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Did you expect such an epic tie break and that you would have a hockey score at the end?

•  How could one expect this? Of course, the tie breaks were very tough for me, as well as for my opponent. In classical round I won one game, and easily. The second game was also not bad. Well, I got worse end game, but I was sure I could manage a draw. But I blundered at one point and the tie break history began. I had to balance and catch up all four games, two times with black. But what is strange: I always knew that all will be alright. I think by the end of the day I was luckier because of my physical shape. I do a lot of physical trainings lately. Even here, in Khanty, I don’t miss my trainings, I work out, I swim, I go to sauna and only then I come to play. Obviously I was in a bit better sporty shape.

•  As famous proverb says Mens Sana in Corpora Sano?

•  Exactly. In principle, an answer to a question if chess is sport is very clear for me. Of course yes! Professional chess players are always under stress. Without good sporty shape you will not survive.

Use the red arrows to scroll through the game.  Leave a comment – predict a winner.
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I recently came across this article in the Inquirer.net written by Laura Sherman.

When we say “OK! That’s the end of today’s chess class,” and hear a room full of young voices saying “No, we want to stay!” that’s when we know a definite connection has been achieved.

Parents and teachers around the globe are very proud when their children learn to play chess. They know it’s good for their kids. But why? Why is excellent chess instruction so beneficial to educational growth?

Let’s start with some basics. Kids do not get smarter when they’re forced to learn things that don’t interest them. They lose interest when they are not challenged. They also lose interest when they don’t understand what is being taught.

The best chess teachers are challenging and fun, while smoothly increasing the level of skill and understanding of each student. When teaching chess is approached that way, the kids remain interested and they improve. Studies done around the world prove that teaching chess to children has a very positive impact on their lives.

Read the entire article

Laura Sherman founded Your Chess Coach (www.YourChessCoach.com) with her husband, Dan Sherman. The couple’s full-time profession is teaching children to play chess. Along with Bill Kilpatrick, founder of several professional specialty schools, they provide consulting around the globe helping improve the ability of coaches, parents and educators to teach chess to children.

GM-Elect was a treat to watch at Foxwoods. The young man showed a lot of discipline and even beat one of my favorite players GM Hikaru Nakamura. Here is an interview that speaks to how he did it and includes some interesting details about his chess coach.

Source:USChess

Robert Hess’s Spring 2009 streak began with the SPICE Spring Invitational (March 16-22, Lubbock, Texas), where Robert scored his second GM norm. A week later in Nashville, Robert swept the High School Nationals 7-0, leading his team, Stuyvesant to a National title. A couple days after that, Robert was off to Foxwoods where he defeated GMs Ehlvest and Nakamura on his way to norm #3. Between catching up on schoolwork and preparing for the 2009 U.S. Championship (May 7-17, Saint Louis), GM-elect Robert Hess talked to CLO about his philosophy on chess openings, confidence and his relationship with coach GM Miron Sher.

Jennifer Shahade (JS): Triple Congratulations on behalf of CLO and USCF for your earning your two norms and a National Championship title in just 3 weeks. Did the High School Nationals prepare you for your fantastic result in Foxwoods?

Robert Hess (RH): Not really – at the Nationals I did not play my best chess. I believe it was the SPICE tournament that brought up my Foxwoods result. (My coach) Miron Sher always told me that if I played in successive tournaments, I would achieve a great result.

JS:What was your best game from Foxwoods?
RH:My game with Black against Nakamura was a very clean game.

Understanding your opening for the average player begins with these ideas. Are you looking for a closed position or an open position? Do you know the advantages of each type?

Knowing what weaknesses and strengths exist in your chosen opening will help you come up with plans during the game.

I often hear players talking about style. Understanding whether you favor open positions vs. closed positions is just one component of style. One is not better than the other. Some player calculate better when there is more space on the board, others with more pieces or occupied spaces.

If you are a player that prefers open spaces and lots of attacking lanes, then you need to make sure you are playing openings that favor this style.

Players who like open spaces tend to play “e4″ or P-K4 openings. They may also consider some of the Indian systems or flank type openings.

Players who like closed positions tend to play “d4″ or P-Q4 openings.  Closed position players tend to maneuver more.  They will shift their pieces multiple times behind their own forces.  If you feel comfortable creating plans where you pieces stay on your side of the board for 10-15 moves then closed positions are for you.

Let’s talk about what happens if you choose the wrong opening.  Let’s pretend you are a positional player and don’t know it.  You have decided to play a popular opening like the Sicilian.  Most of the Sicilian lines are sharp, open attacking lines.  Keeping your pieces at home is a recipe for disaster in this opening.  You will rarely win a game.

If you find yourself constantly asking yourself what should I do now? You are probably playing the wrong style for the opening or the wrong opening for your style.

Players should look for openings that are intuitive.  How do you find openings that are intuitive?  By looking at others playing live.  Jump on the live chess site and watch some high rated players playing.  If you can predict what moves they make or what plans they implement, you might want to try similar openings.

Strong chess players are constantly reviewing other strong players games. They might not look at other games for the same reasons, but they will come away with similar ideas.

I encourage you to regularly look at Grandmaster games.  Some games will excite you others will not.  Either way you should make a note of what openings they are playing and how you feel about it.

If you feel like the French is boring. Make a note. “Note to self. The French is boring.” Feel free to add additional comments to the note. “I don’t like the French because white always ends up attacking the pawn chain.” or “They always end up trading down quickly.”

Making these type notes about openings and games will help you determine your style.

Once you know what opening really fits you, you can then move on to the most important training.  That is determining what ideas exist for your opening.

Play your opening religiously.  Keep notes.  You should be able to tell at what point you made a new move.

Let’s say you play 20 games with the white pieces. Every game your first 5 moves for both sides were identical. (this is a good start). On move six your opponents started doing different things.  Let’s say out of 20 games 5 opponents pushed a center pawn. or 5 games your opponent castled on move six.

You should keep notes on what the best move is from move six.  You can also keep notes that reflect how many games you win based on changes on move six.

The stronger you get, the more moves you will make consistently and correctly in the opening.

You should compare your first 10 moves with grandmaster games.  How many times did you make the exact moves that they made?  When you deviated did you loose the game?  At what point did your opponent deviate? Was there move a mistake?

In Part IV we will begin to analyze the specifics of one particular opening.  Feel free to leave a comment or message me on your opening preference.  I will try to choose an opening with the most requests.

I had not planned on making this a series, but I am still getting questions on what to do in various positions.  So let’s start at the top. We will cover general ideas that you can apply to any opening.

It has come to my attention that the casual player might not be aware that every opening has an objective.  These objectives can be as simple as to control a square, or as complex as attacking a pawn chain.

Whichever opening you choose, you need to be aware of what the objective is for that opening.  Beginners are taught to (A.) Activate their pieces, (B.) Be safe with their King and (C.) Centralize their pieces.  These are good opening principles to keep in mind. However, doing them while ignoring your opponents move will lead to problems and even advantages for your opponent.

Advance players keep the above principles in mind while they are optimizing their piece placement.  Sometimes your opponent will make a mistake, and if you are moving based on memorized sequences you will miss the mistake.

I often observe 1600-1800 rated players making moves without really understanding why they are making that move.  They are just making the move because they saw it in the book or saw a strong player make the same move in a similar position.

If you ever have the opportunity to observe Grandmaster play you will observe that they do not blitz through the opening or the first ten moves of the game.  These are the same people who write books on the same openings.  They are taking their time in these positions for a reason.  Sometimes you can win the game in the first 10 moves, but technique may make the game stretch for another 15-20 moves.

Serious chess. This post is not for the casual player.

I believe that if you have a favorite opening, you should know it inside and out.  For some people, this is how they get a favorite opening. By studying an opening so well that it becomes natural for them.

Lately, I have run across players who will make a declaration about what opening they like to play. Yet, when asked about specific variations or ideas, they shrug their shoulders.

Learning your opening and playing your opening go hand in hand.  I recommend for all players to learn the first ten moves of their opening solid. I recommend that you understand where your opponent will have the opportunity to go wrong in those first ten moves.  You should also explore openings that transpose into your position after ten moves.

Doing all of the above will make you a much strong player. It will also make it easier for you to learn your next opening.

Another explanation I often here from players is that … “Players on my level don’t make that move.”  You should always assume your opponent is going to play the strongest move.  However, if you are playing weaker players.  Spend a little time preparing solid answers against the most common weaker moves as well.  This preparation should get you past this group and into stronger opponents.

I remember very specifically having a pet line in the Ruy Lopez. I got the idea from one of my favorite players Gata Kamsky while on one of my chess breaks(I had decided to stop playing chess for a couple years at this particular time).

I was reading the newspaper and came across his game that he had recently played. Since I hadn’t been playing chess, this game became very interesting to me.  I casually studied this game for months.

From that study I picked up some ideas that I really wanted to exercise in over the board play.  However, what I learned is that my average opponents, where making mistakes long before I could get my home preparation to work.

I had to stop and prepare more accurate responses to weaker lines just because I was seeing them so often.  I am not sure how many other players do this type of preparation, but for me it was a little frustrating.

Now that I am a little stronger, I am glad that I did preparation period.  I am learning to document my ideas as much as possible in any opening that I play.  Even if it is just a casual idea or a move that I would have liked to have played.

Sometimes you can get in a position and come up with this great tactic and your opponent won’t even go into it or might see it and avoid it.  You should still document the idea.  You may find yourself in that position and again and not have your tactical sharpness ready.

Reading your own notes on ideas and games can be magical over time.  I have been playing here at chess.com for almost a year and I have learned so much. Especially about my own game.

I look forward to another year of training and play.  I hope you will join me.

Are you the type of chess player who doesn’t have a lot of time to study?  Chess books are too difficult to understand?  You can’t seem to get your rating about 1400-1600?  Tired of loosing to your friends? or the computer?

There is one sure way to improve your chess game for the lazy chess player.  The minimum required to improve your game is going over your completed games.  I know this sounds like studying, but here me out.  As soon as you finish your game, whether it is a speed game or an over the board game, you should review the moves made by both sides.

Giving yourself an opportunity to have a second look on decisions made by both you and your opponents will enhance your appreciation and understanding of the game and positions that arrived from that game.

The next step would be to document what you thought during your review stage.  The lazy man way of documenting is some type of voice recording.  The stronger chess player will take notes either in the computer or by using a notepad.

It doesn’t matter which method you choose for recording initially as long as you begin the thought process.

I personally review my games (especially tournament games) immediately after I have completed them either with my opponent or on my computer.  Sometimes I might be rushing to play the next round and don’t have time to go into full analysis, so I will just jot some notes on the scoresheet directly.

Now let’s talk about what happens when you do this.  I have been playing long tournament games and while thinking about the position, I can see my notes!  Sometimes I will be in a position and remember another game where I was in a similiar position.  I am able to recall the analysis that was done at that time during that game.

This would be very difficult to do if I had not been reviewing my games on a regular basis.

Everytime you play a game similar to one you have already played, you should be building on your understanding.  Playing chess is not about making random moves.  You don’t randomly decide to leave your house everyday. Nor do you randomly decide to take the window vs. the door when you do leave.  For those of you who have tried the window, you have probably come around to using the door based on your own analysis.

Chess works the same way.  Each game should be an improvement upon the last.  If you aren’t playing games in a similar fashion, you are robbing yourself of the opportunity to naturally improve.

Also, reviewing your games will help to prevent you from making mistakes repeatedly.  If you don’t go over your games, you will make the same mistakes over and over again.

There is a reason why there are so many chess books in circulation.  I once read that some of the super grandmasters have seen millions of games.

I personally want to have as many positive characteristics of a super grandmaster as possible.

If you have decided that you are not a lazy chessplayer but still don’t have the time to put hours on end into studying chess…then stay tune for the rest of this series.  There are still many things you can do to improve your game that will only take minutes a day.