Outcome of de la Maza's Seven Circles Program

Chessattackman wrote:

Wait all you like, I really don't think this discussion has gone anywhere for the past 200 posts.

Uhohspaghettio1 wrote: Wait all you like, I really don't think this discussion has gone anywhere for the past 200 posts. 

You seem to have all knowledge in strategy, here is a chance to shine and show the experts you are more knowledgeable. 

 Okay, I share another positional concept, one way to exploit double pawns is to fix it. The best piece to stop a pass pawn from advancing is a knight.

The unfortunate thing about this thread is that nobody has really commented on the content of the blog.  The fact that I have experienced quite a bit of progress on my chess.com blitz rating, in a number of respects, was the point of the thread, in tandem with the fact that I used MDLM's training program to do it.  Not only did sustain 1730-ish rating for a while, my rating is now sitting at higher rating that was my absolute previous peak, which I could not previously sustain (and briefly touched once).  On top of that, my previous best win was against a 1712, and I am now beating up 1730+ players with a little regularity --and my new best win is over 100 points above the 1712-rated player.  I think these metric milestones are worthy of noting, since I was doing very little aside from doing MDLM's program over the graphed stretch of 2 months.

Now why do I find myself agreeing with @Uhohspaghettio ?  

Probably because the OP is neither physicist nor philosopher.  Just another eccentric chessplayer -- with a broom up his arse.

On balance, the seven circles has made him about as sucessful as the Steelers have been in the last two playoff seasons.

So he hires a troika of coaches.  That's his ringing endorsement of de la Maza ??

You've beated this dead dog entirely to much, @Milly.

You protest too strongly, and simply don't persuade.

Yeah, I think we are establishing that much, but my hope was to show that this particular method is a valuable option.  We'll see how things go for me at my next set of USCF tournaments.  I also plan to keep track of how my various tactics-server ratings fair in this next go at MDLM's training program.  I have recently started working with coaches and, naturally, I will work on a few other things before my next USCF tournament (openings, etc.), but the bulk of what I have done is tactics, so I will live or die by that sword.

Also, see my remark about not paying attention to some commenters.  I simply don't read what they right, and I find that helpful in avoiding any waste of time, such as that induced by name calling. 

I think that it helped me quite a bit.

I absolutely favor study of tactics. I urge caution embracing MdlM's approach to the study of tactics.

I commented on the blog itself.

Seriously, pay attention, no one (in this thread or ever lol) has said not to study tactics.

No one ever says only study strategy or endgames or openings either.

The only one who wants to pretend it's a polarizing issue is the one trying to sell you something...

I do appreciate the comment, but you commented on the original article from January, not the outcome blog with graphs and results (http://milliern.com/2015/03/19/long-is-the-way-and-hard/).

I think what I am going to do, in order to have individual points to use in statistical analysis (chess.com doesn't offer individual data points that go into constructing the ratings graph), is use data points from various tactics programs and tactics trainers (CT-Art, chess.com's TT, chesstempo, chessemrald, etc. ... feel free to make suggestions, anyone!)

Unfortunately, the controls in this experiment won't be as good, because I have begun using coaches, and I am doing endgame studies (Fine, Silman, De la Villa), on top of starting (this week) the Steppenmethode and Yusupov courses.  I am also working on an opening repertoire for the World Open.  I wish I had the idea of looking at chess server data points when I did the experiment, Jan through March.  Oh well.

BTW, your advice certainly hasn't fallen on deaf ears.  I am taking your advice on a number of things.  One item I wonder about is whether you have benefit tactically a great deal from looking at complex combinations more than basic tactical motifs.  One of the things that my wife and I are finding in cogntive science and education publications is the counterintuitive fact that people (especially children) seem to learn best when material isn't abstracted and overly simplified, though such abstract examples (maybe basic tactical motifs would be an example?) aid in learning in instances of learning plateau.  It seems like the brain is made to pull apart information from a rich context and then understand it analytically, but does not learn from analytic, abstract examples so well.  It's interesting, but borderline speculation, at this point.  Any thoughts on whether bare-bones tactical motifs are as productive for you as studying sophisticated combinations?

Why are people fighting over whether learning tactics is good or not?

Strange.

No, it's not fighting (or, at least, some of us aren't fighting).  It's a discussion about whether this particular program is effective.  I provided some evidence that it is.  The graphs (and reasoning) I've included in the blog post suggest that it is.

Milliernwrote:

The book has plenty of examples from practical play.  It's why I don't care too much for composed problems.  Yeah chess is like anything else: break things down to their smallest individual units then assess based on that information and how it connects.  Tactics and strategy supplement each other. You could find a tactic or calculate complications and find that at worst you'll end up with a positional advantage so you'd go for it.  One still must be careful and not overlook things, like a powerful intermezzo or quiet move that defeats the whole point of your piece placements.

So far Yusupovs courses run great, i found things i dont know in subjects i cant believe, tests were hard but doable till 8th chapter and i stuck with test, i am looking diagrams and keep looking :) i decided to take a break and will try again. I had passed previous chapters with excellent results but i read others also said centralization chapter is hard as well. Or it may be combined with i might be performing low because irrelevant things or just can be tired :) Tell me what you think after take 8th chapters test

I think any program that emphasizes tactics and repetition of those tactics to improve pattern recognition will work well.  I recommend MDLM's program to many because the book is an easy read and the steps are easy to understand (which does not necessarily imply that they are easy to implement, since a whole lot of hard work is involved).

Though the discussion here is about adult learning, I know MDLM-like approaches work well with kids as well, and I think the emphasis on tactics and the use of computers for tactics training at a young age is why there are more strong chess kids than ever and why they are stronger at an earlier age than ever as well.

I don't know what has helped me the most. There's no way to separate certain training routines from others in my practice as any given six month period featured several types of problem solving.

Nonetheless, I think the time that spent going through thousands of games looking for positions that I could use taining children probably helped me quite a bit. Books such as Averbakh's helped me identify the patterns that I wanted to include.

I trust Dan Heisman's advice regarding drilling simple patterns. He speaks from a great deal of experience as a chess coach. On the other hand, the professional literature in psychology concerned with development of expertise has identified deliberate practice as a key component. There are several critical elements of deliberate practice, but one that seems relevant to your question is that practice should be focused on the point of failure. Drill should thus comprise those tactics problems just beyond the student"s current level of success.

The three move problems in Manual of Chess Combinations, thus, are too easy for me. Those in Encyclopedia of Chess Combinations, on the other hand, are ideally suited.

http://chessskill.blogspot.com/2015/03/manual-of-chess-combinations.html

Sure.  I will probably do an Amazon review of the Yusupov books and put up a short thread on here about what I think.  Like Ziryab says, doing a bunch of different things together, at the same time, makes it difficult to tell what really worked.  I plan on getting crazy with training over the next couple of months, so I won't be doing any one method in isolation.