According to Mark Dvoretsky the analysis of one’s own games is the main means of self-improvement. In Secrets of Chess Training Dvoretsky offers the following guidelines:
Find the turning points – Decide where mistakes were made, where the evaluation of the position changed or an opportunity...
According to Johnathan Rowson in his book Chess for Zebras we can develop chess skill through a combination of playing combined with chess training, where ‘training’ means working things out by ourselves. The main skill a chess player needs is skill in making decisions so making decisions is what...
Black to move (Stefanova – Shirov 2005)
r3rq1k/8/p2p3p/P1pPnp1P/1p3Q2/5PNR/1PP2K2/R7 b – - 0 29
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Evaluation
The first thing I did was to evaluate this position, and I gave it the following evaluation: Material =, King Safety +/=, Activity =/+, Pawn Structure =. So the game in my...
A frequent issue confronted by amateurs is wishful thinking when calculating combinations. This propensity to fabricate beneficial scenarios in our analysis is very typical throughout an amateur’s game, but it is most dangerous when calculating combinations.
You see a pretty combination worthy of Tal,...
