club and keep posting.

One unanticipated benefit of analysing and commenting on my games is that I can remember the games move for move.

Like all the cmments.  Right on target. Helpful.

So this is one of the worst games I've played since my last post.

Ignore the result, the analysis stops after move 20. I should have resigned but I played on in disgust and got lucky.

I'm open to any thoughts, one thing I am curious about is was there a better idea than to try and attack d6? I was too slow to implement the idea and was punished, I lost a lot of time pushing pawns, I'll have to learn from that. It was a weird game for me as I've only played a handful of games where we castle on opposite sides.

Most of my mistakes were tactics which is something I am constantly working on, but any thoughts on this game or what I should work on are welcome.

4. d3 is a head scratcher, blocking in your light square bishop for no reason.  You are white, and black played the center-counter.  Play aggressively, develop fast and naturally.  D4 and Nf3 give a significant advantage . . . after d3, your basically dead equal.

12. rad1 . . . you don't comment on this at all, but it evinces no plan.  The dfile is not opening up, the rook was probably better on a1.  Rfe1 or nf3 were logical.

With opposite side castling, your goal is to open files to attack the enemy king.  Its going to take a while here, but its logical to think about a3, b4.  The problem is it is a little too slow after f5, nc3 and bd6, forcing white to weaken his kingside pawn structure, making it easier for black to open files than white.  Accordingly, Stockfish prefers playing in the center.  

19. g3 was a blunder that made black's attack much easier.  Stopping here.  

After 12 moves, the game is roughly equal.  Theory says that in this position you have two options.  You can attack with pawns on the queenside or play in the center.  Sometimes you combine both ideas.  But let's discuss ideas you need to be aware of.  15. QXE3 is better because it grabs that diagonal toward the queenside.  By the way, c4 simply weakens d3  Try not to create weak squares in your position.   18...NG4 sets up a tactical pattern that happens over and over.  So memorize this pattern.  The main thing is to realize that h2 must be defended.  In this case NF3 is the best choice because it does not create weak squares. NF2 undefends H2.  The queen defends H2 before NF2. 

Beware of moves that undefend your pieces and pawns.

Thank you all. Really good advice and useful comments for me to take on board.

d3 does seem like a daft move when you describe it so simply @ArtNJ.

@Nwap111 you are right about c4, I think once my f file was opened up and 2 pawns in the centre, I should have concentrated and put pressure on the centre. Maybe then (and minus the blunders) it would have been a better game.

@Manatini "don't be timid for its own sake" is great advice. I, generally, try not to trade pieces as it just seems like a waste of a move unless their position is stronger, but I'm certainly a culprit of being timid as d3 demonstrates.

Hi all,

I thought I would share my milestone games on route.

This was breaking 1600 for the first time. (...or at least the first time since my stats were skewed from when I first joined!)

I'm still making plenty of mistakes, but think I am improving. I applied some of the lessons learned previously in this game.

Two of many weaknesses are my endgame and complacency when I am ahead in material, this game encapsulates both quite well. The first I am working on quite hard by reading through Silman's Endgame Course, the second is coming along with experience. (I lost to a 1760 rating in my most recent game from sheer complacency and it really hurt! I was black and Stockfish had me as -6 ahead before a lazy blunder.)

As always any pointers or criticism are welcome.

Just go over master games, do a lot of tactics and play a lot, I have played for 3 years and am around 2300 on chess.com.

I never really got going in this game. I hope it gives a good example to other people of similar ability of how powerful a knight is in a closed position. It was so difficult to see any good moves towards the end of this game.

I played poorly, but learnt that you need to stick to your plans and not waste moves. When your king is centralised then there is no time to mess about and you need to act quickly and address the main threats.

Any thoughts/advice is welcome.

Hi all,

Haven't posted for a while. It hasn't seemed worthwhile as most of my losses have been blunders, and I don't need stockfish to tell me that leaving a minor piece hanging isn't a good idea. 

The rating has been up and down. I've beaten a couple of 1700s players and an 1800 player, so I'm hopeful my aim isn't complete fantasy.

This is my most recent game. 

I'm not working on openings at all but often find I am getting in good positions at the early stages of the middlegame, and then it can go either way. I'm watching a lot of the videos on chess.com, watching analysis of GM games, and trying to learn from my mistakes.

As always, any pointers are welcome.

The only pointer I would have about the last game as a French defence player is that usually giving up your LSB to take the knight on f5 like 8. Bxf5 is a super annoying move.  It wasn`t strictly a French defence, but you entered a typical structure of such games so it was kind of a transposition. Yes bishop pair is good and all that, but I think you get more than enough compensation for giving up your LSB. You remove blacks most active piece, you destroy his central pawn structure, give him doubled pawns and you weaken d5 significantly. In the French defence I detest Bxf5 so much that i try to avoid giving white that opportunity. 

Thanks @Giasira, that's useful to know. I did consider that move, it was 2nd choice after castling. I figured if I took and he castled kingside then it's going to be difficult to attack the king. My bishop is placed well attacking h7. His isolated d5 pawn would have been a weakness but I would find difficult to attack d5 with the loss of my LSB, and just generally my LSB seemed in much better shape than my other bishop so didn't really want to trade off. I agree with what you say though, I'll try it out if I get in a similar position. 

Hi all,

I broke 1700 for the first time today. It's been much more difficult than I thought.

It wasn't the most elegant game to break 1700, I came out terrible after the opening. I think openings are quickly becoming my new weakness as the opponents I'm playing are getting better. I've had a 'learn by doing' mentality to openings, whereas I've been studying other parts of the game. It's probably time to study openings seriously.

Grateful if anyone can share any pointers on how to go about learning openings and understanding them, not just learning move orders as I find that incredibly boring.  

In the lessons  Mastery - Openings section there are two series of videos by GM Simon Williams explaining the ideas behind the French and Dutch defences against e4 and d4 respectively. Now, what`s good about both those openings is that you can respond to both e4 and d4 with ...e6, so you won`t have to study other responses separately, you can just study ...e6 systems. 

I chose those two openings as my main openings as black just based on the fact that those videos are very entertaining and you get the feel that GM Simon Williams is very passionate about teaching them. As you said, memorizing lines is boring, learning openings is usually boring and theoretical.. but not with these videos!  

I am definitely no expert on openings, and I haven`t spent much time studying them myself, but as far as I understand the best approach is to understand the typical ideas and pawn structures in the opening of your choice. 

This is the series on the Dutch: https://www.chess.com/lessons/the-classical-dutch

and on the French: https://www.chess.com/lessons/why-simon-loves-the-french

I don't think you're making an assessment of the position. You don't have to do it with every move, but at some point, when you need a plan, when your pieces are developed, (1) train yourself to ask questions: what are his and mine weak squares? Any weak color complexes? Which piece should I (and the other) improve now? When you know these answers, you know what to figure out next.

(2) Did you learn standard plans? Such as weakening and attacking king side? Or using a minority attack? Or exploiting a queen-side pawn majority? A center break? What do you do when suspect they try to gather around your king? Do you know these things?

(3) It is typical for 1400/1500 and often also 1600 players to lock themselves up. This way you're not giving yourself chances. If slightly more complex tactical positions scare you, then work on your confidence by practicing tactics.