Chess for Beginners

Tag: Lists

  • Best Chess Blogs and Websites

    Below are my favorite chess sites, as well as the top rank websites based on Alexa rank.

    1. The Week in Chess

    2. The Chess Mind

    3. Chess Daily News

    4. Chessdom

    5. Dan Heisman’s Blog on Chess.com

    6. The Chess Improver

    7. Chessvibes

    8. Dana Blog’s Chess

    9. TempoSchlucker

    10. Jim West on Chess

     

    Top Chess Sites based on Alexa rank

    as of 3/1/2017

    1. chess.com #1,181

    2. lichess.org #2,622

    3. Chess24.com  #7,223

    4. Chessbase.com #13,286

    5. chessgames.com #21,437

    6. fide.org #21,932

    7. Chess24.com #28.261

    8. Chesskid.com #44,208

    9. chessbomb.com #46,539

    10. chess365.com 69,395

    11. chessbomb.com #70,198

    12. ICC #93,567

    13. chessdom.com #118,009

    For more chess links visit the Chess Directory. Please leave your suggestions in the comments.

  • 12 Chess Endgame Principles

    12 Chess Endgame Principles

    Chess Endgame1. In the endgame the King is a fighting piece and it should be centralized and used actively.

    2. Material advantage wins in the endgame. Hold on to your material!

    3. Be wary of sacrificing pawns for development. Only in rook and pawn endgames is an active piece worth material.

    4. Try to gain tempi whenever possible, but without giving up material.

    5. The fewer the pieces, the more important the pawns. The closer into the endgame, the more powerful pawns become.

    6. Have a flexible and sound pawn structure. Avoid doubled, isolated and backward pawns.

    7. Passed pawns must be pushed!

    8. An outside passed pawn is an advantage in King and pawn endgames and it is usually a decisive advantage.

    9. Rooks belong behind passed pawns.

    10. In open positions the two bishops are murder. In almost all positions the two bishops give a tangible advantage.

    11. In open or semi-open positions a bishop is usually superior to a knight.

    12. The knight is superior to the bishop in blocked positions or when the bishop is hemmed in by pawns on the same color squares as the bishop.

    Attribution: Edmar Mednis’ Rate Your Endgame Play

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  • A Matter of Technique

    When reviewing master games, the expert annotator usually does not cover the last few moves of the game and attributes the remaining moves to “The rest is a matter of technique.” Well, I came across the following explanation by Mednis in his excellent endgame book Rate Your Endgame Play, on just what exactly is a matter of technique.

    A technique is a procedure used to accomplish a specific activity or task having good technique in chess means:

    • Not allowing counterplay
    • holding on to a material advantage
    • establishing a clear plan and following it
    • being careful
    • not hurrying, with respect to time or moves
    • avoiding unclear or unnecessary complications
    • winning the game

  • Purdy’s Chess Opening Rules

    Below are a few guidelines from C.J.S Purdy on playing the opening. Purdy had an incredible gift of explaning difficult chess concepts, and these rules are no exception. I also haven’t seen these rules in many other chess books, so it is important to learn and apply them in your games.
     
    1. When you don’t play 1.e4 (…e5) early, never block your c-pawn
     
    2. Don’t financhetto a bishop if an avenue is already open to it.

    3. Don’t move any pawns other than e4(e5) or d4(d5) in the opening, the general rule is not to move any until development is complete (minor pieces out and the rooks have been connected and one of them placed on an file that is likely to become open or semi-open). With the following exceptions:

    a. If you have played e4 (…e5) and it is impossible to play d4 (…d5), keep the option of f4  (…f5) and play it if you think the time is right.
     
    b. When a piece has come down to b4 (b5) or g4 (g5), you can ask it to move with a3 (a6) or with  h3(h6). DO NOT PLAY a3(a6) or h3(h6) to stop the piece from coming down, that gives up a move for nothing at all.

    4. An exchange loses a move if the opponent captures with a developing move. This should be avoided unless you have to lose a move in development in any case.

    5. When considering in taking a center pawn the rule is:

    a. If the pawn is threatening to take your pawn or advance and hit a piece, usually take it.
     
    6. When capturing, usually capture towards the center. An exception is when something has to be recaptured on c3 (…c6) or f3(…f6), here it is usually good to take with the center pawn instead of with the flank pawn as that makes an avenue for the bishop that was previously shut in by the center pawn.
     
    7. In the opening never hesitate to exchange a knight for a bishop.
     
    8 Exchange a bishop for a knight in the following scenarios:

    a. If bishop is on b5(b4) or g5(g4) pinning a knight and you are hit by the a or h-pawns, exchange rather than lose a tempo retreating – provided that the opponent cannot recapture with a  developing move.
     
    b. If opponent can recapture with a developing move then you lose a tempo regardless and it is best to maintain the pin by retreating to a4(a5) or h4(h5).

    9.  As a general rule develop all other three minor pieces before the Q-bishop.

    a. Only time to develop the Q-bishop early is when you are White in the Queen’s Pawn Game, and you wish to develop the bishop in one move before playing e3.

    10. Develop the rooks on their most effective files as soon as you can.

    11. The Queen has to be moved off the back rank to free the rooks; but she should usually be moved only one square, to the file that is least likely to be opened (usually e2 (e7) is a good square for the Queen).

    12. It is bad to put a Queen on an open file; it only means the loss of a tempo later, when the file is taken by an enemy rook.

  • The Three Things That Have Improved My Chess

    1. Practising tactics – I cannot stress enough the importance of tactics at the sub 1800 level. If your time is limited, tactics training would be the one thing that would give you the greatest return on investment.

    2. Playing and reviewing my games – This allows you to learn from your mistakes, and to prevent you from repeating your mistakes over and over again. This important training tool provides you with the appropriate feedback loop, so that your chess training is focused on those areas that you need to improve the most.

    3. Revisiting my thought process – Learning more about how other chess players think, and then taking an inventory of my own chess thought process. I documented a process that made sense to me, and then reviewing it while going over positions and / or annotated games.

    Feel free to add a comment of your own list of things that have improved your game.

  • Steinitz's Elements

    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 piece position
    13. Inharmoniously placed pieces
    14. Advantage in development
    15. Concentration of pieces in the center (centralization)
    16. Space advantage