Let's discuss age and learning to play chess

I'm not a new chess player. My mother's side of my family is all from the former Soviet Union, and my grandfather taught me the game quite literally the moment I was old enough to hold the pieces. To my current chagrin, as much as it fascinated me, apart from playing him casually while he was still alive, I never really nurtured my progress in the game. No chess clubs, nothing like that, and until the last few weeks I hadn't played more than a few times per year. Now at the age of 27 I've decided to pick chess back up in an attempt to restore some malleability to my aging mind, since I don't get to exercise it all that much in my day to day life.

I'm attempting to keep to a pretty strict learning regimen, as the competitor in me refuses to take the game up without at least giving myself a fair attempt at excellence, but obviously learning stuff when you're 30 is incredibly difficult compared to learning stuff when you're a kid. Is anybody else going through learning intermediate level chess at an older age, and those of you who are, what has offered you the most chances for improvement?

I'm just returning to chess and I've now been playing regularly since October 2013 i.e. eight months. I learned at age eleven, but I hadn't played at all since I left school, and I'm more than twice your age, ricky!

There are lots of nice places to play chess in my City (Norwich, England), cafés, pubs and bars, so I play at least four mornings a week, also some afternoons and evenings, and I've made a lot of new friends. We have some good players here so, naturally, I get beaten most of the time, but my opponents are all very kind and helpful and I'm starting to win the odd flukey game now and again!

I do have some other friends who are more at my level so I get more wins with them but obviously don't learn so much as I do playing the stronger ones. I also play against the computer and study from books and online.

I'm very much enjoying my chess, it has really 'bitten' me. As a semi-retired professional musician, I now have the time to devote to it that I wouldn't have had when I was your age. Spending time over the board playing with people who've been playing for sixty or seventy years is a great pleasure and a wonderful chess education for which I am truly grateful.

With a lot less time at my disposal, I focus study. I pick a specific item and for at least a week to a month that's my main focus of chess study. Everyone learns better differently but for myself I need to immerse into something for awhile to really learn it. Then it's a matter of reviewing it every once in awhile to retain it. The more I learn, the more difficult it becomes to keep myself from losing information though!

See my issue is that here in Chicago, I don't know of any chess clubs that aren't in the suburbs, and thus too far for me to travel, and while I have a couple friends interested in playing, their lack of interest in practice is starting to show. Specifically, my practice is starting to distance me from my friends I've been playing with. Every day I'm doing 25-50 tactics at chesstempo, working on understanding the opening and endgame, and building a simple opening repertoire (and playing as much chess on this site as I can find time to), and I've seen my play improve drastically over the past week, but while I'm obviously still a beginner, I don't really know how far this 'seat-of-the-pants' training regimen will take me, and I'm severely lacking in OTB play time, so I'm not even sure how much of what I'm learning to see will translate to three dimensions.

Try using an actual board when playing online (obviously not blitz games), making the moves for your opponent and transfering them to the computer for your moves.

This is a good idea. I'll definitely start doing this.

I guess a couple more things deserve to be noted: I have no illusions about becoming a grandmaster, I hope that's clear, but if not, let's say my goal is to become strong enough that I could feasibly start playing competitively over the board and maybe work my way up to Class A or Expert or something in that range. I feel like that's a realistic goal for a player learning the game as an adult.

Also, due to the nature of my own psychological issues, and my high-stress work, I spend almost every hour of every day 'medicated' (I'll refrain from going into specifics since there are certainly younger users here, but I'm sure those who would have insight here can guess what I mean) and while I know I have the mental capacity to work this way, I could use any tips you guys have on maintaining focus when it comes to studying chess, or even playing chess.

EDIT: It behooves me to add that my memory is completely shot. Is memory as important to chess as all the grandmaster memorization tricks (like blindfolded simul games and the like) are made out to be? I recognize patterns as easily as anybody, but if you were to ask me to call up the first 10 moves of the last game I played from memory, I couldn't give you more than 3 or 4.

It's quite clear that one's brain changes as one ages; there are numerous studies of neuroplasticity that establish that there are permanent synaptic and non-synaptic changes that happen over time.  That does not mean an older person cannot learn or even necessarily that a "more mature" individual will be a slower learner.  You just learn differently.  While young folks do have some advantages in learning, i believe that we older carmudgeons also have advantages over more youthful colleagues.  For example, it is likely that an older student is more disciplined, organized, focused and methodical in studying.  Older students also often are more motivated.  For example, few teenagers would take the time (as you did) to see advice on a training regimen to improve their chess.  Teenagers are more likley to just play and learn through osmosis rather than through study.  Older students are also more self-aware and know what works best for their learning styles (e.g., reading versus listening versus doing).

Good luck.  I'm sure that you'll do well.  (And you are certainly not "old" at the age of 27.)

Hey woahprettyricky! I'm in the same situation, I started playing seriously last year (14 month now) when I was 25. Now 27 and having a lot of the same issues. I knew the rules a few years but only played coffeehouseches once in a year maybe. The way I quickly improved my rating was using chessmaster grandmaster and I did all the courses. So I gained some general knowledge on principles in each part of the game.

Tactics I do on my smartphone when I'm bored. Mostly mate in 1 and mate in 2. The thing that mostly stands out with those mate exercises is that there a lot of pieces near the king. So I try to emulate that with my playing style and fully develop my army and increasing pressure on the king. My main weapon in blitz was the king's gambit and I even tried blackmar diemer gambit a few times. The thing that excites me about chess is a wonderfull attack. That's important I think, something that really excites you. Because otherwise study becomes another school/work project and that isn't a good way to study chess.

My memory isn't great either. I remember general principles easy but knowing exactly a line in my opening repertoire after 5 moves is already pretty difficult and most games I only remember some parts of the middlegame and small opening mistakes.

Thanks for the comments, guys. I've been on an absolute tear in live chess here (30 | 0, blitz and bullet are so far beyond my mental speed that I'm just avoiding them), having lost like a dozen games in my first day or two and starting to actually learn, I've started winning a lot, and getting my rating back over 1200. Obviously, sooner than later, I'm going to stop winning, and I assume settle in somewhere in the 1200-1400 range as my learning speed tapers off and I require more study to improve. I must assume right now I'm seeing such huge results because I've gone from almost literally being clueless to having a decent collection of basic theory and tactical knowledge stored in my head over a couple weeks of steady practice, but I want to be prepared for when this improvement bubble bursts and I'm stuck having to really learn dilligently.

My plan is to develop an opening repertoire consisting of openings that play pretty much unchanged in response to opponent moves, so that I have little to remember in terms of variations, and openings that have a well defined (and basic) plan for the middlegame, so that I'm not just sitting there with developed pieces and no idea what to do with them besides reacting. To this effect, here's what I have so far:

Black vs 1.d4 - Leningrad Dutch

 I like this because it seems to basically force white into playing a basic line that the Leningrad seems to work against, with my main plans being to take e5 and play the Dutch Lance vs the kingside castle, or if they castle queenside I'd play the Leningrad Stonewall and maybe try to pawnstorm the queenside as I'll be castled kingside and relatively safe. Of course they could pay Staunton's gambit, but I'm trying to find a decent DVD or book on that so I can be prepared for it should it happen.

Black vs 1.e4

 I guess the Pirc? My last game as black went smashingly and while I played something closer to the Sniper, with no Knight on f6 until later in the game, my pawn structure involved d6 before c5, so it definitely isn't a pure sniper. Is this a reasonable tactic to keep my openings consistent vs 1e4? At least it seems light on theory, allowing me to play on instinct and tactics, but I may be wrong here. This is a new experiment for me.

As white:

I've been playing 1. e4 and all I really do is play the Italian game against pretty much any responses, which I assume is pretty poor practice. Fact is, I'm terrified playing as white as I learn more about opening theory, because half of my games are not Italian games, but white playing Italian moves while black plays one of a thousand Sicilian variations against me that I simply do not know how to play against. I have been succesful, but but I must only assume that can't continue as I play tougher opponents who know how to punish me for not knowing the lines they're playing.

The Dutch is a fearsome weapon, I would suggest you choose a fearsome response to e4 too for black. Pirc is somewhat slow and can be passive. I think e5 is a good one to learn. This way you can use your knowledge you gained in the italian game you play with white and also learn about ruy lopez, one of the most fundamental openings! Also e5 is somewhat more open and tactical. I used the sniper myself when I first started but I didn't like the position that much. When you first move d6 after g6 Bg7 it's called modern.

Hmm that's bad practice, italian game set up for everything. In general if you don't really know what to do try do develop classical as much as possible: 

The caro kann (c6 d5) attacks e4, you can go d4 and Nc3.

The french (e6 d5)also attacks e4, go d4 and Nc3.

The scandinavian defense (1..d5) is best met by taking the pawn with you e pawn and after queen recaptures play Nc3.

Against the modern I would build up classically and try to develop pieces and protect d4 square/pawn.

So despite their similarity in black-side structure, the Pirc (or whatever I did in that game I posted, some bastardization of the Modern) is not comparable to the Leningrad? I feel like my current strength lies in attacking play. I spot opponent mistakes much more confidently than I am able to prevent my own mistakes at this moment, so I definitely like the idea of keeping my repertoire centered around active games where I can hone my attacking play further.

I had read that d5 as white has significantly less theory behind it, and was interested in something like the Catalan, but keep hearing people suggest new players try something called the Neo-Catalan with c4 and no d4. It seems to me this makes sense as an opening to explore as white rather than the huge mess of e4, since the two options I can see are either accepted or declined for the Neo-Catalan, and that seems like a nice, simple theoretical path to explore at this phase of my education.

No. Pirc/modern is a hypermodern opening that allows white to build up a pawn centre and then you will try to undermine it with c5 for instance and basically try to clear your blacksquared bishop path through the centre to make him really strong. But white has pretty aggressive options against it. Dutch defense aims at the first move f5 to prevent e4. It's true both openings can be pretty aggressive but they will lead to pretty different positions because f5 isn't played alot in pirc and not necessarily you want to fianchetto your bishop in the dutch. 

Most attacking openings are 1..e5 and 1..c5 against 1.e4 so open games or sicilian. The sniper is a transposition to the sicilian but sicilian has a lot of theory behind it. 

Catalan/English has a positional reputation. I think you should play the same kind of games you do with black, active and dynamic chess. I've heard though it has some simiralirities to the white sniper. Maybe you can research that. But theory is pretty intensive on catalan!

I myself recently changed my white repertoire to 1.d4 and I'm also looking for active lines, I like open attacking positions just as you but I like to build everything up first before lines are opened and also learning some positional play. 

I didn't like 6. ... dxc5.  Maybe you get a pawn, but at the moment, they had tripled pawns (!), and you lose the ability to castle.  I think developing a piece like maybe Nc6 would be better.  To be honest, it wasn't a great game, but you got lucky in getting the rook fork. At the end of move 6, your king was stuck in the center, you had holes at h6 and f6, no developed pieces.

Overall, doing the complete Chess Mentor course would be good.  Chess_gg comment above, and plenty of other places give advice on how to improve.  I've been playing since age 8, and barely know any openings from memory.  Playing chess should be built on principles like "control the center", "develop your pieces", improve the position and scope of each piece, take advantage of holes.  The nuances of openings shouldn't even be a concern until I would guess 1700+ (which I'm under). 

There's pubs and cafes to play chess in Norwich?! Do you mean where you can walk in on your own and get a game? Please give me some more specific info!

Worrying about and studying specific openings as a beginner has led to more wasted time than benefits. I've hardly studied any openings, and I couldn't tell you one 5 move variation of a single opening. Following opening principles is still working for me and I can promise will work for you to. Put your study time into tactics, endgame principles, or just running through master games. It'll all help your chess a great deal more than learning some opening lines.

Oh, I understand that much, like I said, I have no intent to learn a million openings 20 moves deep. I just want to have enough comfortable knowledge that I can enter a middlegame I have a shot at winning, because without a few go-to moves I keep finding myself panicking and trying to calculate in the opening where the options are much too deep for me to have any chance of calculating correctly.

This book looked good too.  I'm considering it for myself: http://www.amazon.com/FCO-Paul-Van-Der-Sterren/dp/1906454132

I tried it again, in the interest of research, and almost got mated early by a nasty trap. I think I'll stick to open games from e4.

As for everything else, it sounds like where I'm losing in the ability to memorize and absorb information, I should take my advantage of being able to prepare and organize like an adult, and use it to get more out of my studies.

He violated the principle of moving the queen too early on move 2. Qf3.  Now, the thought should be, develop while attacking the queen.  Therefore, maybe: d6, Nf3, Bg4.  You lost it on move 5 when you went down a piece.  Move 4, you had to castle or play e6.

You might be able to survive this, but it will be hard and maybe impossible.  On move 17, why trade queens?  To disrupt his pawn structure?  It's not that bad pawn structure, and your only hope to fighting back is to keep pieces on the board.  But impressive, you fought back!  The rook fork of the two knights was cool.

See my point was that if you know and understand opening principles they guide you through the opening so you don't need to panic. You'll always know a good response or plan in whatever openings you face and get reasonable positions going into the middle games. That's how effective opening principles are. You don't have to have the first 5 moves planned out. You can, but it's not needed for you to get a good game. Lets say you spend 15 minutes a day on openings. That's about 8 tactical puzzles a day more or less. Now most newer players change their openings about 3 times in my experience. So keeping it simple you play 1 opening for white and two for black ( 1 for e4 and 1 for d4) , that's 9 openings. So given two years time you'd study openings for 182hrs or you'd work on tactics for 182hrs solving around 5,824 tactic puzzles. I promise you, the tactics will get you much further than the opening study.