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Hot Topic (More than 10 Replies) One year plan for improving (Read 12845 times)
TN
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #8 - 02/25/11 at 01:07:42
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If you insist on studying openings, then I suggest the following approach:

1. After you play a game, check it with your opening books and a database to determine how strongly you played the opening, and where you could have played better. By playing a lot of games you will quickly gain experience in the opening and by checking the opening afterwards you will learn the theory based on your own games. 

2. In your middlegame study, look at games that can occur from your opening repertoire, making a mental note of the key middlegame themes from the opening. Ideally you want 'model games', where some key plans or ideas are fully realised, but it can also be instructive to study a hard-fought draw or even a game which clearly shows your opponent's ideas. 

3. Study Lipnitsky's 'Questions of Modern Chess Theory' as part of your opening/middlegame study. This is an absolute gem of a book.
  

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Jesse Gersenson
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #7 - 02/24/11 at 21:17:12
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The first two books in the Yusupov series
Build up your Chess 1
Boost Your Chess 1

first book took me 30 hours second book about 45 hours to work through. 

Half of the time was reading/studying the lessons and their examples, half was solving the problems and playing through the solutions. 
  
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #6 - 02/24/11 at 20:29:05
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Well, knowing that all this study is on top of playing time is good, but 25-35 slow tournament games isn't nearly enough to make serious progress. I still say you should spend some time playing on the internet instead of some of the study time. Playing blitz is a great way to try out your openings, and learn what common moves opponents will make in response to them. Then you can compare to a database of master games and see how you should play against those common moves in the future. And if you have time for a couple of slower internet games here and there, that would be good, too.

  

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Larsen_fan
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #5 - 02/24/11 at 19:13:19
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Thank you for your comments - it gives me something to think about and some good advice which was the reason I posted the plan. 

 
Lack of exercises in the plan. 
This may be a huge weaknes. I have planned solving exercises when working with tactics but not with the positional and strategic study and not when it comes to studying endgames. This  could be a mistake. I want to stick with the concept of making my own plan but don’t know exactly how to address this problem. Surely, working through a high quality middlegame- or endgame book must be of value, even if it does not contain exercises but I get the point that it is no substitute for actual training. Maybe one could say that good instructional books makes the reader understand themes and patterns while exercises makes the student able to better use the knowledge?   
Just a funny idea: If two people study through the same book simultaniously they could make exercises for each other. Maybe use the game collections on chessgames.com (or other site) which have different themes (e.g. I have found themes on IQP, hanging pawns, pawn endings, different sacrifices, bad bishops etc). We pick games from different periods to make sure we don’t use the same games. I think it would actually be a very effective way of learning. Of course having a professional coach pick exercises will give other obvious advantages but I think that constructing the exercises may in its own right be a very effective training. You would of course have to invet some kind of template for the exercises (starting position, access and describe the position, describe the dominant features of the position, outline each sides plans, show main variations, etc) and you would of course have to find games where this is already described by a master, but with the amount of annotated games available I don’t think this would be too much of a problem. 
 
Playing activity. 
I will play the exact same number of games with or without this plan. Due to other obligations my level of activity is not high but I play a weekly game in the club or for the club-team during winter and I will participate in 2-3 tournaments the coming year. This will give me 25 – 35 games. 
About the limited results from reading about swimming etc I get your point but it could also be argued that studying is more like spending time in the gym – I’m sure Usain Bolt spend more time training with weights than he does running. 
Anyway, I get the point about balancing the efford and not overdue theorizing about playing on the expence of playing however I cannot substitude study-hours for playing-hours because most of my studying/training will be late at night (enzomnia is the chessplayers best friend;-). 
 
Book on middlegame pawnstructure.
I have read reviews of sokolovs book and I picked it because I plan on playing the Tarrasch against d4 (untill now I have played KID and regular QGD but will change to Tarrasch). And I plan on playing d4. I know that d4 may not be the optimal way to improve fast but it earns me the point and I want to keep winning even if im improving;-) Anyway I will re-consider if this is the book about middlegame pawn-structure I should start with (it fits my current strength but maybe I should look for something that addresses my weaknesess). 
 
Studying my own games. 
I have not planned on spending much time on this but it could be a big mistake. I usually play them over with fritz which always shows me that the good game I just played was actually a series of mistakes from both sides. Maybe I should study my games a little differently? I once saw a book about annotating ones own games – anyone knows it or have other recommendations?
 
Studying openings vs studying other things. 
Descartes is right! I enjoy and feel good about studying for a detailed repertoire even though I will most likely not get to play much theory at my current level. I simply enjoy working with an opening – have done it the last ½ year with the french (flexible french by Moskalenko) but have not even once had the chance to enter a theoretical line because of my opponents early deviations. However, the time spend have certainly not been wasted. I have learned a lot about closed positions, positional exchange-sacrifice, open lines, timing of freeing moves in cramped positions etc., and I have played through a lot of beautifull games. And I have won at least one game because I obviously was more familiar with a french-theme than my opponent, though it was not a french opening. That’s exactly why I now want to spend “to much time” on openings and especially on the e5 response to e4. I hope that study of the e5 opening-complex will help my handling of open positions even if I don’t get to play much theory. 


That said I will consider if the distribution of time should be different (no point in asking for advice if you don’t listen;-).

I will read the articles from chesscafe and reflect a little more about your recomendations and make a more balanced plan. 

Thanks a lot,
Larsen_fan
  
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chk
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #4 - 02/24/11 at 16:19:42
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Welcome to the forum!

I enjoyed reading about your plan and the answers to it (I agree with all the things the previous posters said). My own shot at it is as follows (just to give you a perspective, I am a father of 1 and have a full-time job, plus other 'serious' hobbies as well):

- Play as many official (long) OTB games as you can. If your job/family do not allow you to participate in many tournaments, then put more hours on studying (but you will improve at a slower pace). What we read in books does not stick to our brain if we don't practice it or experiment with it. Also analyse your games afterwards as TN has noted.
- Resist the temptation for 'browsing magazines, and internet fora or following live broadcasts' as much as you can (of course some fun is always welcome, but these are hours that can be used in a more efficient way). You could replace time online by solving tactics on the ChessTempo site (it's for free-highly recommended).
- 6hrs/week is realistic, but 6 pages/hour is not in my opinion. Depending on the book I may do 1-3pages/hour. But it does not matter. What matters is whether you actually learn something and apply it to your game.
- I second the recommendation about Khmelnitsky's book. You will learn about yourself but also learn some chess in the process.
- OK, you need an opening repertoire but start with something basic and this year work only on 1. e4 e5 as you say. Your other repertoire choices could be some easy to learn, but sound systems that could be later on used as a secondary weapon, if you learn something else in the next few years. Possible choices: As White if you play 1. e4: e.g. Sicilian Alapin or Closed Sicilian, vs. d4: Noteboom or Stonewall, you get the picture..
- I don't see anything on endgames! This a good way to start: You may not get many endgames in your games, but you will learn good piece co-ordination, tactics and calculation.
- I don't quite agree with your comment that by studying openings you will also learn middlegames and endgames. You may learn some, but still your focus is greatly limited on openings.

All in all, I'd say you need to prioritise things in the following way:
1. Play games & analyse them (alone or with stronger players).
2. Do lots of tactics (ChessTempo site)
3. Build a basic opening repertoire (really basic stuff so that you won't lose in the opening, nothing more / since you have been an active junior I suppose you may already have a basic repertoire).

[4. Optional if time allows: You could focus on 2-3 books this year:
- A primer on endgames (I suggest Howell's Essential Endgames)
- A primer on middlegames (Stein's Simple Chess is very good)
- Khmelnitsky's book (only if you feel like it)
- Marin's Spanish Repertoire for Black
I don't have Marin's book, but the other 3 are rather short books ~ 130 pages each, and I think you could seriously study 2 or 3 of them within a year - say mostly during vacations or weekends]

Lastly, be honest with yourself and modify your plan if things don't go as expected. There's no need to hurry, so don't kill the fun, just spread the plan over a longer period!

Well, that's all  Lips Sealed
  

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TN
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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #3 - 02/24/11 at 11:16:12
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Replace the 160 hours of opening study with playing tournaments and analysing your games, and for middlegame improvement, you can study Simple Chess by Stean, Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy by John Watson and The Amateur's Mind (or Reassess your Chess) by John Silman. 

Good luck with your goals.
  

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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #2 - 02/24/11 at 04:44:04
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I've got to agree with Descartes. You're rated 1600, and you're planning to spend HALF your study time on openings? And I don't see playing time on there at all. Playing and studying your own games should take up half your chess time, with another 25% dedicated to tactics puzzles. Opening study should be maybe 2% of your time. Most of your opening study should come from studying your own games after you're done playing them, which is when you can look up the opening in a book or master game database to see how you could have played it better.

I'd say start by checking out Dan Heisman's Novice Nook column at chesscafe.com: 
http://home.comcast.net/~danheisman/Articles/Novice_Nook_Links.htm#subjectorder&...;

Start with these two articles: 
http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman19.pdf ;
http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman68.pdf

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Re: One year plan for improving
Reply #1 - 02/24/11 at 02:52:48
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I would be cautious about investing so much time in this way.

Yusupov's course consists of examples and exercises.  That is crucial. I don't see that many exercises in your course of study.  A related matter: when are you going to play? I wouldn't study to the exclusion of playing a lot (serious games, not blitz or rapid), for the same reason that you need exercises: you can only get limited results from reading about swimming, playing the piano, or solving math problems, and the same is true for chess.

Sokolov won't be of too much use to you unless you play certain openings, primarily 1.d4 and/or the Nimzo, QGD, QGA, Tarrasch, etc. against 1.d4. Have you looked inside that book? It is almost entirely about those openings and the positions that arise from them. Its title is misleading.  Maybe a general strategic set like Euwe and Kramer or Pachmann would do what you want.

I don't think 160 hours of opening study will help you improve much at all compared to 160 hours of analysis of, say, CT-Art positions, though you might enjoy it and feel good about having a detailed repertoire.

I don't mean to be negative. It's great that you want a personalized study course.  If you want to create a study course just for yourself, why don't you pay an instructor to help you design it after looking at some of your games? Before the kind of time investment you're talking about, it would be worth it. Or at least design your own plan around the results of Khmelnitzky's Chess Exam and Training Guide, which will give you 100 intricate and often fascinating exercises, along with a professional statistical analysis (Khmelnitsky is an actuary) of which areas you are weakest in.

Anyway, good luck.
  
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Larsen_fan
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One year plan for improving
02/23/11 at 18:05:45
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Hi
 
Im new to this forum. Here is a little introduction of myself.

I recently took up chess after more than 20 years of absence from the game. I used to be a very active junior but never any great talent. I don’t remember my rating as a junior but after taking up chess again I started out with a rating of 1600 and now, after ½ years of playing, I have gained 96 rating-points (with a 2020 performance rating in the tournament I have played). The rapid improvement is completely surprising to me and has given me the desire to actually try and work with my chess and make a structured plan for developing my play.  
I have never done any structured studying of chess. Mostly I have been browsing around – a little of this and a little of that. I have enjoyed this but now I (to my big surprise) want to improve and see how good I can be. I had expected that I would simply enjoy a weekly game in the local club but at the age of 40 it seems I have suddenly become ambitious (LOL)! Hence, I have made a one year plan for studying and improving.
I would like input and comments. First of all: How much time does it take to read a chess book if you realy work with it, don’t take any shortcuts, play through variations on the board, take notes, etc? How many pages in one hour? I have used an avarege of 6 pages/hour in my planning. Annyone have better estimates? 
 
Instead of making my own plan and finding my own material I could simply start working through Yusupovs course. With the same efford invested this could possibly help me improve more rapidly but I enjoy making my own plan and I think this I part of the learning process for me.  
 
Conditions
Time available. From now and one year ahead I will study for an average of 6 hrs every week for 52 weeks. This will give me a total of 312 hrs the coming year. Activities such as browsing magazines, and internet fora or following live broadcasts will not count as studying time (I guess I will spend app the same number of hours on these things). 
312 hrs is not much but I have to be realistic – I am a father of 4 (0, 3, 5, 7 yrs) with a full time job and an active life (BTW: This reminds me of a Kasparovs reply to an amatur who asked him what kind of studying K would recommend to a person who do not want to devote his life to chess. K answered something like “If you don’t want to devote your life to chess, then, why do you want to improve in the first place?”). 
 
The Plan
I will keep track of the time spend on serious studying. The time will be divided as follow: 
 
Tactics and endgame study 75 hrs.
- The quality chess puzzlebook (shaw) 30 hrs (this will not bring me through the book, but I´ll just see how fare it brings me)
- Learn from the Legends (Marin) 45 hrs
 
Middlegame improvement 75 hrs
- Winning Chess Middlegames (Sokolov) 45 hrs
- Modern Chess Planning (Grivas) 30 hrs
 
Working on Opening repetoire 160 hrs
- BEATING THE OPEN GAMES (Marin) 50 hrs
- A Spanish Repertoire for Black (Marin) 40 hrs
This leaves 70 hrs. for “all other openings in the repetoire”.  I have bourght Watsons Mastering the chess Openings (1 – 4) and plan on working through chapters that fit to my future reperoire.
 
 
This is of course too much time on openings compared to other categories but I belive that studying openings is just as much about middlegame strategies and positional understanding. 
 
Working on the Repetoire:
I don’t have a repetoire at the moment and I do not have the time to build a coherent repetoire. My strategy is to build one cornerstone this period (the e5 responce to e4).

Inputs and comments welcome.

best,
Larsen_fan
  
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