Improvement

Leaving aside the infinite why of chess improvement, let’s jump straight into the how. Today, more “self-help” style books, noisomely telling you “what they are going to do for you” or “what is going to happen” after you’ve read them, than books that will genuinely help you improve your chess, appear on the market. Let’s be clear, one does not improve at chess by reading 200 pages of text in a 300 page Moskalenko book, chess improvement is example and test based, and there is no substitute for hard work; you will gain more from studying 500 tactical problems than all the 200 page Neil McDonald talk-fests in the world.

There have been many famous quotes on chess in its long history, “pawns are the soul of chess” (Philidor), “chess is 99% tactics” (Teichmann), “modern chess is far too concerned with things like pawn structure; forget it! Checkmate wins the game.” (Nigel Short during his ’93 World Title match with Garry Kasparov, much to the horror of spectating GMs!) However the one we find most accurate is from that adonis of a teacher Andrew Soltis: “chess is 99% calculation”.

Calculation of what exactly? It is equally true to say that one cannot usefully annotate a game, or calculate properly until after one understands things like pawn structure strengths and weaknesses (and a plethora of other concepts that lie pushing and pulling like currents under the placid surface of this game). In any case, that is the simplification we will put: Chess is primarily a game of calculation, and to calculate we need not only spatial ability/mental muscles (which come from hard work and nothing else) but also the base understandings of the game in order to know what will be positive and negative for us.

Back on topic: Towards this end, some trainers have developed a training plan based on example and test based teaching, that require you to first study a position, calculate as best you can, offer a move, and then read the brilliantly instructive explanations of these hand picked positions. This is not only building our mental muscles, but improving our understanding of the game too. They have hit on several excellent books they feel are improving not just our ability but also our enjoyment of chess too. The two principle books they are using are:

Bent Larsen’s: Good move guide (1982)
Andrew Soltis’: Pawn Structure chess (1976)

Any serious player with a penchant for chess study should pick up Larsen’s book and work through the examples. He has a section with 100 mid-strength tactics, 50 invaluable (to any level) “find the plan” positions with instructive conclusions, a “find the master move” section with games, and a “practical end game” section- as it said what is invaluable in it is that it asks you to work rather than read. It is a no-nonsense book.

There are two types of genuine improvement in chess. Improvement of your “base strength” with things like tactics study, endgame study, pawn structure study and knowledge. This is knowledge that doesn’t go away and doesn’t lie; before one hopes to understand any opening book, or even remember the moves properly, one must have a decent “base strength”, as this is what helps us understand the opening moves. It should be the primary focus in chess improvement as everything flows on from your endgame, pawn structure and tactical understandings. And secondly, improvement of your “practical chances” via the annotated study of games in your chosen opening. This will not “improve your chess” as much as pure study of those basic chess materials, but may help you win some games anyway.

So the first message on chess improvement is this: ask yourself if you really want to work hard, or quit pretending now.

Mastering Tactics

Only a handful of chess authors truly understand the best method of mastering tactics. Most authors believe, as evidenced by the books and software available in the market, that puzzle exercises and solving them are the best approach to learning tactics. They could never be so wrong. The best way to learn tactics for most people is to actually learn them by seeing the transition point in its entirety from the opening phase to the beginning point of the puzzle.

It is easy for one to solve puzzles of the kind that goes "Black to play and mate in three moves." This sort of presentation artificially aids the learner in finding the solution. Not only that the solver is hinted which side wins, but he is told as well that it can be done in three moves. Knowing the number of moves it takes to mate is a key clue which aids the brain generate possible solutions in the solving process. And knowing which side has the edge eliminates an important learning opportunity to find the obvious and discern the nuances of the given position. This skill ought to be developed among improvers as an essential aspect of learning tactics. Just being able to find solutions to tactical problems does not equate to tactical understanding. The very reason the learner is doing the tactical exercise is to sharpen a tactical vision but he currently does not possess.

The mainstream approach to tactical learning in some trainers and coaches estimation is partially flawed because it tends to develop only the skill of finding tactical solutions, but not more. The skill with the most practical value during a chess game is the one that helps players recognize that a tactical opportunity exists on the board. This other skill is duly ignored by mainstream writers. An improving player needs to master foremost how to spot a tactical opportunity and only then should he learn how to work out the tactical solutions. 

Given a typical position with equal material, oftener than not, the learner does not know which side is winning. This lack of knowing is more pronounced in unbalanced positions. This is so because the learner lacks a formalized system of spotting tactical opportunities. As it is during an actual game, neither player receives a cue that a tactical opportunity has just materialized. Such a formalized system could be the subject of a series in chess improvement.

In post mortem analysis, it is not unusual for players to find one-mover resources that could have changed the outcome from a loss to a win. Using computer engines in some of grandmasters' games reveal tactical oversights overlooked by both players during the contest. 

It is important to realize that learners or improvers to benefit from any tactical training must be shown how the tactical opportunity came about in the first place. So, including the opening moves is helpful as it gives learners chess knowledge that a certain tactical opportunity can arise from a certain opening with a certain pawn structure. The tactical skill must be learned only this way for the learner to beneficially accrue practical gains in this area of chess knowledge.

IM John Watson is one author who advocates learning tactics by also showing the learner how the tactical situation came to be. The learner can then play towards the tactical situation or choose moves in the opening or middlegame that will give rise to the tactical motif. But this does not argue that the learner need not know basic tactical motifs by name. But most learners already know what a double attack or a skewer or a pin looks like.

In one of a teacher's few lectures, he did exercises where he showed students puzzles, but with lacking in specifics. Some students would try to solve the puzzle from the viewpoint of the losing side, of course, not knowing who possesses the tactical opportunity. Some students could not recognize the opening from which the pawn structure arose. One must be reminded that a chess game entails the playing of the opening and sometimes the middle game before these opportunities present on the board. If chess begins with a static position plus a hint as to who is winning, and the number of moves it takes to deliver the winning blow, then the mainstream approach of learning tactics will make sense. This, however, simply becomes a puzzle solving contest.

It can be argued that the way we learn tactics is influenced in some way by economics. The traditional book is constrained by production costs in packaging its presentation of chess knowledge. In the interest of cost saving, it must present the puzzle to the solver at the point where the tactical sequence begins. This particular way of learning tactics benefits most the advanced players since they already possess the knowledge with regards to the source opening by simply noting the pawn structure. The tactical motif or picture becomes a knowledge entity where it is saved in the brain under a meaningful category for easy recall for over the board use. This is why advanced players will intuitively choose moves that channel the game to a recognized position where one or a number of tactical motifs fit.

For example, the well-known Greek sacrifice on h7 by a bishop is usually something an experienced player will intuitively recognize as effective if there is a pawn on e5 controlling f6 and d6. Another example would be some recognition that an advanced f-pawn will allow the rook lift to g3 or h3. When the position warrants this conduct of an attack, one must then avoid moving the g- or h-pawn as it will only impede the transfer of the rook to either file. Another example is the motif where there is a pawn on g6 and the white player sacrifices a rook on h8 to be followed by a queen check on the h-file which can result in a mate on h7 assuming of course that the f8-square is occupied, and the h-file is open.

This is where eBooks come in. EverymanChess.com is pioneering in this delivery method of chess knowledge. But an eBook covering tactics is still in dearth supply. With eBooks, the writer has the luxury of introducing the puzzle by allowing the reader to replay the game from the opening since space is no longer an economic constraint. As with chess books, space equals costs. And more costs means less profit. With the possibility that eBooks offer, it is proposed that it is time for us to reconsider novel but effective ways of learning tactics.

In the teacher's proposed approach, the reader also learns how the conditions for a tactical blow came about. These things do not just appear in thin air. Master players of the game in practice would laboriously maneuver their pieces to arrive into their respective striking points for which a tactical combination is possible. Just knowing the markers on the path will help us tremendously in getting there.

We hear amateurs lament to this effect when playing over grandmaster games, “If I can just get to this position, I will beat this grandmaster too.” Does it sound familiar? We hear ourselves say this all the time in the sound of a wish. And if only we can get ourselves to this “White to move and win in 5” positions, our brain can be easily primed and prodded to look for the winning tactical finish.
Only then can we outplay a master player and proudly share kinship with one. 

You should develop your own system to limit or minimize tactical blunders in your games.

How to improve your Middlegame

As a chess player, you have likely cultivated some favorite chess openings and defenses to strengthen your game. Similarly, you may have polished your endgame. You know how to capture and defeat your opponent once the ground work is laid. All that is left to improve upon is the battle itself: middlegame. The middlegame is where the real action takes place. It is often the lengthiest portion of chess, since many established players have all but memorized the opening game. Aside from slight alterations to the familiar gambits and defenses, openings often play out by rote. The middlegame in chess is the battle. Though the opening sets the stage for how the battle plays out, there are specific choices to be made as to how to approach the protracted struggle. This is where it gets interesting. There are two different ways of approaching chess, and the emphasis of the middlegame depends upon a player's approach. One of the methods which was nearly perfected by chess champion Jose Capablanca, is to create a positional strong-hold early on and play a careful, progressive game that exploits the weakness in your opponent's position, slowly pushing a material advantage until you gain absolute dominance. For the careful mind that can exploit weakness, this is an effective method. Trainers and coaches also feel that it squeezes the joy out of chess. The best minds in chess have tended to be experimental. Some masters have this in common: They all experimented beyond the established boundaries of the game. These masters rejected the stronghold-and-advance method, sometimes to tragic end; but their experimentation also lead to some of the greatest victories in the history of the game.

The difference between the two approaches is that of an advancing army compared to tactical guerrilla warfare. A great chess mind can conquer the middlegame through positional advantage alone, even if they may seem impossibly outstripped in material. In fact, many brilliant chess players will sacrifice material for position. Controlling the center of the board is the goal in chess, but there are specific squares that a great player will seek to conquer.

For the experimental middlegame, these guidelines apply:

  1. Position over material.
  2. Give until it hurts.
  3. Do not trap your king.
  4. Be fearless.

Position over material means just that: Let go of your preconceived notions that a chess game cannot be won without a queen. Understand that there are opportunities that arise for those willing to sacrifice a rook for a pawn. You must have the skill to execute the trap once it is set, but a great player will disregard established rules of value on the board, and see each piece for it's capabilities alone. Value systems are often flawed, and it is a fact that the position of the lowliest members of chess rank, the pawn, often determines the outcome of a game.

'Give until it hurts' compliments 'position over material'. Do not waste valuable moves protecting pieces that are not intrinsic to your game plan. Once you see how to trap your opponent, determine which pieces are necessary, and allow others to be sacrificed by way of distraction, and to give your opponent a false sense of confidence.

The exception to 'give until it hurts' is 'do not trap your king'. You must protect your king or any elaborately set escapades in the middlegame are wasted. Be consistently aware of threats to your monarch, and do not hedge him into a position where he cannot escape. The experimental game requires attention to many pieces, so freedom of movement for your king is more important than a great fortress of pieces to protect him. You do not want to tie up all your material for defensive purposes.

Finally, the brilliant middlegame is not by nature consistent. You can not be a perfectionist and improve at the same time. Leave perfectionism for the safe, advancing middlegame players. Do not be afraid to fail, or you will find yourself too stunted to succeed.

Tactical Puzzles

Tactical puzzles are often difficult and you may be tempted to guess the solution. This is wrong. Don’t be lazy. You must calculate the variations to the best of your ability. Do not guess the answer, because even if your guess is correct you are still doing harm to your subconscious decision-making process.

It’s all about habits. When you guess the solutions to chess tactics puzzles, you are subconsciously developing a habit of guessing.

The problem with this habit becomes evident when you play a real game. What you will do in the heat of the game has a big impact on the result. You might even have a good position and you sense there might be tactical opportunities and you start searching deeper but you just don’t seem to find a crystal clear way forward. So what happens next? You guess a move and hope for the best.

The bad habit wins and you lose.

When things get tough, your mind tends to fall back to old habits. More often than not your “guess-move” is in fact a mistake. 

Several Hundred Tactical Positions

For beginners and improving players, it's very important to start tactics study with a set of fairly simple tactical positions, and to go through them repeatedly, over and over, until you can instantly recognize them, spending only up to a minute or so on each position, then looking at the answer and decreasing this time each pass through the set, and moving on to the next problem. Recognition is the goal in the beginning, not building tactical analysis skills.

One of the best ways to do this is to use randomized flash cards with the only instruction being White (Black) to move. One excellent source of suitable positions is John Bain's book: "Chess Tactics for Students" as recommended by Dan Heisman, the top guru of beginning and improving chess instruction. 

Tactical ability is certainly right at the top of importance, but along with it is developing a proper thought process. Without a consistent thought process, all tactics, strategy, endgames, opening knowledge is basically useless. It takes just one bad move to lose a game.

Tactics for Advanced Players

Prior to the explosion of youth chess, a standard beginning text was Fred Reinfeld, 1001 Winning Chess Sacrifices and Combinations (1955). It is organized by theme with dozens of problems in each chapter. Generations of masters have started with this book. Reinfeld wrote a few other 1001 texts, but this one seems most widely available. 

Lev Alburt, Chess Training Pocket Book (1997) contains 300 positions, four to a page. The solutions are on the facing page, making self-discipline a necessary feature of using the text for training. These well-chosen 300 positions, most from practical play, include common tactical motifs, positional concepts, and endgame fundamentals. The book indexes the problems by themes and by players. Alburt, Chess Training Pocket Book II (2008) offers 320 new positions in the same format. This book can be a central component of your training in the near future. 

Most club players should be able to solve the problems in Alburt's books in no more than a few minutes each, and errors will be easily corrected. A few times through these books should leave the student with a core knowledge of important positions. For more challenging tactical exercises, John Nunn's Chess Puzzle Book (1999) and Paata Gaprindashvili, Imagination in Chess: How to Think Creatively and Avoid Foolish Mistakes (2004). Both of these texts offer fresh positions. That is, the positions in these texts will not be found in Reinfeld. Some of those in Alburt's texts are in Reinfeld, as well as in dozens of other training texts. Imagination in Chess also offers suggestions for effective thought processes. Gaprindashvili's logical process may be considered an improvement over the famed analysis tree in Alexander Kotov's Think Like a Grandmaster (1971). Readers may differ in their assessments of these modes of systematic thinking.

Two other challenging texts offer exceptional insight into the nature of chess tactics, and plenty of training material. These are not collections of problems so much as treatises on the the middlegame. Yuri Averbakh, Chess Tactics for Advanced Players (1992) seeks to build a theoretical base for comprehension of chess tactics. Mark Dvoretsky, Secrets of Chess Tactics (1992) takes a more practical approach, but also contains much of theoretical value. The positions analyzed in both texts can be quite challenging, even for masters.

Chess Strategy

Chess means strategy. When you play a chess game, you make plans, you want your pieces to be active, your pawn structure without weaknesses, you want to weaken your opponent's defense and so on. All these is chess strategy. If you want to improve your chess at master level, it is the chess strategy you need to know better than your opponents. Moreover, what chess strategy you use makes the difference. Every chess player uses a different strategy, but only one player wins the game, so you should know the best strategy in every particular situation. You can think of chess as being divided between strategy and tactics. The truth is that chess is a game of strategy. Tactics make the difference of how easily you succeed to put in practice your ideas (your strategy). Everything you do on the chess board is strategy. Tactics are subordinated. If you are lucky enough to have a grandmaster taking you as one of his special students, he will teach you in details the complete theory of chess strategy for high levels in chess and you will get a complete set of high-quality lessons on chess strategy, concrete and complete theory and explanations. Love to study and training. A lot of strategic tests and unique exercises on strategy aimed at improving your positional understanding and practical play should be part of you.

A GM answer

When the question “How do I improve my chess?” was asked to GM Yasser Seirawan during a lecture at the St. Louis Chess Academy he gave a clear and honest answer. He told the audience what he had done to improve his level when he was not yet a titled player. Yasser Seirawan used to replay his games and write down the thoughts that he had during the game. So not only variations but the ideas and plans behind his moves. After doing this he replayed the game again but this time together with a stronger player. This stronger player or coach showed him alternative plans an ideas. By doing this Seirawan enlarged his tool kit of chess thinking. In his vision if we use this method consistently we simply can’t go wrong. Our level of play will increase as your insight in the game will grow. If you could not find a stronger player, take Houdini.

Distinguishing masters from amateurs

Pattern recognition is often subliminal but it is another skill that clearly distinguishes the master from the amateur. Every master has played thousands of games of chess, and analysed many of these. The patterns from these games are templates in his long-term memory. They enable the master to see the essential features of a position, including what sort of lines may lead to a win.

There is one more essential skill: prophylaxis. This is the ability to see the game from your opponent's point of view, ie to create tactics and strategies on his behalf, as well as how to frustrate them.

Since all human players make mistakes, one more faculty is needed: an active eye for errors. At the least, we must not miss a viable move in response to the next move we plan to make.

There are at least three quite distinct kinds of chess: over-the-board, turn-based, and blitz. Classical chess (over-the-board play) requires all the above skills. Turn-based chess, is similar except that one can avoid visualising altogether, due to the analysis board. Blitz or lightning is quite a different game. Between weak players it is largely a game of chance: who is quicker to make the biggest blunder. Between strong players it requires the ability to play intuitively with severely truncated analysis trees.

A cynic might add that another modern chess skill is using software assistance during a game. The person who resorts to cheating may well win the game, but in truth he is cheating himself. Any win arrived at by cheating is actually an admission of weakness and can only sap one's inner strength.

What you Train and How you Train

To train a skill you need to practice and practice. But if you practice wrong, you will only get good at doing it wrong.

The way you Play

The primary principle some masters use both for long-term training and in preparing for tournaments will be a familiar one to many: train the way you fight, then fight the way you train. This means that any training method used should accurately reflect, at least in part, the tournament game experience.  Conversely, it also means that when in a tournament game, a player should rely on their training when making decisions, rather than impulsively "winging it" when faced with an unclear situation.  One common example of this phenomenon is choosing to abandon your opening preparation when faced with a particular opponent.  This typically occurs when there is a large ratings gap and a player feels that their openings are not good enough (if the opponent is higher-rated) or that the opponent (if lower-rated) can be easily beaten in an unfamiliar line.

Black Middlegame Training

Black to play and achieve a playable middlegame.

Suggested Candidate Moves : 

a) cxd4

b) Qc7

c) Rd8

Black Middlegame Training

Black to play and achieve a playable middlegame.


Suggested Candidate Moves : 


a) Qh5
b) Rac8
c) g6

Black Middlegame Training

Black to play and achieve a playable middlegame.


Suggested Candidate Moves : 


a) Qg5
b) 0-0
c) Bc6

Black Middlegame Training

Black to play and achieve a playable middlegame.


Suggested Candidate Moves : 


a) h6
b) cxd4
c) c4

Black Middlegame Training

Black to play and achieve a playable middlegame.


Suggested Candidate Moves : 


a) c5
b) Bg5
c) Bd6

Endgame Advantage

Black to play and Mate in 4.

Suggested Solution : 1...Nh3+ 2. Kg2 Rf2+ 3. Kh1 Rf1+ 4. Kg2 R8f2#

Endgame Advantage

White to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1. Kh4!! Qd2 2. Ne7!! (+5.33)

Endgame Advantage

White to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1. Rh8+! (+8.84)

Endgame Advantage

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...Rd1+! (-12.44)

Endgame Advantage

White to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1. Qc7! e5! 2. fxe5! Qf5! 2. Nd6! (+5.44)

Opening Lessons with SHE

In the above opening position, Strong Houdini Engine discovered that White should play 1. e3! d4 2. Ne2! dxe3. The following are some important variations.

a) 1. Rc1 0-0 2. Bg2 Ne5 

b) 1. Bg2 0-0 2. Rc1 Ne5

c) 1. b4 0-0 2. Na4 Ne5 

Opening Lessons with SHE

In the above opening position, Strong Houdini Engine discovered that White should play 1. Re1+! Nge7 2. Nbd2! Kd8. The following are some important variations.

a) 1. Nbd2 Bd6 2. Ne4 Nge7  

b) 1. b3 Bxf3 2. Bxf3 Nge7  

c) 1. h4 Bd6 2. Nbd2 Nge7 

Opening Lessons with SHE

In the above opening position, Strong Houdini Engine discovered that White should play 1. Rg1! dxc4 2. bxc4! Qe7. The following are some important variations.

a) 1. 0-0-0 Qe7 2. Rhg1 b5 

b) 1. Na4 Qe7 2. Rg1 Rb8 

c) 1. cxd5 cxd5 2. Rg1 Nb6 

Opening Lessons with SHE

In the above opening position, Strong Houdini Engine discovered that White should play 1. Be3! 0-0 2. a3! Nxd4. The following are some important variations.

a) 1. a3 0-0 2. Be3 Nxd4  

b) 1. f5 0-0 2. Bg5 Bd7 

c) 1. Nxc6 bxc6 2. Bd3 0-0

d) 1. Qd3 0-0 2. Be3 Rd8

Middlegame Training

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...Rh5!! 2. Ng5 Rxg5!!

Middlegame Training

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...e5!! 2. Rxe5 fxe5!!

Middlegame Training

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...Nxd4!! 2. Na8 Bc5!! 

Middlegame Training

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...Bxd2!! 2. Nxc7 Bxe1!!

Middlegame Training

Black to play and win.

Suggested Solution : 1...Nxe5!! 2. Bxd5 Qxd6!!