[All Advice Needed] My Chess Story, What next?

To: The Chess Community

Hello, My name is Ethan this is my chess story…

I started playing chess at age 4, when my first first taught me the basics of the game. I don't remember much, but I do remember going to recreational chess programs that my mom sent me to, and continuing to practice throughout the following years.

By age 6 I remember defeating my father for the first time in what seemed to be forever. As I continued playing periodically throughout the next couple of years.  and my mom decided to send me to a local comunity center to play chess, and be actually rated!  The program was called “Chess Acedemy of Canada” ran by FM Roman Pelts. There, at age 8 I remember my standard rating, of 1026.

Throughout my middle school years I played chess regularly on teams, participating as first chair in my local school. Unfortunatly it was grade 7 when I stopped playing…

I am now a 15 year old in Grade 10, in the last 3 months I managed to start playing chess again along with reading chess books, my first being The Complete Book of Chess Strategy  by Jeremy Silman. I also anylize Grandmaster games in an attempt to improve.

After spending months on this site I believe I reached my true rating of 1400 in blitz, which is not particularly strong compared to the other members of this site.

My standard still remains untouched and I definitly know that it is much higher then my blitz rating. I also don’t favour bullet chess due to the extreme speed. My correspondance however is 1494 after playing 8 games, and I seem to be winning my current 5 games. I estamate it to be around 1700.

Chess was with me throughout my life, and I know that I would have benefitted greatly if I played continuously throughout that 3 year gap. It is sort of deflating to find out my true rating, knowing it could have been so much better. But what is done is done and I have to make do with what I have.

There are tons of questions that I want to ask to the chess community, and don’t feel obligated to answer all of them. Another point I would like to add is that I would love to hear all players regardless of their rating, contribute to this post and feel free to share your own story (with me or with everyone) and how you got to where you are now. Anything would be a huge contribution.

Questions

1. How could I improve my rating in chess in general?

2. Does playng blitz not really help your rating? and should I play standard to improve?

3. Are there any good chess books or websites you could reccomend me that covers vital material (example: endgame tactics)

4. At what age will I reach my full potential, and will I improve from then on?

5. If I study chess a lot, will I ever make those 3 years that I didn’t play, back?

6. Can everyone regardless of age become a titled player, and do I have a chance?

Sorry for such a long post, I hope you can help me on my way to success.

From, Ethan

1. Practice is the key to success. If you want to become a professional, you have to practice every aspect of the game, especially the endgame, where only one move wins. Solve tactics, and practice the middlegame and openings. If you put in a lot of effort, you'll become a much better player.

2. Actually, it does, because it forces you to think quicker, and that helps you calculate variations quicker. If you're talking about bullet/lightning, then you're right, because you barely have any time to think at all.

3. I have Build Up Your Chess by Artur Yusupov. Although I haen't read it yet, I'm sure it's a good book. As for websites, I believe www.chesstempo.com would be the website you'd like.

4. It depends on how much you try and practice. If you put in enough effort and enjoy the game, then you can.

5. It depends on whether you like to study it or not. If you do, then yes. If not, then you're "forcing" yourself to put in effort and that usually doesn't help.

6.

a) I don't think age plays a factor in becoming a titled chess player.

b) If you put in the effort and enjoy this fun actiity, why not? How do you think chess grandmasters managed to become grandmasters? They didn't undergo a miracle. They simply worked hard and their effort paid off.

I hope this helps!

Thanks so much for your advice

In my opinion, blitz does not help your rating, in fact it hurts your rating.

You need to learn from your mistakes.  You need to be able to identify your mistakes. [which you are unable to do now] and then try not to make the same mistakes.

It would help if you could find someone at least 400 points higher than you to look at a few of your games and show you how to improve and what mistakes you are making.

Thank you all for replying advice from all has been greatly appreciated and taken into accoujt

Update my Blitz is now 1466 Thx to all who contributed

Brief thought from someone who has been working hard on chess improvement.

chess improvement is not a constant upwards climb.   but measured game by game you'll have times of steep improvement and long plateaus.   This is normal; espacially if you are playing serious games with longer time controls.

its my belief, that better skills take time and effort to integrate into your game.  You have to repeat new patterns; so that knew abilities are done with ease and don't distract you from others parts of your game. (like keeping all you peices safe and watching out for threats to your king).  

but when a new skill becomes easy and you gain the extra insight you have been lacking.  suddenly people that you consider good are much easier.  your elo rises, and confidence builds.  until you meet the next group of stronger players.

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I'm a big believer that nearly every chess player who isn't a master can do a lot better at knowing his tactics.  to that end;  Everyone should either use a online (or PC) tactic trainer or have a good puzzle book or two.

Good luck in your studies, ethanmoon.  I certainly wouldn't worry about not playing chess for those three years.  You're still young and have plenty of time to take advantage of the learning potential that your still developing brain gives you.  Now, I'm no scientist, but it is my layperson's understanding that a person's brain is still developing and modifying itself until the age of about 25.  That's not to say that you ever lose your capacity to learn, but the next ten years or so should give you the most bang for your buck.  You will have much more important things than chess to attend to during that time, but hobbies are certainly beneficial, so work in what you can, especially if you care about it as much as you seem to.

I wish I had started this game sooner.   I just started seriously studying it nine months ago when I was 31.  I'm fairly pleased with my progression, but a title is probably not in the cards for me, and not just because I don't play otb tournaments.

I'm not qualified to make this prediction, but I would bet with enough consistent practice you could earn yourself a title.

Again, good luck.

joliepa and chester, Thank you so much for your advice, it has been noted and I will comply as soon as possible