stuck at 1000

Does anyone have any good tips besides doing a lot of tactics, to help me reach 1200 & stay there? Or will doing tactics like let's say 30+ a day, will be sufficient in reaching my goal? I'm new and I don't read chess books or analyze my games as both of those things are time consuming.

Tactics are a good start, but they can only do so much. You need to understand positions. If you don't like books or analyzing games have you considered hiring a coach? That could save you time.

I can't figure out how to reply to you but coaching sounds expensive, if that's the other option I'd rather analyze games and watch YouTube videos.

There was a similar thread a few days ago - most people said tactics, tactics, tactics at that level - I may have changed my mind and now agree with tactics, but - since you did say you want to do something besides tactics... :) I think endgames is at least equally important as tactics, so you can decide how to shape the game to a workable endgame, also opening theory, not really specific openings, but things like fighting for control of the center, mobilizing pieces, king safety, etc. so that you can survive the opening even if your opponent plays something strange. Also checkmate patterns, obviously, but that’s kind of tactics too. Those I think are the main thing, and then start working on building an opening reproit and specific attacking ideas in your favorite openings. - I’m not a super strong player mind you - around 14-1500, but that’s advice given to me by much stronger players.

Playing a lot and doing tactics puzzles should be 90% of your chess time at that level. But for the other 10%, I recommend two books:

Silman's Complete Endgame Course is organized to be easy for beginners to just read and learn from the first chapter or two, then put it aside to learn the rest later, when you're higher level.

Chernev's Logical Chess: Move by Move will help you understand opening and middle game positions better, so you can improvise better moves early in the game and hopefully get into better positions where the tactics will favor you, not your opponent.

 

Check your pieces are safe. And read dan heisman.

play chess with much better players and get beaten a lot - get thumped as much as possible.

Pay attention to your moves and your opponents moves. Should be over 1200 in no time.

At 1000, your main issue is most likely piece safety. At that rating, here are things that helped me

1. Watch out for very quick mating traps

2. Don't leave material undefended

3. don't lose sight of your diagonals

4. Watch out for knight forks.

 

Learn how to properly defend yourself against those quick mate in 2's, and ALWAYS, ALWAYS make sure your material is defended before making any move. Tactics will help, sure, but right now, board awareness will easily get you out of 1000 I guarantee. In that range, players almost always straight up blunder pieces away.

I'm not gonna pretend I have all the answers but here is how i did it: 1. I reduced the number of simultanious games from 15 to playing 3-4 games at the time. 5 at most. 2. I started concentrating and really analysing the game before each move. Skipping all the quick moves you do on your phone while standing in line to pay for groceries with a crying kid on your arm etc. 3. As I played I try to have an overall focus on three things: A. Dominate the center of the board. B. Develop your pieces. C. Protect your king 4. I started playing the same opening every game. Yes, the same opening in EVERY game. After 50 games.. 100 games.. 200 games.. 300 games with the same opening you start to know that opening like the back of your hand. You indentify the hazards and you know what moves to play no matter what your opponent does. Removing all the mistakes in the opening gets you into the end game in a lot better shape, which again results in you winning more games. 5. When I felt like I had mastered that one opening I moved to another. I found another opening and played that for 200 games in a row.. when I mastered that one I found a third opening etc A year ago my rating was roughly 1250. Now I have stabilised around 1500. Again; I'm not saying this is the best way to do it but atleast it worked for me

You are doing tactics in the wrong way. According to your status, you spend like 30 seconds each problem, which is ridiculous. Don't worry about rating, worry about getting the problem right.

If you aren't willing to invest some time to analyze your games in order to learn from your mistakes then you won't improve much. If you don't have the patience for this then chess is not the game for you, at least if you want to get better at it.

Do you have a chess club with 1400 level players? Ask them to teach you basic checkmates such as king and rook. Also buy Weapons of Chess, by Pandolphini, to get a very broad fast intro to positional chess. To get to 1400, yes, you have to do tactics problems, though I recommend textbooks that explain each motif with examples and then give problems that start easy and build up. Get the book by Littlefoot if you can find it. Otherwise Lev Alburt.

When I met my first and only chess couch, rated 1250, he won about 3/5 games against me. So likely I was around 1000. I think part of why I was even that high was my parents bought me a chess tactics book for a trip we went on. It kept me quiet. Before then I won games by queening lots of pawns and hoping I don't stalemate. There was so much I still did know then, like how to checkmate with a king and rook. Even my friend, who almost caught up to me in tactics, wins a few pieces off me, I still make him prove he can checkmate with the material. Most 1000 rated players don't know how to win against a king and rook with their king and two rooks, and just check me till they give up. The way I got to 1400 was by studying 4-5 chess books, on endgames, tactics, checkmates, positional chess, and openings. Playing stronger players helps, but books are better.

Possibly of interest:
Simple Attacking Plans by Fred Wilson (2012)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090402/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review874.pdf
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Simple-Attacking-Plans-77p3731.htm
Logical Chess: Move by Move by Irving Chernev (1957)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708104437/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/logichess.pdf
The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played by Irving Chernev (1965)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/most-instructive-games-of-chess-ever-played/
Winning Chess by Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld (1948)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708093415/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review919.pdf
Back to Basics: Tactics by Dan Heisman (2007)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708233537/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review585.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-back-to-basics-tactics
Discovering Chess Openings by GM John Emms (2006)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627114655/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen91.pdf
Openings for Amateurs by Pete Tamburro (2014)
http://kenilworthian.blogspot.com/2014/05/review-of-pete-tamburros-openings-for.html
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/openings-for-amateurs/
https://www.mongoosepress.com/catalog/excerpts/openings_amateurs.pdf
Chess Endgames for Kids by Karsten Müller (2015)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/chess-endgames-for-kids/
http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/Chess_Endgames_for_Kids.pdf
A Guide to Chess Improvement by Dan Heisman (2010)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708105628/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review781.pdf
Studying Chess Made Easy by Andrew Soltis
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090448/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review750.pdf
Seirawan stuff:
http://seagaard.dk/review/eng/bo_beginner/ev_winning_chess.asp?KATID=BO&ID=BO-Beginner
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708092617/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review560.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-winning-chess-endings
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627132508/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen173.pdf
http://www.nystar.com/tamarkin/review1.htm

 hello,

i have been on here since sept 2016 and started with a rating of around 600 on blitz, now i am around 1200. my lessons are around 1700, 30 minutes chess around 1300.

do the free lessons and tactics everyday, play everyday. 

i have read a few books. logical chess by chernev is a good one.

i have discovering chess openings and simple attacking plans. working through the latter at the moment.

keep playing and you should improve.

there are a lot of things that people mention. one is to follow general principles, this can be tricky as each game will provide different challenges and knowing when to ignore these principles is what would help you improve.

i forgot to include the lessons that came with the grandmaster edition of chessmaster. i think it was called chessmaster. it had josh waitzkin narrating lessons. i worked through the lessons which is why i shot up on the lessons on here.