Chess Training

I had the pleasure of playing in the Category A section of the Eastern Class Championships this past month in Sturbridge, Massachusetts. This was the perfect opportunity for me to see if my self-training methods have come with any meaningful results. Being rated at 1819 entering the tournament, I was in the slightly unfortunate position of being rated just high enough to play in this category, so I knew I was in for some tough games throughout the event. I wanted to prove that I had improved enough over the past couple months of training to belong in this group of players, and being a fairly large event for this part of the country, there were going to be some tough fights ahead - I was ranked about 20th in a field of 29 players for this section. First, let me recap how I trained the past couple of months. I focused on the two areas I felt I needed the most help - plan construction and endgames. Plan Construction In reviewing my past several tournaments over the course of the previous ...

Here is a useful training technique you can do with your chess partner as suggested by Jacob Aagaard in his great book Excelling At Chess. Using a position from a master game, talk about the position in general terms to try and find the correct plan of action. Ask questions about the pieces and the pawn structure, open files and diagonals, outposts for knights, etc. It is important to vocalize these thoughts as, in general, we listen to ourselves much more than someone else (no surprise there, eh?). A good methodology is to start with comparing the pieces. Select a piece from each army by deciding which ones will be likely traded for each other and compare them objectively. Is the bishop 'good', 'bad', or 'active'? Does the Knight have potential good outposts? Which files are likely to be opened and can any Rooks take advantage of them? Continue on to discuss plans of action, ideal squares for the pieces, which is your worst piece and how to improve it (as Aaga...

Kramnik - Aronian Rapid Match The Week In Chess reports World Champion Vladimir Kramnik plays World Cup Holder Levon Aronian in a rapid match May 4th-6th, 2007 in Yerevan, Armenia. Two games will be played each day. The time control will be 25 minutes for the whole game with an increment of 10 seconds per move. The match is organized by the Armenian Chess Federation.

See what anti-draw measures result in the tournament in the fifth Breizh masters in Guingamp (France) between at Lyceum Le Restmeur a Pabu. The women's section had a total of 7(!) draws throught 9 rounds of play, for a draw percentage of 15.55%. The men's section resulted in 16 draws for a draw percentage of 33.33%. Although the men's section was more than twice the women's draw rate, it is still far below the usual ballpark 50% draw rates we see at IM/GM tournaments. Players were required to play a minimum of 30 moves prior to a draw offer. Breizh Masters

As a 30-year life member, I love the USCF. Please help me save it. With your support, I believe we can. We face many important issues, including securing our finances, fostering chess interest in the US, and building and serving our membership. We must address these, but no Executive Board member is going to constructively change things based on our current circumstances -- we cannot make progress while our leadership is divided and divisive. We must focus on electing a Board that can collectively work to improve our organization. Lately, the Board has been distracted from the work it needs to do. Important discussions and decisions have been sidetracked by internal dissension. We can no longer afford this politics as usual -- we need a change. Change has to start with the people we elect. We must elect Board members who are honest, effective and accountable. Our Board needs to convey and demonstrate professionalism, collective competence, teamwork and good judgment. We need to get bey...

White to move and win: Execute a nice series of moves here to reach a winning endgame.

There has been a great amount of talk and pandering around the upcoming vote by membership for the USCF Executive Board. Any attempt to summarize the past 4 years on this blog would require weeks of due diligence and hard work, and would serve to only infuriate current board members of the USCF, should I be so lucky they read this. I think it is sufficient to state that the membership has reaped what it has sowed in the election of certain board members and the (perhaps not) unanticipated behavior said members have engaged in the past 4 years. A quick perusal of the usenet news groups and USCF boards paints a broad picture of the real trouble our federation is in. Recent troubles with sponsorship of the US Championship only highlight a small portion of the underlying problems the USCF has endured recently. In short, it's time for a change across the board, 'board' being taken in a literal and figurative sense here. We, as the Voting USCF membership, have a great opportunity...