You're playing all this blitz and bullet...how are you going to improve playing at that speed? It's not possible for anyone to play their best game at 3/2 or 1/1, you are playing on intuition with only seconds to think about each move. To get better you need to see more and understand more and to do that you need to look longer and look harder.
Makes sense! I will get started on some rapid games today. Thanks for the tip!
Yeah, a big part of improving is reviewing your mistakes, and thinking about them.
Like:
"why, specifically, is the move I made a mistake in the first place?"
"why did I make this mistake, what ideas or things in the position was I thinking of (and not thinking of) at the time?"
"what strategies will I use so that in the future I wont make this same mistake again?"
For example, maybe you didn't see a bishop in a far away corner could capture your piece. It's not enough to think "oops" you have to try and understand it. "I often miss long line moves" or "I was too focused on my idea and I forgot about what my opponent could do" and then strategies like "I'm going to routinely check my opponent's back rank and the sides of the board for sneaky far away pieces" or "when my opponent has a bishop on g2, I'm going to put pawns on the light squares, and avoid putting any of my pieces on d5, c6, b7, a8."
---
You make mini lessons for yourself this way, and at first they wont seem to help, but do it day after day, and even within a week you'll start avoiding mistakes you would have normally made.
Also great insight. I'm going to start writing down what I learn from reviewing my games, and look for overall weaknesses in my play. Hopefully this will help me identify these weaknesses and stick with a plan to remedy them. Thank you! This helps more than you know.
Your tactics are lacking - in this game https://www.chess.com/live/game/7431108267?username=gm_goonsby after 8.Qe1 Nd3 wins on the spot because of the DISCOVERED CHECK!. And stop falling for fried liver stuff. after Ng5 please, go d5 and after exd5 play NA5! That is what you do against Ng5.
And NXF2 was a bad move. Two minor pieces are almost ALWAYS better than a rook and a pawn. And I don't know what was on your opponents head with qe1. he should have taken on f2 with rook and then with king.
Your tactics are lacking - in this game https://www.chess.com/live/game/7431108267?username=gm_goonsby after 8.Qe1 Nd3 wins on the spot because of the DISCOVERED CHECK!. And stop falling for fried liver stuff. after Ng5 please, go d5 and after exd5 play NA5! That is what you do against Ng5.
Your right. After that game I studied the Traxler and the normal Fried Liver Defense, practiced the lines in the opening explorer, hopefully it sticks! Thanks for the tip!
I have been playing chess for a decent amount of time - for fun since I was a kid on and off, and fairly seriously for the past year. I have been very active on this website and others for the year of 2020. I have watched tons of videos on opening preparation, done a fair amount of checkmate training, read a book called "The Big Book of Chess" by Eric Schiller, as well as doing my tactics. One thing I have not done is play rapid games (or any longer time formats); I either play bullet or blitz or daily. My daily record isn't terrible, however not great.
I have never really been able to break 1000 rating points, and starting to get pretty frustrated at my play. Am I hopeless? I generally like to think I am a pretty logical thinker. However, admittedly, I have terrible visual pattern recognition (I have taken tests online). But I'm not convinced that my problem is pattern recognition.
I feel like I have followed most of all the tips I have heard for training and progressing in the game. But for whatever reason I don't seem to be improving. What am I missing in my training? Have I hit a brick wall, and shouldn't expect to raise my rating? I love the game, but my lack of growth has really been discouraging me lately. Any tips or insight?
Thanks!
Knowledge and skills are different. I made a post about the most important habit you can form in chess. Without it you wont improve much no matter how much you know.
https://www.chess.com/forum/view/for-beginners/the-most-important-concept-for-all-beginners
Woah, this is exactly what I was looking for. Really well laid out lesson, great communication for beginners. I will be taking that lesson to heart. Thank you so much for sharing! I think that this will really help me with my calculation. I don't spend enough time looking for weaknesses and coming up with a plan to take advantage of my opponents mistakes. Thank you so much!