It's Better Not to be a GM!

What is this about?

It's not about playing the guitar poorly, strumming the right chord now and then, because that would lead to enormous frustration. That would be the opposite of fun, and people who can't get past that stage quit.

I've taught thousands of students how to play musical instruments in the past 27 years, and if I can't help them to get over the hump of playing poorly, they will quit.

I would have quit chess had I not discovered the importance of tactics training. When I first started playing chess at about age 50, my tactics rating here was leveled off to 600. I stopped messing around with those interactive computer puzzles, and tried to get better my studying opening moves, with the idea that if I start the game with a few good moves, I will have a better chance of winning.

That didn't work, and that was where I almost quit until I finally got it through my thick skull, after repeated attempts by my forum friends, to go back to tactics trainer and stick to it. Now, my tactics trainer rating floats around the 1200's in most sessions, and in some, I can keep it the 1300's, and sometimes peek at 1400. I reset my history regularly, to keep things fresh, with a different set of puzzles, with some hard to explain psychological boost. Plus, I save all of the tactics problem numbers and categorize them by motif, i.e., pin , fork, mate - so I can get in some repetition practice, to burn those patterns deep into my brain so I can recall them within 5 seconds OTB/Live Chess.

So, I'm just wondering if the really, really good players...not the good players...ever get bored with the game after knowing most of the ins and outs, and would be quite happy to play something different to keep things interesting and intellectually stimulating, perhaps playing Chess 960.

Last, I started this topic, wondering if chess for the GM is like Tic Tac Toe. Cringe

Once you learn the little trick, there is one way to win at Tic Tac Toe, some of the time, but the other player must not know the trick for it to work. Either way, with best play, Tic Tac Toe always leads to a draw. In theory, with best play, chess too leads to a draw. Indeed, GM's know tricks that dramatically increase the odds of ending a game in a draw, and they will say at times that they are playing for a draw. Kramnik drove Kasparov nuts, playing the Ruy Lopez-Berlin Defense, and even with the White pieces, one of the greatest attacking players could not knock down that wall. Draw-Draw-Draw...

How can a player be beat, when that player plays so solidly, and refuses to take any risk that will increase the winning chances for one side? This is one example of how chess, with best play, can't be won by either side. If you can't win at chess, and the object of the game is checkmate, then what do you do? This game does not look any fun, to this beginners eyes, and that is why I threw out the idea that maybe it's better to not be a GM, for the sole reason of keeping the chances alive of keeping the game fun.

One person must make a mistake for the other person to win, at any level. For beginners-advanced players, it can be stated as follows: one person must make more mistakes than the other for a win.

Maybe he just found out that a hot looking girl is interested in dating him.

What is his name?

@ muskimole

Your example of Kramnik using the Berlin Wall against Kasparov is too far removed from your basic premise to be relevant. That was a match for the World Championship, the ultimate professional honour - the idea that there could be any 'fun' in that environment is naive.

Its a bit like golf, you see many journeymen pros scratching around just trying to keep their cards from one year to the next, not even dreaming of winning a Major. When people say they should give up because they aren't that good their reply is that they are making a living doing something they love..I think that may be the crux of why people become Grand Masters at chess as well, even if they can't produce the flashy brilliancies of the old timers, they get as much satisfaction out of a well played draw because they just love to play and study chess.

I have finally won that game and I should have done so long ago. I was trying to be clever and ignore the pawn on a6! but in order to win I have to take it..... 

In response to the question in post #88 the player is GM Vassily Ivanchuk.

Who, incidentally, Plays the Berlin Wall with both colors, and of course he enjoys it quite a lot.

@ muskimole

I think that this is definately an extremely interesting question, one that I've never really come across before.  Let me put across a few points from my perspective.  I think that chess, as a competitive activity, is fun in that aspect, and from that point of view it doesn't matter what level you play at.  Everyone gets a kick out of beating someone else, whether its Dad or a Grandmaster, and thats an integral part of what makes chess fun.  That being said, I think that apart from the competitive, "sport" part of chess there is also the artistic side of it, and I think that as a Grandmaster you would get alot more pleasure out of that side than as a 1600 player.  At our level a simple tactical win, leading to a win of a piece and an easy endgame is exciting, and rewarding, but imagine what it must be like at the highest level!  After preparing hard at home, you come to the board with several novelties- each your very own artistic creation, ready to delight the chess world.  After a few minutes of play you spring this upon your opponent, who instantly goes into deep thought.  He valiantly attempts to stave off losing too much, but he commits a small inacuracy.  With a precise zwichenzug you establish a clear positional advantage, which you later convert to the win of a pawn that your opponent must give up due to a fork threat.  Your opponent, being an experienced fighter, sacrifices a second pawn to try to drum up an initiative, but you defend by sacrificing the exchange, leading to a theoretically won but still dificult endgame.  You play hard for another 20 moves, don't make any slips, and accurately convert your advantage.  Now I believe that sounds fun!- its like you've created a piece of artwork with your opponent, that the rest of the world can see and you can be proud of.  All of your class a, b, c and expert knowledge went into this game, but it stayed below the surface, as both you and your opponent avoided big tactical and positional mistakes.  I'm sure that you, as a self confessed perfectionist, must find the possibility of playing games with few mistakes, often imperceptible to players below master strength, an attractive possibility?

Is it better to be a GM and make a living at chess, or to make a iiving however you do it now, with chess as a hobby?

 No you haven't so stop talking about an ongoing game.

Playing online is boring. Playing on board is unboring.

@ Musikamole

I've seen GM games (with commentary) featuring the Berlin wall where some innocuous mistake means a dead lost endgame (after a 40 move long technical phase) for one player or the other.  It's not so simple, but well prepared and evenly matched opponents may make it seem so.

Also Kramnik didn't with the match by drawing all his games :p  He obviously won games too.  In match play this was his way of neutralising Kasparov's whites.

And finally, a lot of what us class players struggle with and one day hope to learn is what professional players consider 2nd nature basics.  E.g. topics about "should I study endgames or openings or tactics" would only ever be asked by an amateur.  So while we win and lose games due to unseen forks and pushing our passed pawns, GMs get to be creative with their ideas (although also technically correct execution).

I suppose to put it in music terms it sounds like you're saying "I practice my sacles which are boring, and these great composers have written music which is also based on these rules, so that level of music is also tedious/ not interesting"  

You said in some topic (was it this one?) that music was an ocean while chess is a pond, which suggests to me how little you know about chess   Likewise I may say the same thing (only reversed) about music... so now you may know how little I understand about music!

I'm sure it's fun for some, and not fun for others. At some point they realize that this is what they know, this is what they are good at, for better or for worse. Wasn't it Steffi who said to Andre on their first date "Of course tennis is boring!"

That is simply because both players in a GM vs GM game are perfectionists. Although I would have to admit you have a point about some games. I think they maybe should add another 50 move rule for chess this one being you can not offer a draw until the 50th move excluding perpetual checks. Many times I see a GM game and it gets drawn, and to me it looks like there is still a lot of play left.

 On the other hand Carlsen and Navara played the dullest 82 move draw you could imagine the other day at Wijk aan Zee. Carlsen said he played it out because he didn't want to just go back to his hotel room and twiddle his thumbs after move 30! Some positions are just dead draws even with major pieces and plenty of pawns left, Karpov and Andersson used to get a few extra points by forcing their opponents to play the whole thing out to 'prove' they knew the drawing technique but most players accept that the other guy knows what they are doing and they don't want to waste energy looking for winning chances that don't exist.

Grand Masters are the real [chess] perfectionists.  Musikamole you admit to being a perfectionist, yet you suggest chess is a field where it is best to avoid perfectionism.  This seems like a contradiction to me. 

+1

Excellent Post!

You are good at telling exciting chess stories! That was a very good read. Thank you!

I own a few books of Grandmaster games with annotations, and the easiest book for me to understand is   Understanding Chess - Move By Move by John Nunn. The book, Learn from the Grandmasters is also a great read, and beginners like myself can get something from it, but most of the moves are not explained, however the writers, the actual GM's who played those games, are also great writers! It's a true delight to read, even if I only understand a little.

Would playing games with few mistakes be an attactive possibility?  Sure. I am working on tactics, calculation, and visualization in order to make fewer mistakes. However, perfectionism (the mental disorder), gets in the way.

Perfectionism is a psychological condition that no one wants. I'd love to be free of it completely. It's not that I believe that I can be perfect, because I know that no one can be perfect, especially me!  Matter of fact, perfectionism is destructive, causing a person to make less progress in life, and to make even more mistakes. I'm less of a perfectionist than I was when I got married and had kids 27 years ago.

For example, with the mess that the kids make in the house, i.e., stepping over toys all over the house, you simply must loosen up a little bit, or you grow more grumpy, angry, and hate life.

To strive to get better at something is healthy, i.e., to become a chess master, but the way a perfectionist would go about it would be the opposite of healthy, and impossible, because we have a big fear of making mistakes, which prevents are ability to improve, at least to that high of a level.

It's not o.k. to walk a child across the street and NOT pay attention to traffic. That's one example where perfection is necessary, and possible, especially since the life of a child is at stake. However, chess is not a life and death matter, so in that sense, perfection is not even required, and it's impossible to not make mistakes in chess anyway. Chess players have the opportunity to improve if they take the time to go over their games, so that they can learn from their mistakes.

The perfectionist doesn't see it that way. That person would be far more comfortable to figure out a lot about chess before playing the game, because mistakes are painful. The perfectionist would rather spend a year on the driving range "perfecting" his swing before playing his first round of golf.

Jumping in with both feet, or getting one's hands dirty is the opposite of what a perfectionist wants.

Jumping in with both feet, or getting one's hands dirty is the opposite of what a perfectionist wants. In short, it sucks to be a perfectionist.

On a happy note, my five children don't suffer from the psychological disorder of perfectionism, since I made sure NOT to make them feel uptight, for example, if their rooms were not as clean as a military barracks, even though it drove me nuts to see their messy rooms. I didn't want them to grow up like me. My five children are healthy and HAPPY.

Sorry for the very long post, #103. If you take the time to speed read it, then my hope is that this appearance of a contradiction will disappear.

I would politely argue that grandmasters are not perfectionists, at least not the type of perfectionist that requires medication to function, to be able to make some sort of progress in life. Perfectionism freezes a person in place. Tunnel vision sets in, where the perfectionist feels the most comfortable and safe from their own fears of making mistakes, analyzing the smallest of details, and never getting back to the big picture, in this case, of playing a game of chess.

In the most extreme cases, the chess perfectionist would spend an entire year researching the IQP (Isolated Queen Pawn position), and never come up for air. Hmm…IM Daniel Rensch did a very long series on the IQP.  Maybe that is why he is not a GM yet. Just kidding!  

For anyone to make IM, well, there’s just no way that they could have done it being a perfectionist. You need to be comfortable with making mistakes to improve at chess, lots of mistakes, over and over again – and the more often a person reviews the mistakes in his or her game, the faster the improvement. In that sense, it’s not rocket science, nor is it some big mystery, on how to improve at chess.  

I need to relax a lot more, forget I even have a chess rating, and rejoice in my mistakes. That’s going to be really hard for me, as I will need to go way out of my comfort zone. Heck, if I can make it happen in chess, just think of how it might change other parts of my life.

Practice makes perfect? That saying might work for some, but it’s the last thing I want to have running through my brain!

Dang!  Another long post. Arg!

Its better not to be a faggot

Yes, a bundle of sticks