Getting to 2000...
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Take a break from blitz. Study and practice slow chess. Books like soviet middlegame technique or my system are fantastic. GM Ben finegold has some wonderful videos on YouTube. Improving at blitz might not improve your chess, but improving at chess is likely to improve your blitz as by improving at chess your intuition for chess can improve. As there isn't much time, chess players often rely on their intuition for blitz. Hope this helps!
It's a steep cliff. Not many climb it
.. Since you're obviously, of serious intent ; I'd, also make a point of reading up, on what 'food groups' are good for the 'brain'; And, taking up 'half marathons', {weightlifting?}, might also indirectly help, the 'blood flow', To your 'brain'!
.. Especially, if you're presently tending, to being, 'sedate' activity, oriented !? .. Oh yeah - I Don't practice, what I 'preach' here, in this case. ] ;
May 13, 2017
0
#6
Flank_Attacks wrote:
.. Since you're obviously, of serious intent ; I'd, also make a point of reading up, on what 'food groups' are good for the 'brain'; And, taking up 'half marathons', {weightlifting?}, might also indirectly help, the 'blood flow', To your 'brain'!
.. Especially, if you're presently tending, to being, 'sedate' activity, oriented !? .. Oh yeah - I Don't practice, what I 'preach' here, in this case. ] ;
Ive been going to the gym 5 times a week lately, although i didnt start going because i wanted to improve my chess game. I go because i wanna look good lol.
May 13, 2017
0
#7
logozar wrote:
Take a break from blitz. Study and practice slow chess. Books like soviet middlegame technique or my system are fantastic. GM Ben finegold has some wonderful videos on YouTube. Improving at blitz might not improve your chess, but improving at chess is likely to improve your blitz as by improving at chess your intuition for chess can improve. As there isn't much time, chess players often rely on their intuition for blitz. Hope this helps!
If youre talking about the videos from Chess Club of St Louis, i have been watching those videos every now and then lately. That youtube channel is amazing for improving your chess game. I probably should watch and study it more though.
13 years ago, not many players were good in online chess play, especially in the blitz and bullet disciplines. Very different today. I have played a lot 13 years ago, and sporadically through the years, and I know....There wasn't even a Naka or Carlsen back then (I mean, as top chess players).
If I compare myself today and back then, I was a patzer back then. My bullet could even cross 2000+, but the level of players were just not good. Roland Schmaltz was the blitz king and then some Singaporean IM too.
Just compare with today...........
Also, you will notice many old players here currently rated around 1500-1600 who were rated a lot higher 7 years ago. I sometimes see some rated 2000 over and today, they are hundreds of points below. What changed? The average competition level.
May 13, 2017
0
#9
I started playing online in 2001. I agree that there seem to be a lot more good players now than there was then. I was thinking maybe if it was because that was pre youtube. Way less ways to train online back then.
Slow_pawn wrote:
I started playing online in 2001. I agree that there seem to be a lot more good players now than there was then. I was thinking maybe if it was because that was pre youtube. Way less ways to train online back then.
- Chess engines (Nowadays even a handphone Stockfish can trash Chessmaster GM Edition all the time)
- Youtube lessons (like you say)
- Unlimited GM games going on 24/7 at most chess sites enabling wannabes to observe and emulate
- Lots of tactical chess apps/software to drill with
May 13, 2017
0
#11
Debistro wrote:
13 years ago, not many players were good in online chess play, especially in the blitz and bullet disciplines. Very different today. I have played a lot 13 years ago, and sporadically through the years, and I know....There wasn't even a Naka or Carlsen back then (I mean, as top chess players).
If I compare myself today and back then, I was a patzer back then. My bullet could even cross 2000+, but the level of players were just not good. Roland Schmaltz was the blitz king and then some Singaporean IM too.
Just compare with today...........
Also, you will notice many old players here currently rated around 1500-1600 who were rated a lot higher 7 years ago. I sometimes see some rated 2000 over and today, they are hundreds of points below. What changed? The average competition level.
As far as the GM level, its pretty obvious that youre right. As far as the average competition being weak back then, i dont think thats true. I mean im sure theres more competition these days since we live in the information age, but if it only took me a month of analyzing and practicing tactic drills to get me back to the mid 1800s, just imagine how good i was back then when i played like 150-200 games a week and studied the Chessmaster lessons daily. I also did read a couple books from Seirawan and Pandolfini.
So heres a little info on me before i get to my question (if you dont care then just skip to the end) : So i reached about 1950 as my peak rating back in the day playing blitz chess on yahoo. That was 13 years ago when i was 19 years old. Then came the clubbing and alcohol days of my early 20s and i never got to 1900 again. Heck i couldnt even reach 1800 again although i only played sparingly over the next 8 years. I recently started playing again after a 3 year hiatus to hit my bucket list goal of being a 2000 rated player. Im happy to say that after just 1 month i am once again a mid 1800s rated player on a couple different sites. What got me good in the first place was when i purchased chessmaster back in 2002 i think. Josh Waitzkin certainly made the game very fun to learn. He helped take my game from a 1400 rated player to 1800s over just a few months i think. Anyway, my endgame knowledge and openings vastly improved through the game. I figured my weakness though is the midgame, and so i started practicing chess tactics daily a few weeks ago. That easily shot my rank back in to the 1800s pretty quickly. I also think that im almost as good now as i was then since i play 5 min games now. The majority of my games now i win by resignation, while back in the day i only played 2 or 3 min games where i would win by time mostly.
So now that you got my back story down, my question is what is it gonna take for me to crack the 2000's rank? Do you think that if i just keep practicing chess tactics daily that it will be enough to take me above 2000? Ive recently been practicing against 1900-2050 rated players on other sites and although i put up a fight, i almost never pull out a win against them. I feel like their openings knowledge is very high, so i guess i need more work there too.