How to improve BLITZ and OVERALL game?!

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@thegreatpazer Hahaha I do go to BYU! I'm pretty busy so im trying to set goals Thats hopefully I'll be able to accomplish as most of the time im studying! Chemical engineering is tough! Thanks for your reply and advice :) you guys motivate me! I'll be joining the BYU chess club as well!

thegreat_patzer wrote:

first GG, a big hello from a guy that loved Utah.  spent 2 years on SLC- loved it!

you location makes me wonder if you goto BYU- but this off topic...

about breaking into higher rating you CAN do it!  but.. clearly you need to free yourself from bad habits.  I made a big push to get my Blitz rating to 1200 and I DID it!

time management, a consistant reportoire, a being as tactically aware was the key to getting to 1200.  Now I am working on my long game- and I recommend you do that.

I see you do bullet game, and I think this is a bad idea-- you do not have the skills to make important decisions in split seconds.  Instead you should get an attitude that your going to carefully fight to the very end-- in just the last game I played- I messed up the opening- and was strongly losing- but the opponent didn't look at my threats and I managed to swindle the game (win) and bring my standard game back over 1500.

Get a consistant routine together based upon tactics, openings, and looking over your game;

my strong recommendation is to get into G30 games (I think you 1200ish in that TC) and bring it up. 

balance your G30 with quicker G10 blitz games and leave those quicker time controls for stronger players....

@nekhemivich thank you so much bro! I'll keep doing that and I'll be playing 15 minute games more! Thanks for your advice. :) hopefully someday I can be at your level :)

Everybody I really appreciate the you guys taking the time to help a newbie out. I absolutely love chess and always have, but never played because I didn't have anymore to play until I discovered this site. Thanks everyone for your advice, I'll check out that book, I'll keep up my tactics training, and I'll transition into longer game! Hopefully in a few years I can be at the 1500 level. You guys are awesome, thanks again!

Oh and happy new year! May lots of chess be played :)

@0101010101 (however many zeros and ones) @hhnng @Kikhorian12 thanks guys! Ill really look at that, and try to really focus on the pieces and what im doing. :) my guess is that if I master the basic concepts at a slower rate, with practice I'll be able to do them much faster?

Yes, exactly.

Many skills and patterns work like this in chess. At first they take a lot of conscious effort. Like checking if your intended move is safe from capture. Well, checking once isn't a lot of effort. But checking for every move of the game can be difficult. Especially if the opponent's move made us worried about some other threat and we're, in a sense, distracted by it.

But eventually it becomes largely unconscious. So yes, then it's much easier to do in speed games and so you're much better in speed games.

Of course... if you don't play any blitz or bullet for a few months, then your first few days getting back into it may be rocky. But once you're back up to speed so to speak, then you'll be much better than you were.

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By the way a good goal (which should take some time) is to be aware of all the forcing moves... typically cited is "checks, captures, and threats." For threats, pieces that are undefended and an exposed king should be examined first. To do all this on every move really does take a lot of time at first! Unless your games are hours long you probably wont be able to see all that on every move of a game.

But the more you practice the easier it becomes. To the point that it wouldn't be unlikely for a 5 minute game between two grandmasters to be higher quality than a game I spend 3 hours playing. The tactics and strategy I will spend time examining will be unconsciously known to the GM!

Last  piece of advice:

 

Blitz is somewhat different than slower chess (duh, but true).

 

Blitz places a big premium on good opening play. Since the time control is so short, if you don't know what you're doing in the first 10-15 moves, you'll probably find yourself lost pretty quickly. 

The advice "don't study the opening as a beginner" is TERRIBLE advice for blitz players, even ones rated <1000. 

Even as a 1500 blitz player myself now, if you manage to play me into a position I am not familiar or comfortable with (and isn't obviously losing for your side), I play at the level of roughly a 1200 level player. However, if you play me into a position I know very, very well (I have several London system positions like this), I'll player +200 over my rating.  

 

Note that you don't have to 'win' the opening by some material gain, etc. Just having someone else play in your garden of familiarity will give you a huge time edge and free your brain to really hunker down when it counts. Before I studied openings, I wasted both a ton of time AND brainpower in the first 12 moves of games - people who played 'slow' systems like closed positions and London systems where tactics don't occur until much later, would beat me every time because of this, even if I played much, much better than they did - they'd time me out every time. 

 

Unfortunately, it's hard to learning openings as well. It takes a lot of hard work - mine is still a long, long work in progress, but honestly, I didn't make a lot of headway in blitz until I studied openings. Still crank your tactics, but don't neglect the opening if you hope to survive in blitz.

Sup brah. This might be a late response but here are the tips that have worked (still working) for me :3

1. Do 20 (minimum) tactics problems each day. This will help you improve your calculation speed (useful for bullet/blitz/standard).
2. Practice online. Try dividing up your time equally for the corresponding modes (ex. 1 hour for bullet, 1 hour for blitz, 1 hour for standard).
3. Spectate games. Watch 2000+elo games, try and understand how good players think and apply this knowledge in your games.
4. Study openings. Try not to just memorize each move but instead learn the reason behind them, because if someone plays a move that is "out of the book" you will most likely tilt.
5. Have fun :). Chess is a wonderful game, if you enjoy it, you will improve quickly.

I know I'm not a good player, but these tips have helped me gain a good 600 elo, so try them out and good luck :)