Break.............

Taking a break from blogging.....................! Good luck to you all!

Theory vs Practice - Queen vs 2 rooks

In my last blogspot , I posed a question on who wins in that battle of Q vs 2P; I was more interested in 'how' though. AOX replied with Qh2, there was no Qh2 as it was black to move (and not white).  AOX sealed the discussion though, by mentioning that the King should move towards f4. Correct. That game was one I played as White. Either way, White had a very strong chance of win but definitely had to know 'how'. There was a fair chance of a misstep, taking into consideration that we are dealing with players rated around 1500, and one wrong step may cause difficulty for white and end up as a draw. I don't think there was a win for Black either way as the best chance was a draw.

I was reviewing game 5 of World Chess Championship with my students. At the above position, it is obvious that Carlsen had a knight vs Anand's bishop. Carlsen had double pawns as well. When I review games with my students, we do it OTB 1st. After we finish the game review OTB, we switch to  the computer review. When we were reviewing the above position OTB, obviously the students mentioned the 2 'weaknesses' about Carlsen's position. When we switched on the computer review, Houdini didn't show any significant disadvantage for Black.

Again in game 6 (position below), it is obvious that Carlsen is battling with double pawns on his side. The machines did not show any weakness though.

I was playing a tournament game with a ~ USCF 1600 rated player (higher than my rating).  I won this game comfortably. When we were reviewing this game after it was over, we paused at this stage where I was left with a Queen & a Rook whereas my opponent was left with 2 rooks and 2 bishops (position below, White to move). We calculated the piece values and my opponent said he should won if not for the mistakes he made. The value of the pieces was higher for him, but I said I will win 9 times out of 10 if I have the queen. We argued back and forth, he refused to believe that having a Queen was superior to having 2 rooks. Because theoretically, 2 rooks have more value than a Queen. Does it work like that though?

I will show you one more example. This time I am illustrating a higher rated game, not at the 1500 - 1600 level. A tournament game between a US National Master vs another similar rated player (not NM, but slightly below). Black had 2 rooks, a bishop, a knight and 4 pawns. White (National Master) had a queen, a rook and 5 pawns. Picture below, Black to move. They did not have any advantage with the positioning of the pieces or the pawns. Black made a mistake very soon, was down a piece and never recovered and White won comfortably from that stage.

In all the above games, the machines are showing that neither side has significant advantage. It is very easy to look at the computer analysis and say that the positions are even. But, is it that easy and straightforward? What do you think?

At the level (1600/ 2200/ Super GM) these games were played, does the inadequacies (having knight vs bishop/ double pawns/ Queen vs 2 rooks) matter? Or not? My opinion is that the inadequacies do matter in practice though in theory the positions are even.

May not matter so much at the Super GM (Carlsen/ Anand) level or the Koumoudo/ Stockfish 3500 rated level. But, the inadequacies do matter below the 2500 rating level, they make a difference.

Even though the positions are even, it is hard for the player with double pawns to chalk out a win. It is easy for the player with a bishop to win vs the opponent's knight in the end game. It is easy for the player with the queen to win vs the opponent with 2 rooks. In my honest opinion, it is an excuse for my 1600 rated opponent to think that "I made a mistake, otherwise 2 rooks can match the queen". My opponent had to coordinate 4 pieces while I was at ease to slide my queen all over the board to take out the pawns and pieces with forking the king and the pieces. I think for a 1600 rated player, it is very hard to coordinate 4 pieces when playing with an opponent with a queen and a rook. FYI, me and my opponent replayed the game from that position and I won again. I even offered to play with 2 of my pawns off the board. Not just 1600 rated level, I have shown you above a game involving a NM as well to support my point of view.

Discuss......



Q vs 2P endgame puzzle

Black to move, who wins? or draw? Based on the natural  assumption that a Queen is better than 2 pawns, white has the psychological edge. Sure? We will discuss in the comments section. This is a ~ 1500 rated problem.

Delighted to lose - Mate in few

You teach your students all tactics, give suggestions. You play games with them. You watch them trying to get better than you. You start playing a game with your 8 year old student. All of a sudden you watch him smile and tell you that you will be checkmated. You sigh and continue playing but get checkmated in few...

I encountered such a situation today in practice. I played this game today (my rating swings between 1400 - 1500 just FYI) with one of my students, 8 yr old. He said you lost the game, well I couldn't figure that even when he said that. Ha! Black to move, Mate in few (you figure that out....!).

I have few posers to you:

1) Try solving this problem - Black to move
2) Tell me the rating of this tactic (Don't tell me I shouldn't be rated around 1400 hahaha.....)
3) I guess I have to admit and accept that this student is beyond my skill. He is 8 yr old and has been growing very fast in chess. What should I do with him?

Nevertheless, it is delight to see him do tactics everyday. It is a delight to see him yell that he solved XYZ puzzle while he does that. That is all one thing but I was delighted to see him show his skills in a game to beat me to pulp and laugh at me. I couldn't help but smile back at him......

Blunders and silence.....

There are blunders, there are bad blunders, there are worse blunders and then there are absolute blunders. I am just kidding! Blunders are blunders no matter which piece you lose. It could be due to oversight, it could be due to lost focus.

 

It is one thing to make a blunder when you are down in pieces and position and another thing to make a blunder when you are up. See below photo. White is up nicely and just has to push his pawns down. No big deal. No resistance actually! Comfortable position. Instead, blunders to take f7 pawn.

 

 

 

A one off mistake, right? Anyone can make a blunder, even Grandmasters have made blunders. What if the same player does make another blunder like this in the same tournament. The player is rated ~ 1300 FYI. So, this is not a beginner making such blunders.

 

I often see players getting restless having worked too hard. It is appropriate for every player to peak right at the tournament. If the player peaks before the tournament, then we can just sigh off. Sometimes if the players peaks off few days before the tournament, and then pushes too hard before the tournament, such blunders do happen.

 

What do you do when you see such blunders repeating in practice games? And then tournament games? What do you do? The ideal thing is to take few days off (= silence), relax in life, after that keep practice to a minimum and then play lower rated players in tournaments to win confidence. When you gain confidence, step in. The bad mistake would be to continue to test yourself in tournament games when you continue such blunders. You will lose badly and then it will devastate your confidence.

 

When you make blunders, silence is all that is needed. There is time to work hard, then there is time for silence, in life!

Having fun at the Tournnaments?

Chess tournaments =

intense competition,

testing your (latest) mastered skills,

excitement of ratings increase,

rush of tactics,

tiebreaks,

strategy run,

trophies,

prizes,

awards,

 pairings

 etc etc etc and etc.

Do you have fun at the Tournaments?

What kind of fun?

What if you were a player?

What if you are a coach or a parent?

If you are a player, what do you do in between games?

Do you tour places if you are playing a multiday tournament?


Kids have lot of fun at the tournament. See photo below, it is a common sight that kids want to play with chess pieces building towers. It is a joy to watch the kids play chess seriously. It is a joy to watch kids running around at the tournament venue playing with each other. Kids who go to higher ratings miss this kind of fun. As the ratings go higher, they move into adult/ open tournaments where they cannot mingle with kids anymore. That kind of sucks the fun out of their tournaments. It is our responsibility as parents and coaches to find fun for them in multiple ways = take them to movies they like, take them to places like Disneyland for tournaments, bribe them with goodies etc. Ofcourse, these kids with good ratings do deserve bribes. :)) 

Sometimes it does get boring if  the games are scheduled at a specific time instead of asap. Sometimes chess tournaments are outdoor events, especially when they are in summer and when they are at a sports festival. Parents do talk about what is going on with their kids at schools. Coaches talk about the latest, exciting and new rise of talented players. Sometimes players do use chess tournaments as social gatherings, usually at club levels.




Chess is a serious game. But, it all boils down to saying that we should have fun no matter what type of sport we are playing. Have fun irrespective of the results.....!


p.s: What chess piece do you see the above 1st paragraph as? :D

Speed thrills....

 

In the last few months, I lost games that I should draw against; I drew games that I should win. As a result, my USCF rating dropped ~ 200 points. Age catching up? Loss of focus? Worldly problems? I didn't know. For one or two matches, I didn't care so much. Actually any player can lose 200 points from the peak, no big deal. But, the player should know the quality of his game over a period of time.

 

Last week, I was playing a game against a player who was 300 points higher. I was unable to see more than 1 move ahead. I couldn't see any tactics. I very well know that is not who I am.

 

So, I put myself to a test. I opened chesstempo.com, started doing tactics. I don't practice tactics myself regularly. I teach  tactics to students, analyze games but don't do tactics or puzzles as a habit myself. I do tactics occasionally though. When I started doing tactics on chesstempo.com, my rating dropped 250 points one day. I was shocked this time. Dropping points on USCF is one thing, because we can lose games based on many factors. But, chesstempo is another thing. It only involves your thought process to do tactics and nothing else. I looked back on what I was doing wrong....

looked at the big picture.

 

Like everyone else in this world, I am also a slave to my mobile phone. Not so much as everyone else, I think. I don't do texting, nothing. But, when we have a smart phone and we have tools that we can do, we won't sit quiet. Chess.com app, other chess apps made their way into my smart phone in the last few months. So, I started playing 30 min games on chess.com. Then, I started playing 5 min games. I played 100s of them in the last 2 - 3 months. It thrills to play speed chess. We don't waste too much time to finish one game, we don't need to wait for the other person for a long time. And we can play many games in one hour. I didn't give 2nd thought on what I was losing by playing Blitz games.....

 

 

 

If I am not wrong, playing blitz is what has been killing my ability to think properly. Hikaru Nakamura is the king of speed chess (he recently lost those titles as well), but many famous players are of the opinion that speed chess is what is holding Nakamura from becoming World No. 1.

 

So, what is the comparison between Nakamura and me? Nothing much except both of us are chess players. I think speed chess affects players of all levels. World class players to beginners. During speed chess, we don't have the time/ chance to frame and think tactics too much. We just play on our intuition. To be precise, it even kills our tactics skills.

 

Just my honest opinion.

 

So, are there no benefits to playing Blitz games? I think there are!! We want to practice openings. We could do that against a software in a computer. But, if we want to do it against humans, we can do by playing Blitz games. If you want to practice variations in long games against humans, it is possible but takes a long time. Other than this, I don't see much of value in Blitz games. At least to me, my style of game. Other players may have different thoughts, others may see value in Blitz. I respect their opinions......

 

I stopped playing lot of Blitz games immediately. I still do, because I have the craving but I reduced that habit a lot in the last few days. Instead, I am practicing tactics on chesstempo.com  ....We will see how my rating graphs goes....

 

Ciao! 

 

 

 

 

Playing too fast......

I posted here ~ couple of months back that my student broke the USCF 1,000 rating barrier after a plateau. He worked hard in summer session when his school was closed = worked on tactics (on chesstempo.com, polgar puzzles, other popular chess puzzle books...), played practice games with computers, with me,  and with other players = learnt quite a lot. As a result, his ability did improve. As we discussed before, ability does not always reflect in the ratings. But, in this day and age, there are tools to measure performance wisely. Some of the tools are, ofcourse again chesstempo.com tactics rating, chess.com standard rating, games with computer software etc. These tools will roughly provide an estimate of the players' performance even if the player does not play USCF OTB tournaments. So, even without playing USCF tournaments, I can say that his performance did improve a lot. However, he did play USCF tournaments in summer. His rating has risen to USCF 1254 and when the current tournament gets rated, his rating should be close to USCF 1,300. He will be rated in the Top 100 USCF players for his age group when USCF lists the players next time ~ October 1st. Which is quite an achievement for a player who started learning chess only ~ a year back. I expect him to plateau around this level for a while, but let's see. We never know...Sometimes a player's ability is less than OTB rating while at other times the players' perform lower than their ability OTB. Our next goal before his next Birthday is for him to break into the top 50 players for his age group. 

I am rated @ USCF 1,500. Last year around this time, I used to win 80% of the matches between us. Right now, he wins 70% of them. I am finding it to be increasingly difficult to win against my student. I can see the day when he will never let me win, very soon in future.  Now, let's focus on our this blog's title topic from here. 

Select any sport; When a player finds something too easy, he will try to hasten things. Same goes in chess. When the player is not thinking too much, he tends to play fast. When the player is playing fast, mistakes do start to happen. But, didn't I say we solved the problem of playing too fast? Now, our player is playing too fast once again. Ofcourse, at a higher level of game/ tactics. As a result, his  performance (eg: chesstempo) is falling about ~ 25 points lower. I don't just look at the performance. I told my student that irrespective of how higher he goes on the rating graphs, I am also looking at the aspect of him playing slowly. Regardless of the difficulty of the problem, my player is trying to rush solving those puzzles. If we ignore simple mistakes, those mistakes will cause the performance to slow/ drop at some time. Now, we need speed breaks to slow him down. I believe I can apply some tools to slow him down now. All my player needs is space to think. I believe I can apply 2 tools: the first one is checkmates exercise and another is from chessgym (find pieces under attack) which was suggested by  AoxomoxoA wondering as well. I believe these 2 types of exercises will give some challenge to my player and get him to think = slow him down. I plan to let my student do these exercises for 15 mins each in the morning and evening. More on how this works in a few weeks time....

Looking for defensive tactics' resources....

Calling out to all bloggers out there...

Most of the resources (chess.com tactics trainer/ chess tempo/ Polgar puzzles/ any other tactics book) that we have for Tactics training are geared towards attack on the opponent. Among the tactics trainers/ puzzles from above sources, they cover defensive aspect of the tactics only about 10 - 15% at best, I feel. Rest of it 85% is geared towards attacking the opponent's pieces. There are very few books like Solits' "Art of Defense" available but these are also not so good.  

As a result, most budding players often know how to attack but are poor defenders. Most of my students have varying strength in defense vs attack. If they are rated 1200 in attacking tactics, they would be at 800 rating on defensive tactics.

I would like to know from you all any resources that concentrate on defensive side of tactics. I am looking for a complete tactics book with many puzzles/ exercises which covers Defensive tactics better like ~ 50% defensive tactics and 50% attacking tactics. Or please suggest me a website if possible.

Thanks...

Does it work or does it not?

On this blog, I will be posting interesting things about chess, interesting details of my students and all I want to talk about chess.

My 1st post is about one of my students. He missed basic backrank mates...Read below.

Does this program work? I don't know but my student has definitely improved by working heavily on tactics in the past 2 months. My 8 year old student hit USCF rating  ~1,000 within 6 months of starting to learn chess, and within 2 months of playing rated chess games. He learnt chess in the summer of 2013, and by Jan 2014, his rating was at 1054 USCF. We were shocked, for sure on the sudden rise to this rating. He just started playing OTB tournaments, chess was so new to him, how can he scale a rating of 1,000 within few months of getting introduced to the game? We did not know how to work on learning the lessons of chess. We did not know what was important to actually play better. He was still making blunders. He was resigning due to lack of confidence, he was resigning a lot. Games that he could win, games where he was only down a couple of pawns. He was playing fast. He missed basic back rank mates...No amount of instruction (before the game) helped. When the game started, he would play fast. Most of it was emotional. And lose. He was slowly sliding down the ratings. Not much though. 10 points in a tournament. Like that. This went for a long long time, like 6 months or so. We were reading books heavily. None of that was showing OTB. His blunders continued. He blundered at most games, drew games he should win, lost games he should draw. Most of his opponents were going up like a couple of hundred points while he was stuck there.

What was the reason?

I did research on the learning methods of chess. What was important to reduce blunders? What was important to slow down the really fast players? We didn't know. He was working hard. Doing chess videos, learning new ideas, playing games - almost 3 to 4 hours per day. Nothing helped.

Well, a couple of months back, I turned to tactics. I asked him to start doing Mate in 1s. The good thing about him is he will obey what he is told to do. Though he scorned at the idea of doing Mate in 1s, he did do them seriously. He got them 100% correct. Then, we moved to Mate in 2s, Mate in 3s, Double attack, Discovered check etc. He worked hard.

His hardwork on tactics began to show in the games. He was seeing chess games differently, I could see his confidence levels rise. He needed some pyschological teaching as well. When not to resign, how to time games, how to relax during games, how not to exchange all the pieces and oversimplify etc. After all, he had a 6 month slump.

His rating still slided. He had a couple of tournaments where he had bad luck. He started one tournament after 2 rounds. He gained a measly 2 points in that tournament. In another tournament, we showed up late. So, he had to play with his time cut into half. Obviously, he lost points in that tournament.

Recently, he played in a tournament. And I was impressed. He lost his first game, but I was watching him lose on time = he was thinking. He did not exchange madly. He did not oversimplify. I was satisfied. The quality of his game is showing up. I patted him for playing well. He won the next 3 matches, and his rating went up again to 1,000 now.

Results will come, but lessons should be learnt in a proper manner = Lesson learnt. My job now is to find him the right kind of tournament to play, so that his rating will get good jumps. I need to pace his training, and tournament participation in such a way that he will make optimal use of the resources he has.

The hardwork continues...meanwhile.....Right now what book is he working on? He is doing the puzzles from Coakley's Chess strategy for kids. Yes, "for kids". Nevertheless, I am confident that working on these sets of books will enable him to see the board, pieces, and tactics clearly and hence, will improve his game and rating.