Check out de la Maza's book. You will find complete games with notes.
Or, you can wave your hands. I do hope others will bother to take a look at the links that you just waved off.
Can you really become a class A player by studying tactics?
Sort:
Jan 5, 2015
0
#163
To get to 2200+, there are basically 3 things you need to be able to do, not that it doesn't take hard work.
1. Calculation
If you can consistently calculate 2-3 moves without error and find combinations
2. Strategy/Positional ideas
Be able to find correct/good plans and use them effectively
3. Don't blunder
Basically 1, calculate and check your moves/see what your opponent can do
In addition, you have to try to find the best moves and fight to win positions otherwise you won't get better.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#164
In my experience, even 16xx players can usually calculate without errors for 2-3 moves deep. What trips them up is that they can usually calculate only a single variation, and have difficulty branching out to include other candidate moves deeper along the tree of variations. Just about everybody +2000 can visualize the board several moves deep.
In terms of strategy and positional ideas, I once got a really interesting piece of advice: create your own theory. It doesn't matter whether it's "correct" or not, but become familiar with a few certain types of positions, especially ones that are considered equal. Learn them, learn to win with them. That will set you apart from others.
Blunders happen to everyone, but you're right, the stronger you get the less you blunder. That advice is good for getting to ~1800. But to get to 2000, you have to learn how to encourage your opponent to make mistakes. That's a skill that is very rare below 2000 and quite common above 2000.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#165
I totally agree, calculate 2-3 moves means to be able to calculate and assess each possible candidate move.
Creating theory is an interesting idea, but it requires having positional reasoning behind the moves obviously. Personally, I am fine with playing grandmaster moves :)
Somewhat related, somewhere I vaguely remember some strong titled player said something like "I want to play the 2200, not Karpov", which is why some simply get out of theory and play offbeat lines against lower rated players who may know some lines of theory or an opening very well. For example, Carlsen doesn't play heavily theoretical lines, and usually just outplays his opponents positionally.
Some theory is important to know but you shouldn't try to memorize all the lines in an opening book, you should know the ideas. Of course this has been said many times before.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#166
ipcress12 wrote:
Well I mean I reached 1800 studying that way, or rather when I began studying that way. Jumped from 1300 to 1800 and on to now ~2205.
Rogue_King: Did you really not study openings or did you study them then make up for your deficits in tactics and postional play? Then resume opening study at 1800?
I can believe it's possible to make it on tactics and positional play. As I say, there are players so talented they can go a long ways by just playing and paying attention.
But I don't believe we understand chess development nearly so well as all the confident general claims about how newer players should learn.
The guys I came up with didn't go by the various party lines and they turned out well above average. Maybe they were among the too-talented-to-fail. Or maybe those party lines are bull.
Most advice about how to learn chess strikes me as having the intellectual heft of the latest dietary recommendations.
I will show you my rating graph so you can clearly see exactly what I studied and what stuff got me to what level.
Inbetween the red lines was the period of time I just studied openings and played a lot of blitz and long time control games (about 3 years with almost no rating change).
Green marks when I began to study positional chess from the book Amateurs Mind. I played 6 tournaments over this period of time and rose about 270 points, in slightly over a year.
I then took a 3 year break from chess. When I returned to my local chess club I discovered a talented person my age who could handle my positional play but whooped me with tactics. I began to study tactics heavily in the area marked with blue, although I did also read silman's endgame manual. I rose about 230 points in exactly 2 years, playing in only 4 tournaments over that time.
At this point I was over 1800 in the area marked by orange and the competition was much more punishing of dubious moves. At this point I watched all of Danny Rensch's books on pawn structures and read Pawn Structure Chess by Andy Soltis so that I could understand the ideas behind openings and learn to play the middlegames positionally better. I then began studying the best books I could find on my chosen openings (there were about 3 high level opening books I read cover to cover), as well as reading some of Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual, read My System, read 3/5ths of Winning Pawn Structures by Baburin, did thousands of tactical puzzles on tactics trainer+chesstempo and read a few tactical puzzle books, and watched all of Melikset Khachiyans and Alex Lendermans videos as well as some by Shankland, Bojkov and others that reviewed master/GM games. Over a period of 2 years doing this I gained 215 points and became a 2000+ player, I played in 5 tournaments.
I then took a year long break for school and decided at the start of 2014 (area to the right of the black mark) I wanted to go after master and get it before the end of the year. The first half of the year I studied 20-30 tactics every single day for about 5-6 months, as well as memorizing 15-16 GM games a month, and going over a chapter a day in Winning Chess Middlegames by Ivan Sokolov. I was playing a blitz game on icc everyday along with that. Midway through the year I also began doing 10 rook endgame problems from Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual each weekend with a friend and I kept that up for about 3 months. I took a break for a month in june then began studying tactics again everyday as well as games from 2700chess.com and ongoing tournaments. Near the end of the summer I joined an endgame group that lasted about 2 months and went over 2 books on endgame Mikhail Shereshevsky's Endgame Strategy and Winning Chess Endgames: Just the Facts by Lev Alburt. We would play 10 round blitz tournaments in the endgame positions from the book, 2 tournaments each week. I also went through about 1/4th of two of the high level opening books I mentioned before, in specific variations I was having trouble in or trouble remembering. I continued to do tactics and master studies this whole time. I went really hardcore with studying in september, averaging about 4 hours a day split between playing long games, studying openings, doing endgames in Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual, doing tactics, and reviewing multiple master games each day. Then from October onwards I toned it down and just did 10 tactics everyday, reviewed atleast 1 master game a day, and was playing one 45/45 game each week. I maybe read 2 chapter in an opening book over these 3 months. Over this year I gained 175 points and achieved master, I played in 5 tournaments.
As you can see getting super indepth on the openings was not what got me to where I am, but rather study of middlegame, tactics, and eventually endgames and many many master games both with commentary and without. The benefit of the openings was mainly that I could play my games faster, was fresher in the middlegames, and didn't get so tired out in the later rounds of tournaments.
And that's the full nitty gritty details of how to improve.
It is clear to me that the importance of openings is directly proportional to playing strength.At the very highest level I would risk saying it is mostly about the opening.And yes, i agree, a 1500 player need not lose sleep over his relatively superficial knowledge of openings.Study midgame material,do tactics training,and systematically study the endgame.Nothing will boost your chess confidence faster and better than getting stonger in the endgame phase.Just my opinion.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#168
This is because a players ability to understand the opening dramatically increases as they gain strength in the middlegame and even the endgame.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#169
Here is some testimonial from a player who finally did listen to what higher rated players told him and buckled down on tactics problems. I also really like the conditions he placed on his training, I use many of them myself. http://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/2ras6a/study_tactics_a_long_but_hopefully_uplifting/
Rogue_King wrote:
ipcress12 wrote:
Well I mean I reached 1800 studying that way, or rather when I began studying that way. Jumped from 1300 to 1800 and on to now ~2205.
Rogue_King: Did you really not study openings or did you study them then make up for your deficits in tactics and postional play? Then resume opening study at 1800?
I can believe it's possible to make it on tactics and positional play. As I say, there are players so talented they can go a long ways by just playing and paying attention.
But I don't believe we understand chess development nearly so well as all the confident general claims about how newer players should learn.
The guys I came up with didn't go by the various party lines and they turned out well above average. Maybe they were among the too-talented-to-fail. Or maybe those party lines are bull.
Most advice about how to learn chess strikes me as having the intellectual heft of the latest dietary recommendations.
I will show you my rating graph so you can clearly see exactly what I studied and what stuff got me to what level.
Inbetween the red lines was the period of time I just studied openings and played a lot of blitz and long time control games (about 3 years with almost no rating change).
Green marks when I began to study positional chess from the book Amateurs Mind. I played 6 tournaments over this period of time and rose about 270 points, in slightly over a year.
I then took a 3 year break from chess. When I returned to my local chess club I discovered a talented person my age who could handle my positional play but whooped me with tactics. I began to study tactics heavily in the area marked with blue, although I did also read silman's endgame manual. I rose about 230 points in exactly 2 years, playing in only 4 tournaments over that time.
At this point I was over 1800 in the area marked by orange and the competition was much more punishing of dubious moves. At this point I watched all of Danny Rensch's books on pawn structures and read Pawn Structure Chess by Andy Soltis so that I could understand the ideas behind openings and learn to play the middlegames positionally better. I then began studying the best books I could find on my chosen openings (there were about 3 high level opening books I read cover to cover), as well as reading some of Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual, read My System, read 3/5ths of Winning Pawn Structures by Baburin, did thousands of tactical puzzles on tactics trainer+chesstempo and read a few tactical puzzle books, and watched all of Melikset Khachiyans and Alex Lendermans videos as well as some by Shankland, Bojkov and others that reviewed master/GM games. Over a period of 2 years doing this I gained 215 points and became a 2000+ player, I played in 5 tournaments.
I then took a year long break for school and decided at the start of 2014 (area to the right of the black mark) I wanted to go after master and get it before the end of the year. The first half of the year I studied 20-30 tactics every single day for about 5-6 months, as well as memorizing 15-16 GM games a month, and going over a chapter a day in Winning Chess Middlegames by Ivan Sokolov. I was playing a blitz game on icc everyday along with that. Midway through the year I also began doing 10 rook endgame problems from Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual each weekend with a friend and I kept that up for about 3 months. I took a break for a month in june then began studying tactics again everyday as well as games from 2700chess.com and ongoing tournaments. Near the end of the summer I joined an endgame group that lasted about 2 months and went over 2 books on endgame Mikhail Shereshevsky's Endgame Strategy and Winning Chess Endgames: Just the Facts by Lev Alburt. We would play 10 round blitz tournaments in the endgame positions from the book, 2 tournaments each week. I also went through about 1/4th of two of the high level opening books I mentioned before, in specific variations I was having trouble in or trouble remembering. I continued to do tactics and master studies this whole time. I went really hardcore with studying in september, averaging about 4 hours a day split between playing long games, studying openings, doing endgames in Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual, doing tactics, and reviewing multiple master games each day. Then from October onwards I toned it down and just did 10 tactics everyday, reviewed atleast 1 master game a day, and was playing one 45/45 game each week. I maybe read 2 chapter in an opening book over these 3 months. Over this year I gained 175 points and achieved master, I played in 5 tournaments.
As you can see getting super indepth on the openings was not what got me to where I am, but rather study of middlegame, tactics, and eventually endgames and many many master games both with commentary and without. The benefit of the openings was mainly that I could play my games faster, was fresher in the middlegames, and didn't get so tired out in the later rounds of tournaments.
And that's the full nitty gritty details of how to improve.
Excellent. Thanks for the details.
By the way, any special criteria when you chose games to memorize?
If they were very long into the endgame did you memorize the whole endgame?
SmyslovFan wrote:
"Seek and ye shall find." (No citation)
Wasn't it Jesus that said seek and thou shall find? I believe he was talking about God though.
You can just go to their website. I could cite numerous sources. But I think you're capable of looking it up yourself.
Yes, De Groot is an excellent place to start. It's not the only place.
Go to USCF and take a look at their scholastic section.
"Seek and ye shall find." (No citation)
Jan 5, 2015
0
#173
RK, your detailed record of your progress is an excellent testament demonstrating that it takes hard work and honest self-analysis to break 2200!
It also mirrors what the Botvinnik School, especially Kasparov, has to say: find the area that you are weakest in and improve that. Constantly evaluate your strengths and weaknesses, and focus on fixing the weakness.
Congratulations on breaking 2200 USCF!
You can google it right?
But I think it's in Matthew?
Jan 5, 2015
0
#176
SmyslovFan wrote:
There's circumstantial evidence about his possible cheating, but the real proof would be in the games he played. The people on that site seem to think it would be an inordinate burden to bother to check his games, many of which are published in his book, but don't find any problem accusing him. It would take a dedicated person an afternoon to find out whether his games had a high match-up rate. If they have the book, they will see that de la Maza performed post-game engine analysis on many of his games and published the results in the book. It doesn't look like he cheated, but I haven't gone through and checked his findings.
The book's main problems are:
a) he oversells the benefits of a specific type of tactics training
b) he continues to oversell his concept throughout the book (it's only 126 pages long, and much of the text is extolling the virtues of his snake oil)
c) he himself didn't follow his own advice! He states in several places names of openings, tactics, and analysis that could only have been known if he had not followed his own advice. He clearly studied Kotov in depth.
So in terms of whether his program works, it doesn't matter one iota whether he cheated. His program doesn't work, and that's the main problem.
d) A look at his quick rating suggest that he overstates the extent of his gain. Maybe he started with a little sandbagging because he already has a book idea outlines.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#177
ipcress12 wrote:
Studying tactics out of context helps too, but I highly doubt it is necessary or the only way to become a stronger player.
DrCheck: The previous generation of Americans became 1800+ players without tactical trainers or a rich tactics literature. So, sure, it's not the only way to become a stronger player.
But given the way the brain develops pattern recognition, tactics drills are a fast, reliable way to go. I think American chess is better for its new emphasis on tactics training. I wish that had been recognized when I was a young player.
The Soviets certainly used such drills in their chess training.
Everyone my age relied on Reinfeld's series of 1001:
http://www.amazon.com/1001-Winning-Chess-Sacrifices-Combinations/dp/0879801115
http://www.amazon.com/Brilliant-Checkmate-Chess-lovers-library/dp/0879801107
Not much of the new stuff is better.
Jan 5, 2015
0
#178
Actually, the quote is part of all of the synoptic Gospels. You can find the exact quote in both Matthew and Luke. Mark's older version is "Therefore I say unto you, whatever things you desire, when you pray, believe that you will receive them and you shall have them".
But, look it up and you will find it! 
Jan 5, 2015
0
#179
leiph18 wrote:
By the way, any special criteria when you chose games to memorize?
If they were very long into the endgame did you memorize the whole endgame?
Ah I forgot to note I only memorized games the first 2 months of last year not the full 6 months I seemed to imply. Because I was taking the time to memorize the entire games they were in the openings I played, although when I normally review a master/gm game I study it regardless of which opening it occurred in. Not only that but they were games I thought were well played and had maneuvers I wanted to commit to memory. I tried to learn sideline possibilities mentioned as well and I did learn the game to it's conclusion. Most of the 30 or so games I memorized were in the Kings Indian Defense, and ranged from the exchange variation, to the classical variation, to the petrosian and more, a few were in other openings too.
I'd heard some random advice to memorize 20 master/grandmaster games if you wanted to get to master, so I thought I'd give it a try. I think it helped some but it was pretty intensive so I didn't continue it for too long. It reminded me a bit of memorizing songs back when I played guitar.
Also I'm glad you and Symslov appreciated it. I wanted to give a specific example of what it takes to improve and to get to master.
Reb wrote:
Milliern wrote:
I can tell you from experience, it's an absolute fact that all you need to study is tactics. I went from a little over 1000 USCF to 1600 on tactics alone, and I will break into the A-class (or near it) in my next tournament. You might FEEL as though studying those positions help you, and maybe they do to some inefficaciously minimal extent, but they don't move you toward A-class as tactics do.
It's like Michael De La Maza said, class play is almost always decided by tactics. I'll take it further: all class play is decided by basic tactics, whether executed or missed. I love only having played the game for a few years and smashing thes players who have spent thousands of ours on positions, master gams, and openings. If you can't gain 200+ points in a year while being a class player, you haven't caught on. TACTICS.
Your records on uschess.org shows you have less than 20% against B class players and less than 15% against A class players so apparently you havent caught on too well either ..... You cant become an A class player like that and certainly have no chance if you don't play otb tournies which you havent done for some years now ....
Rex, I think the thing you are missing is that you are looking at my total stats from a two-year period. Of course my stats from earlier in that two year stretch drag down the totals. What you need to do is look at my stats from my more recent performances. My success against 2000-2099 level players was 21.4%, and that's throwing in a loss or two from earlier that year. That was from when I was studying NOTHING but tactics. If I can score 1.5/5 against USCF 2000-2099, I think that proves my point. Thanks for the somewhat clumsy observation... Confirmation bias will do that to you.
Heres a novel idea...Study the whole game!
A good idea, but hardly novel.
Sure, study the whole game, except what does that mean and how?
It seems to me that chess is where body building was in the 1950s. People knew you had to go to the gym and lift weights and eat differently, but beyond that, most of what people did was based on gym folklore and a fair amount of that was wrong.
So there are some anabolic neuropeptides just around the corner???? They'll have the side effect of schizophrenia or OCD