Pic's of me here -- http://www.chess.com/blog/bladezii

Check out my videos. I made them because I enjoy sharing the knowledge.

I started with correspondence chess back in 2001. Family life, living location, and time basically carried me to this outlet. I later joined Chessworld.net, a pretty popular correspondence chess website. Correspondence chess did a colossal effect to my understanding of chess and chess positions.

I learned theory like I have never learned it before. I eventually got to play, study, and learn with players from around the world. Having the time to review the positions over and over over the course of days or weeks is just something you have to try to be able to appreciate fully since words will not do it alone.

Some of my favorite coaches I have had are GM Alexei Dreev, one of the top players in the world in early years of 2000. He put me through the most intensive training sessions using the typical positional and tactical nuances of of positions arising from the Queens Gambit (he is a world expert on the Slav) as well as top-notch end game coaching.

IM Castillo, who did a fantastic job of teaching me some of the best material relevant to maneuvering in certain pawn structures pertinent to a variety of set-ups, with the subtleties of when pawn breaks and advances were to be executed right.

GM Boris Alterman, who tought me to this day what I consider are the best lessons in handling the dragon structures. I took training from him from the Kasparov Chess University. He taught me material par-excellence in handling the two bishops in open and semi-open positions.

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Why did I have chess coaches when I was playing correspondence chess almost exclusively ? In correspondence chess, the better player and better prepared player wins just like in any other form of chess.

How much you understand chess matters.

How well prepared you are in the openings matters a lot in CC, and in my opinion, a lot more than in OTB. In CC once a player achieves an advantage in the opening, they rarely ever let it go, and more often than in OTB, they convert it to a win. How you start the game in CC matters at the high and competitive level of CC (correspondence chess).

End game preparation and knowledge matters.

Knowing what to do in typical structures matters.

Evaluating and judging a position correctly in CC ic CRITICAL. The smallest types of mistakes in your plan or your play can be the last one in a game more often than in OTB.

There is nothing easy about CC. It can be as challenging and as testing as OTB.

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I love closed games. I like strategic games. The positional struggle is what I love most. As you can see from my games, I love the English opening, which I took up because I HATED facing the French with 1.e4

I play the French because I wanted to feel what French players feel when they give 1.e4 players that kind of experience... I don't know if that makes sense, but you have to face the French to understand what I mean.

I also keep my first love, the Sicilian.

Then I went and crossed to 1.d4, and doing that while playing the English made the cross smoother than coming from 1.e4.

I recommend you strive to be able to play 1.e4, 1.d4, 1.c4 at least during some time in your chess life. It help your understanding grow by leaps and bounds.

Favorite players:

Kramnik

Carlsen

Petrosian

Botvinnik

Karpov

Kasparov

I love chess. I love to share.