Advice to an Improving Adult Player
Must read advice for any adult player looking to improve their game.
Chess Notebook
What do you all use as a chess notebook? Is it solely chessbase, or is it a handwritten notebook or a combination of the two? Would love to hear your feedback. As for me, I’m thinking of using Chessbase but also printing out the diagrams and notes and adding them to a binder for easy…
Annotated Game: Mattison Vs. Nimzovich
Matisons,Hermanis – Nimzowitsch,Aaron [E21] Karlsbad Karlsbad, 1929 [Irving Chernev] The following game so beautifully annotated by Chernev in ‘The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played’ shows the power of centralized knights and rooks on open files. Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Nf3 The Nimzo-Indian defense. 4…Bxc3+ 5.bxc3 d6 6.Qc2 Qe7 7.Ba3 c5 This fixes…
Triangulation
Triangulation refers to a King maneuver which aims to lose a tempo, and leave the opponent with the move. (Dvoretsky) The d5 and d7 square are in correspondence. White in this position can easily “lose” a tempo and place his opponent in zugzwang. 1.Ke5! Kc6 2.Kd4 Kd7 3.Kd5 White has acheived his aim, by creating…
Key Squares
Key squares are squares whose occupation by the King assures victory, regardless of whose turn it is to move. (Dvoretsky) White to move is a draw. It is important to note that a pawn on the 4th rank or below has 3 key squares, whereas a pawn on the 5th rank or higher has six…
Purdy’s Thinking System
This blog has been around for a while, so I will begin promoting older posts to the front page every once in a while, for the benefit of new readers. In Search for Chess Perfection CJS Purdy details his ‘System’ for for evaluating a position and picking a candidate move. I. My turn to move…
Evaluation and Analysis in Chess
Sometimes the definitions for evaluation and calculation are used interchangeably, but they are quite different things, and understanding what they mean is the first step to improving your thinking process during a game. Evaluation: You evaluate a position to determine the strengths and weaknesses of both sides. Based on your evaluation you develop a short…
Chess Symbols
Symbol Meaning # Mate + Check ++ Double check ! Good move !! Excellent move +/= Slight advantage to White =/- Slight advantage to Black +/- Clear advantage to White -/+ Clear advantage to Black +- Winning advantage to White -+ Winning advantage to Black ∞ Unclear ? Bad move ?? Blunder !? Interesting move…
Chess Boards Take Two
We have had to upgrade our bulletin board software due to unwanted spam that was becoming unmanageable with the previous package. Please take a look around the boards, and feel free to contribute.
Becoming a Grandmaster
I have always been interested in the complex process that Grandmaster candidates need to go through to attain their title, so I figured I post it here in case others were curious as well. The Grandmaster title is awarded by FIDE and the requirements as follows: 1. A player must have an ELO of at…