Smack my bishop (into shape!) - The training log

Lucena

Will post some games once I get my computer replaced, whenever that is.

I've decided I'm going to go directly to Yusupov's course, picking up where I left off, who knows how long ago.

I WILL study one chapter a week, starting now. The tactics and game analysis will occupy the rest of the time.

At the rate of one chapter a week, it will take me five years to finish everything, but if I do nothing, the time will pass anyway.

Besides, it's mean to be a complete course, so following it should fill any gaps in existing knowledge, and build on that.

Ok, I'm going to study some chess.

YEE-HA!!

Valmont

What book are you studying?

Lucena

Build up your chess: The Fundamentals 1

I think it's the same one you're studying.

Valmont

I'll be curious to see how quickly you get through it considering the gulf between our ratings.

Lucena

I'll keep you updated.

Started on chapter 7 last night, did all the examples and will try to do some of the problems tonight. Looking through some of the earlier chapters, some of the stuff seemed ridiculously easy, and some other stuff more challenging. Hopefully that's a sign of gaps in knowledge being filled in, and not that the material is all over the place.

Lucena

Reasons why I don't train as much as I'd like to - Chapter 1 - The joys of being a captain!

Spent an hour and a quarter Monday night ringing different club members to try a get a team together for Sunday. I needed a mere THREE people, grand so, I'll ring X, Y and Z, they'll play, and I'll get back to doing more important stuff. OH NO YOU DON'T!!!

"I'm sorry, I'm invited to dinner that day"
"I'm sorry, taking my wife away for the weekend"
etc. each call taking 5-10 minutes between the small talk and discussing our chances for the season.

Must've rang 8 people, left messages, had one ring me back while I was on the phone with someone else, ring him back.

GMs don't know how lucky they are to not have to deal with this.

cdeb

I think my record is having to go through 22 players to fill an 8-man team.

It's kind of worth it when your two Bodley subs pick up 2/2 in a Heidenfeld match.

I did have another match where I had four Bodley players in a match against the eventual Heidenfeld winners that season. That didn't go quite so well...

Lucena

Did six of the 12 end of chapter problems last night. Yusupov insists that you set up each problem on the board, and then play through the solution once you've written it down, including all relevant variations. I find setting up the position takes a lot of time, especially when on some of the easier problems, you could pretty much get the answer by looking at the diagramme in the book.

Still, Yusupov knows a bit more about training than I do, so I assume the fact of playing it out on the board 'burns' the information into your brain better than just glancing at the solution and going 'yep, got that one right'.

mikhail

Lucena wrote: »

Still, Yusupov knows a bit more about training than I do, so I assume the fact of playing it out on the board 'burns' the information into your brain better than just glancing at the solution and going 'yep, got that one right'.

It's not strictly necessary, but it's a decent attempt to avoid the pitfall of "reading and nodding", as Jonathan Rowson calls it (though I think he was quoting someone else.

Lucena

According to this site:

http://exeterchessclub.org.uk/content/learning-opening-lines

"Reading and nodding is not learning", says Jonathan Rowson (after Nigel Davies), and he's absolutely right.

Valmont

I'm finding the three star problems very time consuming. First I have to find several winning variations, calculate them all, and the write each one down. This one has me stumped at the moment (I'm thinking Bxf7) but I can't resist my urge to play e5, Nc3, or O-O. This is the chapter on openings.

checknraise

That is a line from the Giuoco Piano when black plays Bb6? instead of Bb4+. I usually play d5 in a similar position and hope black plays Na5, after Bd3 black has problems defending the knight. If black moves anywhere else we gain another tempo with e5. Everything looks good for white.

Lucena

Finished chapter 7 tonight. Just one point off full marks for the chapter. Hopefully I can keep up this 'one chapter a week' lark.

In other news, my divine punishment has finally arrived, with the loss of 25 points from that shocking tournament in September. New rating: 1702

Lost another game this afternoon (4-board team match) against an 1850. I had black against White's Catalan (didn't know it was a Catalan until after the game!) I just couldn't concentrate properly as I was also the arbiter. Usually nothing happens, but this time there was a semi-accusation of cheating 'I'd just like to point out that two of your team mates are having a long chat outside'. Created a bad vibe for a bit.

I also had two different people wander into the club looking for info on joining (which is good) but as the game was underway, I had to go outside with them and give them all the info on joining, opening hours, lessons etc. Which all took away from my concentration (and time on the clock).

Valmont

What's your chesstempo rating, Lucena? I'm starting to think tactics are what I'm really missing in my game at the moment. It would also explain how my brilliant looking positions tend to fall apart almost every time I manoeuvre into them.

Lucena

My standard chesstempo rating is 1787.

And yourself?

Valmont

1510. My average time to complete the puzzles is not healthy either but I can feel my tactical intuition slowly growing!

Lucena

Have done exactly nothing this week. Very busy at work, Monday and Tuesday finished at 11pm and 1am (8am starts) and then was too wrecked to do anything in the evenings. Am playing this afternoon in the local individual championship, the pairings were made two weeks ago, but I haven't done any prep i.e. don't even know what my opponent plays. Ah well, I'll just have to wing it.

Not really motivated either, had a lot of crap to deal with during the week on the chess organising front.

I'll get a bit of study done tomorrow hopefully, nothing else planned.

Lucena

A draw against a 1650 with white. He played the Berlin, I know nothing about this opening. Did ok, got into time trouble and even tried to play Ne4 to c2 (tiredness) but ended up in level endgame.

Lucena

Managed to finish the examples on Chapter 8 'Centralizing the Pieces'. It's the first chapter where I feel I didn't really learn anything, probably because the topic is a lot more complex than typical mating patterns. The examples were interesting, winning player organises his pieces, threatening stuff all the way.

Did the first two problems, or should I say, tried to. Spent at least 30 minutes on each, was completely stuck for ideas, had a guess but was miles off. Very depressing. If I spend this long on each problem, I'll be lucky to finish another couple of chapters by Christmas.

This book is meant to be for people trying to make it to 1500, and as a 1700 I'm struggling. Still, it was only two problems, we'll see how the rest of the chapter goes.

Valmont

Lucena wrote: »

Did the first two problems, or should I say, tried to. Spent at least 30 minutes on each, was completely stuck for ideas, had a guess but was miles off. Very depressing. If I spend this long on each problem, I'll be lucky to finish another couple of chapters by Christmas.

I'm having the same experience with chapter three. I have two A4 foolscap pages of lines I thought might be close to getting me the three stars for one or two of the problems but I only got one star for the most basic move. Even though it's slow progress with the book I think it's definitely educational - I think you force yourself into looking deeper than you usually would in a game or with a tactics puzzle.

I'm definitely not looking forward to chapter eight if you're finding it so tough!

Lucena

Finished Chapter 8 of Yusupov last weekend. I've never had my ego crushed so badly. Ended up getting 4 points out of twenty-something. Still, I've noted the ones I've got wrong and will do them again when I finish the book.

Finished Chapter 9 (Mates in Two) yesterday. How hard can that be? Tricky enough, most of the positions only had a couple of pieces and nearly no pawns, so a lot of different moves to calculate, especially the ones with queens. Got most of these right (yeah!) and feel my calculation has improved.

Played a terrible game two weeks ago (Black missed a win on move 23, see if you can spot it!)

http://www.chess.com/blog/Binouzenours/how-to-play-badly-and-still-draw

I'm probably not getting enough tactics in my diet.

brianhere

Bishop to f2?

Lucena

Just did a heap of problems on chesstempo, and gained 74 points!

Is that from working stuff out with a board and a Yusupov book? I hope so!

If you're reading this brianhere, I've changed the move number to 23 (I had it incorrectly as 26).

caissa007

23____Qa7 24. Qd4 Bb6 ?

Lucena

caissa007 wrote: »

23____Qa7 24. Qd4 Bb6 ?

That's it. Needless to say, not the high point of my chess career.

brianhere

Lucena wrote: »

That's it. Needless to say, not the high point of my chess career.

Yes I guess it's pretty obvious alright although we all make mistakes!

Valmont

Why did you draw? Could you have taken advantage of your pawn on f3? I took five minutes on black's missed win and did not spot it!

Lucena

Valmont wrote: »

Why did you draw? Could you have taken advantage of your pawn on f3? I took five minutes on black's missed win and did not spot it!

Short answer: I was rattled. I'd played an illegal move earlier in the game (N on e4 to c2!) and was very unsure of myself afterwards. It was probably my first ever illegal move in a long game. I'd also seen the tactic Bb6 at the last second ( 24. Qd4?? Bb6). So when the draw was offered, I took the practical choice.

Lucena

I'm really not making much headway. Read Chapter 10 this week, and have only had the time so far to do three of the twelve problems. I'm enjoying the work, but I just don't have the time to do enough. At this rate I should finish the book by Christmas 2015.

Played a competetive game today, did ok out of the opening even though I'm not very sure of the theory, having recently changed some of my repertoire. Managed to get to a winning ending and then made a complete balls of it. Will hopefully stick the game up tomorrow if I get a bit of time. It's only the second time in a couple of months that I've gone attacking with the king away from the centre when he should be staying in the centre and dominating from there. At least I'm detecting a pattern!

In other news, I dropped 6 points in November and am now down to 1696, an 18-month low, although this is probably just the bobbing cork effect.

Lucena

Well, haven't updated this in a while. Baaaad Lucena!

Have done five chapters of Yusupov's book since my last post, which considering Christmas was in the middle of that is pretty good! I feel definite benefits from working through the material. I'm definitely considering a broader range of moves than before, considering more possibilities, and my calculation seems to be sharper. Currently working on Chapter 16 (Queen vs lone pawn endgames) which I feared would be a bit dry, but I'm enjoying it. I'm also delighted by the realisation that I'm more than half way through the book, the end seems to be in sight. The important thing is, like most endeavours, to just keep going, work regularly, and eventually the goal will be reached.

Gained some points back, am now rated 1711 (the cork has bobbed back up again).

I really should post on here more often, keep me motivated.

Finally I provide, for your entertainment, a bad loss against a 1900 player.

http://www.chess.com/blog/Binouzenours/january-2015---a-bad-loss

I had planned to play a weekender this weekend, but the weather scuppered those plans, so ended up arbiting a schools championship instead.