Permanent advantages 1. Material advantage 2. Bad king position 3. Passed pawns in the middlegame 4. Weak pawns for the opponent 5. Strong and weak squares 6. Pawn islands 7. Strong pawn center 8. Control of a diagonal 9. Control of a file 10. Bishop pair 11. Control of a rank Temporary advantages 12. Bad…
[Annotator: Bronstein, David] A weakness of the dark squares is also a weakness of the pieces and pawns on the light squares. Light-square weaknesses are also possible, resulting in a weakening of the enemy pieces on the dark squares. The point of an attack on the dark squares is that by placing my pawns and…
White to move 1. Material: White is up a pawn, that is about to Queen. But White cannot defend it. 2. King safety. White’s King is pinned to the light squared bishop. Black’s King is in no immediate danger. 3. Activity: Black’s rook is more active, and his bishop is not pinned like White’s. 4.…
This content was buried in a post for Kotov’s Method for Chess Improvement, and since it is such an important chess improvement tool, I figured I would promote it to its own post. Stoyko Exercises from Dan Heisman’s Exercises page A summary of Stoyko exercise: 1) Find a fairly complicated position 2) Get out a…
It is very important that you have mastered exercises 1-5 before starting on this exercise. For exercises 1-5 visit the chess exercises page. Without looking at the board, tell all the squares controlled by: – a bishop on b2 – a bishop on b7 – a bishop on a5 – a bishop on h4 –…
The purpose of the following list of chess errors, is to assist us to diagnose our weaknesses when we annotate our games. Opening Weaknesses Falling victim to an opening trap Ignoring the development of your pieces Waiting too long to castle Opening inaccuracy Moving the same piece more than once in the opening Calculation Weaknesses…
For exercises 1-4 visit the chess exercises page. It is very important that you have mastered exercises 1-4 before starting on this exercise. Without looking at the board, tell all the squares controlled by: – a bishop on g2 – a bishop on g7 – a bishop on e5 – a bishop on b7 –…
Favorite Chess Blogs 1. Chessvibes : News, tournament reports and endgames studies. 2. Chess for all Ages : A little bit about everything about chess. 3. Chess Training : Not a well known blog, but worth checking out. It is not frequently updated, but when it is the content is exactly what I’m looking for…
I have been going over My System for the past few weeks as part of the study strategy portion of my study schedule. I think the best way to go over the content of the book is to go over The Elements section going over each example carefully. Luckily I have a Chessbase file with…
“If you want to get better at chess you need to place much less emphasis on ‘study’ whereby you increase your knowledge of positions, and place more emphasis on ‘training,’ whereby you try to solve problems, play practice games, or perhaps try to beat a strong computer program from an advantageous position.” (p.25). “Chess skill…