Study Plans

Okay, so I have managed to raise my self from abysmal to just kind of bad.  I feel like if I want to progress further, I need to study and practice, not just play.

Specifically, what do you guys do to get better at chess, besides playing?  If you study, how specifically do you study?

I dont have a plan, cause i like to be flexible with my chess study, studying when im in the mood to. I believe i study chess about 25 hours each week, play chess about 7 hours a week and chilling on these forums, reading blogs, and stuff like that about 4-5 hours a week. The chilling is mostly for fun, not something i get much better of.

The study hours that your asking to, is:

24 hours a week

* Building my opening repertoire (3 hours)
* Studying middlegame (mostly positional understanding) (10 hours)
* Tactic (7 hours)
* Endgame study (4 hours)

I need to study more endgame, and soon i will go for it. You should study more endgame, and maby not that much middlegame, but thats what i think is what i need.

The way im doing this:

For the openings, i just read (Quiality Chess) opening books, and set in the theory on chessbase 11. An example on this could be Playing the Queens Gambit i red a while ago, here is my review: http://blog.chess.com/SimonSeirup/review-playing-the-queens-gambit-by-lars-schandorff
For the middlegame im currently about finish "The Middlegame" by Euwe witch has alot of material in it to study (Here is a review on part 1/2: http://blog.chess.com/SimonSeirup/review-the-middlegame-book-one---static-features-by-m-euwe-and-h-kramar). Im also doing a bit of Chess Mentor, vids here at chess.com

For the tactics, im mostly doing some tactic books my coach got me from Russia or Germany i believe. I dont know much about it sorry. Other than that, im solving the tactics in "The complete chess workout" witch is nice, and a bit tactic trainer here at chess.com.
For endgame, im solving some studies, my coach gives me, and explain at my weekly OTB lessons. And im also reading Fundamental Chess Endings, witch im using most of the time reading.

Hope you found it informative, questions, just ask. 

Everyday I try to go over tactical puzzles in my book 303 tricky chess tactics and 1001 winning sacrifices and combinations. I've gone over 303 many times, 1001 just once and am half way through it again. My tactics trainer rating is 2610 so I must be doing something right .

Besides that I've gone over The Amateur's Mind by Silman very slowly and carefully a few years ago. Its jumped my rating up 300 uscf at the time.

Really I just figure out what the best books are, buy them, and then go over them when I have time. Right now I'm taking care of Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual. My next books are Endgame Strategy by Shereshevsky and My System by Nimzovich. And of course I continue to study tactics every day, which has been a big help. My rating has just been shooting up lately (OTB haven't been on this site in awhile).

Thanks, great advice.  To go over these books, do you guys actually set up a board and follow along or what?

Yes, of course.

You always want to do tactical puzzle books in your head, or any puzzle books really. It improves your calculation and your tactical vision the best. But if the book is explaining something by going through games, or is saying which moves to play in a position, then I would pull out a chess board and follow along.

I recommend you check out Dan Heisman's Novice Nook column on another web site (which I won't name, since chess.com staff are sometimes touchy about linking to other sites, but google will find it for you). Start with his article entitled "The Four Homeworks". Then read the rest of them. It'll take a while to finish them all, but by the time you're done, you'll have learned a lot, both about chess and more importantly, how to improve at chess.

Probably most chess books will require you to follow along with a chess board, unless you're really good at visualizing the moves in your head (I'm not).  I did it that way until I downloaded Chessmaster, so now I use that program to set up the pieces and move them around to follow what the book is talking about.  It's just simply easier and quicker to follow that way.

You havent tryed hard puzzles then.

If the puzzle is hard, you need to set up the pieces.

Yes of course, but at some point the puzzle gets to hard, and you cant calculate it all in your head. Then you need to set up the pieces, and work through the variations.

See that's my plan once I get through with all of these other books. When I do that I'll be ready to study the opening and grandmaster games. I already go through my own games, but I dont play in enough OTB tournaments for that to be a serious study method.

I'm sorry Simon but I'm gonna have to go with what Conzipe said here. If a puzzle is that hard I just can't do it period. I do force myself to go through all the variations, and sometimes go through them an additional time, until I can see that a line either either works or it doesn't before moving on to the next one. If you practice this way enough, you will not need to work through any tactical puzzle with a board. That doesn't mean I'm always right, but I can calculate pretty far ahead pretty accurately.

Conzipe the last thing you said here is kind of ironic, because I can play blindfold chess. Atleast, I can play well enough to beat 1500 uscf players, haven't tested it on anyone stronger than that.

I dont play through all the moves, just set up the position to look at all variations careful. 

I second the recommendation for Andy Soltis' book Studying Chess Made Easy. It's a great read and will give you lots of good ideas.

I'm getting lots of great advice here, and I much appreciate it.

As I said above, check out the article "The Four Homeworks" from Dan Heisman's Novice Nook column. He's a master and full time professional coach who has coached hundreds of amateur level players over the years, so he's seen the same problems over and over with his students. Basically, he says that the four things any player needs to do to improve are:

1. Play (both blitz and slow, and study your games afterward, preferably with help from stronger players)

2. Tactics puzzles

3. Study well annotated (in words, not variations) master games

4. Other reading

As for doing puzzles with or without a set, I agree that you should try to solve them without moving the pieces around.

But if you do a particularly difficult puzzle, and you're having a hard time visualizing it in your head, then you should play out the solution on the board afterward to make sure you can see why it works. Then set the board back to the starting position, and visualize it again without moving the pieces. If you can't visualize it, then move the pieces again. Repeat until you can visualize not only the moves, but why they work, without moving the pieces. This will help your visualization skill.

I agree with everything Fromper said. Especially the part about doing tactical puzzles. No matter what plan you choose make sure to do those every day.

I picked up both Soltis books.  Thanks for the advice.