Calculation ability is 100% genetic

Kolty was a GM. It was an emeritus title, but he earned his IM title over the board.

Wow, thanks. I knew he was very good. Didn't want to exaggerate.

I think btickler said this very well and I want to reiterate his point. If you placed 32 pieces randomly on a chess board, there is no way even Magnus Carlsen could recall the exact location of every piece without at least two minutes to study the position. I am talking computer chosen pseudo-random generation with no relation to actual chess. The Key is to remember positions and relationships rather than square for square piece placement or visualize an actual board.

Here are some ways to practice blindfold, even if you are just getting started:

Mato Jelic is a youtube commentator that reviews master games. Not only are his videos very instructive, but he calls every move out loud almost without fail. One way to get started is to follow the master games to his voice calling moves. Sometimes he goes through it quite fast, especially the opening- but you might be surprised how well you can organize your thoughts if you pause the video and let yourself think about it for a second. Here is his channel:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMxK1FKAbmj2N-faTWLwNig

Unfortunately, in a few games he just says "check" and you may have to pause the video and open your eyes. But in the great majority of games he will give you enough information outloud for every move.

Here is a game to get started:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBMZuFpx8bU

Chesstempo offers a blindfold option for chess puzzles. The chess board will shows for a finite amount of time and then you must solve the puzzle blindfolded. This is very different from simply playing blindfold chess and is a useful training tool, since it will improve your ability to memorize positions quickly and visualize positions accurately without having to worry about positions changing. 

Right here in live chess chess.com offers a blindfold options where you can see the board but just not the pieces. From what I can tell, this helps very very much compared to absolutely no vision. You can see the 8 x 8 board in front of you and all you have to do is place pieces onto the board.

There are lots of ways to start learning blindfold chess even when you have zero visualization to begin with.

Blindfold chess being genetic or something destined for only masters is an excuse invented by lazy people because they never wanted to put in the effort. I would say that playing blindfold chess at my level is much, much easier than actually beating a master- and if you think you have the chess ability to beat a master or play at that level, then you definitely can play blindfold chess. It's just something you have to choose to pursue or take seriously.

http://www.chess.com/tournament/700-1200

It's definately bull. We are not talking about random positions. I don't see the board with initial position. I tried to exercise but as I said I can see only 3x3 board more or less clear. That's all. No matter how hard and long time I tried to play in my mind I didn't see any improvements. Believe me if you managed to learn blindfold it means you already had that ability somehow.

Are you seriously trying to tell me you cannot visualize a chess board with pieces in initial positions, or with say just a single move like e4 and e5 played, etc.?

I'm not buying.  If that were true, you would have to re-evaluate openings every time you played them.  You would not know when you had a back rank mating threat.  How do you avoid knight forks?  You visualize the forking knight and resulting position, etc.  How do you look more than one move ahead at all?

Burgerboy, how did you try to train for blindfold? I only ask because for the longest time, I had difficulty visualizing the board, too, but I still had hope because I could set up positions 10-15 moves deep into my favorite openings (Sicilian Dragon/Yugoslav Attack, Dutch Defense/Leningrad Variation, several Scotch Game lines) entirely from memory.

Then I found a tool that is helping me enormously: chess fonts that I could use in analysis that progressively require you to rely on memory and visualization. I'm still far from perfect at it, but I'm getting pretty good, and can usually beat my cousin (~1150 rated) blindfolded. (Not both of us; he looks at the board and moves the pieces.)

Level 1 turns all the pieces black, so you have to remember which pieces are which color. Level 2 turns all the pieces into white and black circles, so you must recall which piece each one represents. Level three makes all pieces on both sides black circles, so you must remember both. Finally, level 4 replaces all pieces with blank squares, so you've reached blindfold ability. Just Google "blindfold chess fonts" and you should be able to find them and install them with whatever chess viewer you use. (I use Arena, because it's free and I'm cheap.)

Like any skill acquired in adulthood, there's no way to shortcut the musician's maxim of "practice, practice, practice." I suspect that either your method or your level of dedication is to blame, not your genetics. Making blanket statements like "chess calculation is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT GENETICS" reflects a self-defeating attitude that definitely isn't helping you.

At first i had trouble to see in my head 2x2 no kidding. Let's say we put bishop on a1. I know i can move it to c3. But i could not visualized on my head the space between c3 and a1 and the squares near. And I did not know colors of the squares. I could not see/track the path/road to where that bishop from c3 can land.

i was hopeless. I think thata becouse i played only bullet and blitz in my short chess life. i can see like only 1-2 moves ahead blurry.

 i found videos here and some articles there and now i can almost see whole board, every color, every diagonal. this took some time and not pleasant practice, but now i can freely move a bishop or a knight. that improved my calculation. Next month i hope will be able to beat 800-1200 rated player in rapid or computer-1/2 blindfolded.

ALways great to see anecdotes with no evidence.  Oh and let's just throw in epigenetics because why not.  Smacks of "I'm lazy and want it to be easy"

I definitely agree that blindfold chess takes practice and requires concentration.

wilford-n, do you have a link for that tool? (I came up empty when I googled  "blindfold chess fonts.")

If you cant visualize the starting position how do you set up the pieces when you play on an actual board.

I can't visialize the whole initial board, only part of it. The whole is blury. I still miss back rank threats and forks from time to time. But i'm trying not to rush and observe the whole board by visualizing where pieces can go. Yes, i can do it for one and maybe couple pieces at the same time. But i need to do it for each piece separately.

Do you remember when you just started chess and just learned how the pieces moved? Maybe you started the game by playing 1: e3 and 2: Qf3?Perhaps a "puzzle" consisted of figuring out that there was a free queen on the board.

Did it ever occur to you that if you want to play blindfold you will have to start back from scratch relieve those days? If you wantt o play blindfold, you are not a 1500 player who has memorized openings and study master games. You're just some ameatur learning how the pieces move. And if you are willing to start from the beginning and not get frustrated at "easy" tactics (imagine if back when you started chess you gave up because you recognized that everything you missed was something obvious) then you might find that you will pass that beginner level quite quickly.

Blindfold chess is like running a race while wearing a potato sack around your legs.

It's not unlike the "3-legged races" undertaken at Cub Scout Jamborees.

Great entertainment, for some.  Not unlike a Circus performance.

Why not start a thread on "Blindfold Duplicate Bridge" ?  It's essentially the same idea.

I can't figure out when I learned to visualize. All I know is that it surprised me when I first read that visualization had to be learned. I calculate by grafting the images of chess pieces onto the real board. When I first started playing, this made me very good at tactics because I could see them with my eyes. The funny thing is I only really learned chess when I met my future coach at the age of 15(My dad taught me when I was 7 or 8, but I didn't have a coach then. Later, my coach turned out to be a teacher at my high school who was extremely strong.), so I don't know where I learned to visualize so effectively. I don't remember ever really miscalculating, but then, I never really calculated in the first place, I just saw everything. 

EDIT: I now remember. I learned visualizing the way I learned to read. By doing it without speaking. Visualization came as a way to keep myself interested in chess when I wasn't moving. Basically, instead of getting bored, I would just practice seeing a knight on a square where it wasn't. 

Xman720

There are lots of ways to start learning blindfold chess even when you have zero visualization to begin with.

Blindfold chess being genetic or something destined for only masters is an excuse invented by lazy people because they never wanted to put in the effort. I would say that playing blindfold chess at my level is much, much easier than actually beating a master- and if you think you have the chess ability to beat a master or play at that level, then you definitely can play blindfold chess. It's just something you have to choose to pursue or take seriously. 

Sir, I know this from experience players below experts can't play blindfold. There is a player who is rated 1500 uscf and goes to this coffee house where everyone is playing blitz at all levels, he like playing experts only blindfold and he is absolutely horrible at it, he has the advantage of a empty board in front of him and still can't play blindfold, he does it every Wednesday night, even experts can't play blindfold, they eventually don't get the right pieces on the rights square or forget to remove exchange pieces, I  am not referring to one expert only but almost all experts. This how they do it, I player is following all the move being call out on a board and pieces so to avoid any mistakes and the two players are have a blank board no pieces at all, so it is blindfold, so one is 1500 uscf and the player is expert, the player who is 1500 always makes the first mistake but is corrected by the player who has the  board and pieces, eventually both player have to give up beause they can't see the position correctly and they play a regular game with pieces and board. I played without a board and pieces against 1900 uscf player and was able to win against the 1900 player becsause he is horrible at blindfold. Some player have a gift without any training and others have to train it, but that is at higher level ( expert and higher; maybe a talented 1800- 1950); it is completely bull, I see it with my eyes player below experts can't blindfold, even experts have a hard time visualizing the board correctly and where are the pieces is place on a square and what pieces are left on the board. Those low rated players who claim they can play blindfold why are they still low rated, believe me if can see visualize a position without a board and pieces you are very strong player, you can analyze without sight of a board and pieces, that is already very strong expert and master strength. 

Calculating is hard skill to master, you have to assessing the position first ( making a plan), then selecting the appropriate amount of candidate moves and here comes the hard part, pure calculation like a machine and holding each position in your mind and assessing each position at the end there conclusion and to evaluate appropriate and best respond in a giving position, mastering this skill is very strong expert level and already player who possess this skill is master level. 

 First learn to analyze better, assessing, selecting candidate moves, calculating and then evaluating the end results in a position to its  conclusion; a player will do better mastery this skill first before trying to play blindfold.

I've been doing 2-4 hours a day for a year or two and I can't break 600 elo.   It's genetic.   It's literally impossible for me to see basic things or calculate in a rudimentary way during a game, after thousands of games.   Cannot "visualize" positions, cannot "remember" positions, and I struggle with things like "are these two piece on the same diagonal".    I have to consciously, intentionally check that, square by square, and call it wrong sometimes.   I'm an extreme case b/c I have a genetic vision problem that caused parts of my brain to not develop. But there are absolutely inborn limitations that everyone faces.   If you're lucky enough that these aren't too restrictive, than of course you've got to do lots and lots of work before you even discover them.   In my case, I'm there at my limits, already, from the get-go.

I was hoping practicing chess hard would help develop/compensate for this, but it's 100% useless (as I was told it would be) and my brain is just broken. YMMV, but at some point everyone hits their "wall".   Everyone.  Only you can tell if you're there (and you might be dead wrong in either direction).

(Weirdly, I can do tactics kind of passably, I'm 1900 puzzles.   But can't play a real game if my life depended on it.  That's really the only "interesting" part of my sob story, besides the main point...)

Um actually, this has probably been repeated thousands of times before, but there is a method called "EFFECTIVE PRACTICE".

 This is super-offensive, ableist nonsense.   You have no idea what you're talking about, or how hard people with different abilities work at trying to do what normal people take for granted.   You might as well say someone with ALS is too lazy for not doing more deadlifts and gaining muscle.   

Get lost with this attitude, it's terrible.