no it is possible a lot of grandmasters play blindfold chess
He says he "calculates it better without looking at the board"
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Its defintely possible...read up on players like Alekhine, and Koltanowski and how many blind fold games they played at once. I for one can play up to and only 1 game at a time blind fold.
Oct 9, 2009
0
#4
noodlex wrote:
I have this one friend at a local chess club who's rating is about 2100. He has a tendency to brag a lot and act all superior sometimes, but he does have talent in chess. Anyways, he told me that the reason he's so good is because he can calculate moves in his head. I've seen him play and sometimes he doesn't look at the board. He stares at something else and then makes a move. He says that he sees it better without looking at the board.
I don't know if I'm just being gullible, but IS it true that he sees it better in his head? Is that even possible? He also told me that some world champions see it better in their heads than on the actual board. Is that true too? Does that mean they have a genetic advantage? Or is that impossible and my friend is just bragging? Thanks.
Interesting post. That's unfortunate about your friend (the ego part)-- but, it is kind of common among chess players, I've found.
You can be certain that your friend feels really Hot when he's telling you about being able to see it better in his head, but you shouldn't think too much of it. After all, what is anyone doing when they stare at the board? They're visualizing future positions in their head. If you can pick a move while looking away for a moment, that's just a much less impressive version of playing blindfold chess, which is something any fairly experienced chess player can do.
It's possible that certain people have brains that are genetically adapted to visualizing patterns and future positions on a chess board. I forgot the specific term for it. Anyway - certain studies already show that most men are better at this than most women. I'm sure that some men will be better, or have more potential, for this, than other men.
Hope this helped.
i dont look at the computer screen. i play with stunner shades on to increase the mood of my not watching the screen
When I played the current U.S. Champion Hikaru Nakamura at a simul in Indianapolis, he didn't look at the board too often. When it got to a complicated position in anyone of his games (he had twenty-three opponents), he simply gazed at the board a few seconds and looked away, twiddling a chess piece in his hand or something, then he moved.
At the tippity-top of the chess pyramid some players prefer to play without looking at the board.
Ivanchuk is famous for staring at the ceiling during his games and Svidler has been quoted as saying this is the kind of thing any strong GM can do, meaning play as well this way as looking at the board.
You'd think Ivanchuk would dominate the blindfold section of the Amber tournament but he has not. I think this partly verifies Svidler's contention.
Famously, when Fischer and Petrosian were playing their match in Buenos Aires the power was cut in the hall and they were in total darkness. The clocks were stopped. After awhile Petrosian complained to the arbiter that Fischer was analyzing the position in his head. Fischer agreed and the clocks were restarted.
Edit: As informed by my own experience, I don't think the GMs play as well blindfold as they do looking at the board, but they occasionally recharge their view of the board while otb and this allows them to play better otb-blind than pure-blindfold.
goldendog wrote:
Famously, when Fischer and Petrosian were playing their match in Buenos Aires the power was cut in the hall and they were in total darkness. The clocks were stopped. After awhile Petrosian complained to the arbiter that Fischer was analyzing the position in his head. Fischer agreed and the
I have my own take on this 'famous' incedent. It was a master move by Petrosian, deserving !!. What was somebody with Fischer's ego supposed to do? Deny? Not on your life....
rooperi wrote:
goldendog wrote:
Famously, when Fischer and Petrosian were playing their match in Buenos Aires the power was cut in the hall and they were in total darkness. The clocks were stopped. After awhile Petrosian complained to the arbiter that Fischer was analyzing the position in his head. Fischer agreed and the
I have my own take on this 'famous' incedent. It was a master move by Petrosian, deserving !!. What was somebody with Fischer's ego supposed to do? Deny? Not on your life....
That was how I took the incident at the time!
Fischer could have refused but for pride's sake he acceded. In the meantime he able to make hay by analyzing in his head for a few minutes.
I don't know of anytime Fischer played more than one game blindfold at once but he was a formidable exponent anyway. Evans recounts when he was driving a young Fischer around and the boy was always pestering him with complex variations while Evans was at the wheel. Another time Fischer glanced at the scoresheet of a game a weaker player had finished (expert level as I recall) and Fischer immediately started telling him where he went wrong.
The most impressive story I have heard about Fischer playing blindfold is this one:
Frank Brady, in Profile of a Prodigy (1973, p. 76), narrates the story of Bobby’s participation in a New Year’s Eve party at Jack Collins’s home on December 31, 1963, when Bobby had one game to go, (on January 2, with Anthony Saidy) to finish the regular U.S. Championship with an 11-0 score — perfection that had never before been achieved in our national championship. Most chess fans know that he won that hard-fought game.
Right after ringing in the new year, Bobby played a good number of blindfold games at the party with the strong master Billy Addison (also a player in the ongoing U. S. Championship) under conditions where Addison had sight of a chess board and pieces. Bobby allowed Addison to play White in every game and, in addition, Bobby took off his king’s bishop’s pawn at the start of each game as an extra handicap. Each player had only five minutes per game. Brady reports that Addison “barely managed to break even” in their series. Brady remarks that “it was a memorable chess experience for all of us to witness.”
http://www.blindfoldchess.net/blog/2009/02/bobby_fischer_and_blindfold_chess/
Oct 9, 2009
0
#10
saidh wrote:
Not to be typical saidh but I do the same thing. I find if I'm staring at the board trying to visualize what's going to happen sometimes I can completely miss something. I seem to more easily remember the combinations that have developed and how the pieces are "interlocked" if you will rather than staring at "knight moves here, pawn goes here..etc" like a dummy. Meaning, a knight move might free up some square due to a combiantion of pieces being clustered in that area. It's easier to remember the connections between the pieces as the game has progressed than to try to calculate manually all the time.
great, a perfectly good thread is ruined. thanks a lot.
tool
i was going to mention ivanchuck but G-dog to to him first. Micky Adams is also reputed to stare at the ceiling "as if he is asking God for help" when calculating. it seems to me that if one is looking at the board the visual input might interfere with the computational processes that are trying to use the same visual cortex that getting sensory information from the eye, so by looking at something thats not a chess board the mind could focus the visual cortex on fantasy variations instead of getting jumbled up by the position that in front of the eye... but then again im 7 years removed from my studies in neuro-psychology and a bad chess player to boot so you might want to research that theory on your own...
It sort of makes sense too. When you're looking at the board while calculating a few moves ahead, it's easy to confuse the two positons. Who hasn't calculated a line that ended with your bishop taking his queen -- the same bishop that was traded off in the first move of the line?
Blindfold ratings, derived from Ambers:
1. Morozevich 2811
2. Kramnik 2809
3. Anand 2761
4-5. Aronian 2744
4-5. Svidler 2744
6-7. Leko 2735
6-7. Topalov 2735
8. Shirov 2734
9. Ivanchuk 2707
10. Kamsky 2705
11. Gelfand 2686
12. Karpov 2681
13. Bareev 2667
14. Lautier 2662
15. Almasi 2656
16. Vallejo 2653
17. van Wely 2631
18. Nikolic 2630
19. Piket 2629
20. Polgar, J. 2612
21. Ljubojevic 2579
http://www.blindfoldchess.net/blog/2009/05/grandmaster_blindfold_ratings_2008/
I doubt it, but if anyone has a reference...for GM or IM or even 2200 level.
There may be a 2200 who says he can't but I suspect that may be a case of not caring to try something he perceives as unpleasant.
noodlex wrote:
I have this one friend at a local chess club who's rating is about 2100. He has a tendency to brag a lot and act all superior sometimes, but he does have talent in chess. Anyways, he told me that the reason he's so good is because he can calculate moves in his head. I've seen him play and sometimes he doesn't look at the board. He stares at something else and then makes a move. He says that he sees it better without looking at the board.
I don't know if I'm just being gullible, but IS it true that he sees it better in his head? Is that even possible? He also told me that some world champions see it better in their heads than on the actual board. Is that true too? Does that mean they have a genetic advantage? Or is that impossible and my friend is just bragging? Thanks.
Of course it's possible, and his advantage may not be entirely genetic. Environmental conditioning has a lot to do with intelligence and "computing" ability. In other words, how he spends his free time, his nutrition, sleep schedule, and upbringing all have to do with it, not strictly genes alone.
It's a bit different, but in High school and college, I would endlessly frustrate my math teachers by doing all my assignments and tests in my head. They would demand I "show my work", but whenever I tried, I just got mixed up. It was much easier for me to visualize all the problems and keep track of them in my head, even on complex equations that took me 15 minutes to solve.
More specifically, my high school teacher once told me, "You can't be doing that in your head because I can't even do that." Fortunately for me, his inability did not prove my inability. I'm not even particularly good at math! It was just much easier for me without staring at all the different parts on the paper.
Perhaps it has something to do with not wasting "resources" on the occipital (visual) lobe of the brain?
You should remember that Big Chucky is a strange man. Aynway I think I will try calculating without looking at the board. I've always thought it might be easier to calculate without seeing the board but I didnt want to try it because I wasnt sure if it would work. Now I know that really really strong players do it I will start trying it. I wonder if anyone knows whether morozevich does it because hes really good at blindfold.
Well for me, sometimes I think about correspondence games I'm playing and I know many of the positions. In fact, a few times I would think about a game and then actually catch a blunder of me or my opponent (like for example I might find a way to win material in the current position without looking at it). Also, many different openings I can now visualize in my head. The more experienced you get with chess positions just seem to stick in your head! It's pretty amazing, and I could only imagine what Alekhine could come up with in his head, maybe a novelty! lol
Obviously though thinking in my head is significantly worse than looking at the board and thinking, but it's amazing how many opening main lines I can visualize in my head.
I've found that happening to me recently as well. Sometimes I don't remember perfectly and forget about a piece or someting...
As I grow stronger (in chess) and more mature (in years), I find this happens to me a bit too in OTB. Of course, in an OTB game I know the position very well, so it sticks in my head. Sometimes I find myself lost in lines and I kind of space out (those times when you don't want to move your eyes for some reason) and discover some critical idea. Still, I'm better when I look at the board, but it can help to look away for a bit.
I think many players can play blindfold games if they have a try. I would guess, for example, that most players rated about 1900 OTB should be able to do so if they want to.
I myself have tried to play up to two blindfold games simultaneously (also quite a bit before reaching CM level), and it worked. Of course, one spends some of the thinking time trying to remember where the pieces are, for example by recalling what the last moves were and what sense they made. (Moves that do not make any sense are hardest to remember ;-) )
I would not say that generally, it is easier for top players to calculate a position by not looking at the board. Often, when they look up from the board, they may be trying to remember the opening theory or the opening analysis they have prepared. Or they may be trying to look up in order to mentally take a step back from the position and get a fresh look at it, making it easier for new ideas to emerge.
But it is true that GMs have very few problems picturing positions and variations in their heads, and for example standing on the corridor and discussing the lines they calculated in a game they have just finished.
Having such extraordinanary blindfold skills as, for example, Kramnik, can even have its drawbacks: He calculates without seeing the board with such ease that he can easily continue to analyze while for example, giving interviews. Which can make it quite a bit harder to get the necessary relaxation periods away from chess that one also needs, of course.
I have this one friend at a local chess club who's rating is about 2100. He has a tendency to brag a lot and act all superior sometimes, but he does have talent in chess. Anyways, he told me that the reason he's so good is because he can calculate moves in his head. I've seen him play and sometimes he doesn't look at the board. He stares at something else and then makes a move. He says that he sees it better without looking at the board.
I don't know if I'm just being gullible, but IS it true that he sees it better in his head? Is that even possible? He also told me that some world champions see it better in their heads than on the actual board. Is that true too? Does that mean they have a genetic advantage? Or is that impossible and my friend is just bragging? Thanks.