I am searching for a chess coach with some "qualifications". Somebody interested?

I want to make a step further in my pitiful chess career, so I am searching for a coach. I was thinking on this since months, but now I am convinced that this is the right thing to do.

1. "Qualifications"

(a) Something like a Elo around 2000+ would be great! But if you have good qualifications in the point (b), than I think a coach around 1900 would also be enough (about my estimated rating see below).

(b) I am looking for a coach who understand well 1.d4 d5 2. c4 for White, and 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 and 1.e4 e5 for Black, I am telling this because I think it is important to learn with a coach who understand well the studied opening. If I would not have invested so much in the openings already I would follow your recommendations, but I invested already a lot in the opening, especially on 1.d4.  With 1.d4 as White I have a rather good idea how to play the opening, but almost now knowledge about long-term plans. As Black in the lines 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 and 1.e4 e5 I did not invest much time yet, but I bought several books on this stuff and I think I should learn this. I am learning a complete repertoire written by GM Alex Colovic and is of course from high quality. This repertoire cover 1.d4, 1.c4, 1.Nf3, , but also things like 1.f4 or even 1.g4.

I would be prone to change my repertoire 1.e4 e5 as Black if you have good arguments to do so, as I did not invest much yet on this stuff; I could follow your recommendations here (but it would be VERY interesting if I could use an opening which is available in the website "Chessable", so go to this website and browse the books there to see if you find something that you know well and I can use.

Just to let you know:  I gave up a Scandi repertoire with Qd8 as Black, although I invested rather a lot in this defence. I would go back to this if you know this stuff and recommend it to me, or as a main repertoire against 1.e4 or as a backup.

I don't see a problem to have two different coaches, one specialist on 1.d4 and the other on 1.e4 e5 (or something else, as I wrote above)..

My "ambitions"

I am not very ambitious about chess, as I am already 55 years old and rather untalented. I just want to be more straightforward in my development and see how far I can get by training systematically openings, endgames, and middle games, at least for one or two years. My ability to visualise and calculate is certainly below-average. My main motivation is to improve my game to be able to teach chess for beginners and intermediate players (I am doing this already since many years). I stopped almost completely to play blitz (I know that this will not help me much to get a better player), and will go soon to a chess club for the first time since many many years. I can send you the game I played there.

I would like to improve every phase of the game, I need somebody to help me to go through my games, tell me my typical inaccuracies, how to use engines for analyses, how to use databases to go through games played by strong players, etc etc.

My rating...perhaps around 1550-1600?

I do not know my Elo rating, since I never played in a serious tournament. I went to the a website where you can measure your chess skills (Elometer). I got a surprisingly strong number, 1936, with a 95% confidence interval of [1811...2061]. However, after discussing this tool with people how have a rating, I found out that Elometer definitively overestimate your rating. One guy for example got an estimated rating of 2618 while his FIDE rating is actually "only" about 2200. I think my rating should be something between 1550 and 1600, if I compare with people who had a similar estimation in Elometer.

My skill in tactics, endgames and strategy

Unfortunately, I am not good in tactics, although I will give a go with it with different apps, especially with CT-ART 5.0. I trained several months also with Chessimo.

I do not know much endgames beside the basic stuff for beginners / intermediate players, but I am learning de la Villa's "100 Endgames You Must Know", also in Chessable, and I hope to have a rather good understanding of endgames within one year.

I have several books on strategy (actually I have a very good chess library - but I should also learn these books, not only buy them!). I am working now with "Simple Chess" by Michael Stean; I like it. I have also Silman's "The Amateur's Mind" and "How to Reassess...", but I did not really work hard with them. I have also other good books on the subject, like Nimzowitsch's "My System" and "Chess Praxis", and "Chess Strategy for Club Players" by Grooten.

Somebody interested?

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Hi Daniel, thank you very much for your contribution. Which language are you using? Or did your cat step on the keyboard? 

I really like your humility.   Question:  Do you think it's better to get a local coach? One that you can physically meet with?  Or is an online coach better? Why?

I would somehow prefer to meet a coach, but in Switzerland I guess coaches are expensive (everything here is very expensive). I do not have any experience both with online and coaches OTB, but I think that for example with Skype it would be possible to record the lessons (I heard this), and to go through the lessons several times. 

Did you learn already with a coach?

What price range are you looking at spending?

No, I don't have a coach.  I think it's a great idea though.

ASK DPNORMAN

I am currently open to new students, and your self-description sounds like the type of student I would be interested in teaching.

I am a lifelong 1.e4 e5 player for black. I rarely play 1.d4 for white (1.e4 mostly) or 1.d4 d5 for black (I play Guenfeld and Nimzo). However, I have nearly 30 years of tournament chess experience, and understanding and teaching ability in all phases of the game.

To get an idea of my teaching style, you could read my column in Chess Horizons magazine, available free online. A couple sample issues:

http://www.masschess.org/chess_horizons/articles/ch_spring2016.pdf

http://www.masschess.org/chess_horizons/articles/ch_summer2017.pdf

Feel free to look through my games here (mostly blitz and played very casually, of course, but still) to get an idea of my playing style. Most of my tournament games are not available online, unfortunately. But here is a small and somewhat random selection that made it into a database:

https://www.365chess.com/players/Jacob_Chudnovsky

Also, SeniorPatzer, who replied above, thinks I give good advice in these forums.

If interested in discussing further, please follow up by private message.

Thanks.

Actually I don't know, I have to compare the different offers...

Thank you very much Jacob, it sound good. I will still wait if somebody else answer to this thread and I will come back later to you.

I would highly recommend IM Valeri Lilov (Tigerlilov on chess.com)

He was my coach for awhile last year.  

why do you like Valeri Lilob

I can imagine he is a great coach. He has another repertoire: he plays 1.d4, but than he goes for the Quuen's Pawn Game, otherwise he plays 1.e4 and 1.c4.

As StupidGM says, if you are going to go through all those books, you are largely coaching yourself.  Having additional information thrown at you may not be useful, as you can only absorb so much in a short time.  If you try to do too much, especially with your self-described un-ambition, then you may be setting yourself up for failure.  Be careful.

With that caveat out of the way, I love talking about chess and have recently started a YouTube channel where I analyze positions and games,  I will link an example below, and if you are interested, I could do something similar for you.  I don't meet your requirement of being an 'expert' in your opening choices, but I understand planning at a decent level.  If you find it useful, we can look at something longterm, and if you don't, no worries.

The Scandi is an opening as any other. If you know your stuff, you have good chances to equalise the game or sometimes win. The problem is that I did not decide yet what to play against 1.e4.

I Smith

I got your point. Perhaps you are right. My reluctance to search for a coach until now was exactly because time constrains, as I am already working on my game. However, I am sports teacher since 1985 (actually I began working in this area already 1981), and my experience is that people who want to make quicker progress for example in tennis should get the help of a tennis instructor. I thought I could do self-coaching in chess. My problem is that I still feel that I could learn a lot about how to use databases, how to analyse my games, how to prepare for a tournament, and so on. I could get some help from people from a chess club, but I think it would be better to pay somebody to help me with these things.

I know JB, as I am learning his 1.d4 and Scandi repertoire in Chessable (he is one of the owners of this website). So, this is not a coincidence :-)

This is true. At the end this is the way to improve, right? The coach will just give you some hints to improve quicker. I think it is a good thing to get the help of a good coach, as it is rather hard (for me at least) to go through my own games that I lost. I want to get used to analyse my games regularly and learn from my mistakes and lack of plans. 

Dont get caught up in how well you think your analysis needs to be.  Post a loss, and include your own analysis.  Include your ideas, thoughts, etc.  Then post them here for peer review.  You will get a lot of valuable advice.