my dilemma...

[John Coleman]

11. Nbd2 is not the move

I dunno, it looks pretty good to me. I doubt I would have found it - the line is more than one move deep - but it looks as though Black is in a lot of trouble. My computer gives an eval of something like +5

[Louis Morin]

I dunno, it looks pretty good to me. I doubt I would have found it - the line is more than one move deep - but it looks as though Black is in a lot of trouble. My computer gives an eval of something like +5

Actually, I was wrong when I wrote there was only one winning move. There are others, for example 11.Bc6 and 11.Nfd2, but 11.Nbd2 still seems to me the most natural and crushing.

[Sid Belzberg]

Actually, I was wrong when I wrote there was only one winning move. There are others, for example 11.Bc6 and 11.Nfd2, but 11.Nbd2 still seems to me the most natural and crushing.

Yes...the line I found was Bc6 and was very sure that was the winning move you were referring to.

[Henri Hughes]

Actually, I was wrong when I wrote there was only one winning move. There are others, for example 11.Bc6 and 11.Nfd2, but 11.Nbd2 still seems to me the most natural and crushing.

other problem ive had sometimes is even something simple as converting a winning position when theres so many options

[Toy Chack Kwan]

I am curious in regards to how many hours, on average, a day (or week) you spend on chess, and how you spend it...
eg playing online games (bullet? Blitz? 15+15?), studying openings, endings, tactics? watch online Gm tournaments? playing at chess club? etc
.

[Henri Hughes]

I am curious in regards to how many hours, on average, a day (or week) you spend on chess, and how you spend it...
eg playing online games (bullet? Blitz? 15+15?), studying openings, endings, tactics? watch online Gm tournaments? playing at chess club? etc
.

I play at the Guelph club every Wednesday night from about 7-11 then I study about 10 hours week generally doing opening studying but recently working on my middle game as I feel that is my weakest part of my game I finish off every session with half an hour of tactics

[Henri Hughes]

I feel like I do need a coach for guidence and help with learning the game in general but its not possible

[Tony Li]

Henri,

Your rating history suggests you are actually improving a lot. In the last 6 months, your rating went up 100 points even though you've been playing at the top of your section. Sounds like you are struggling to consistently win against lower rated opponents with white. You might want to download Canbase and figure out how 1700s normally win against 1400s.

Write down now how you think it happens. Then check out 20-30 game and see if you are right.

Furthermore, don't resign or offer/accept draws, and write down and review how much time you spend on every move.

[Louis Morin]

other problem ive had sometimes is even something simple as converting a winning position when theres so many options

Yes, there were so many options, but all of them involved sacrificing material, so they were not so obvious or easy to play.

On the other hand, you noticed that Black had already won a pawn and was attacking your rook a1, your bishop b5 and your pawn d5. So you tried to minimize your material loss, and managed to get two pieces for a rook and two pawns. But at this point Black had successfully castled and could easily finish his development, so your big advantage was completely gone.

What you had to realize at move 10 is that you were completely winning. Your opponent's King is still stuck in the center, his Queen has moved prematurely to grab material, his two knights are pinned and he cannot easily finish his development. In this kind of situation, you must go out of your way to find the crushing move. If needed, you should think an hour or more until you find it. You cannot simply say "i need to play something" and continue "business as usual" if you really hope to get good results. Sometimes you need to play slow positional chess or keep a material balance, but not when you have such a huge advantage in development. In the game, in order not to lose material, you merely exchanged one of his pinned Knights for your strong Bishop (bad idea), forced him to develop his undeveloped Bishop (another bad idea) and helped him to castle safely (final bad idea). All this in one move (11.Bxe7?). I hope this will be a good lesson for the future.

[Henri Hughes]

Yes, there were so many options, but all of them involved sacrificing material, so they were not so obvious or easy to play.

On the other hand, you noticed that Black had already won a pawn and was attacking your rook a1, your bishop b5 and your pawn d5. So you tried to minimize your material loss, and managed to get two pieces for a rook and two pawns. But at this point Black had successfully castled and could easily finish his development, so your big advantage was completely gone.

What you had to realize at move 10 is that you were completely winning. Your opponent's King is still stuck in the center, his Queen has moved prematurely to grab material, his two knights are pinned and he cannot easily finish his development. In this kind of situation, you must go out of your way to find the crushing move. If needed, you should think an hour or more until you find it. You cannot simply say "i need to play something" and continue "business as usual" if you really hope to get good results. Sometimes you need to play slow positional chess or keep a material balance, but not when you have such a huge advantage in development. In the game, in order not to lose material, you merely exchanged one of his pinned Knights for your strong Bishop (bad idea), forced him to develop his undeveloped Bishop (another bad idea) and helped him to castle safely (final bad idea). All this in one move (11.Bxe7?). I hope this will be a good lesson for the future.

yes thank you that was very instructive im gonna work on those positions all this week and then I am playing the 6 rounder in hart house ill be playing u1600 instead (usually I would play up in u1900) so this will ne a good test to see what I can do!

[Egidijus Zeromskis]

thats the other part of the problem how should I be determining my style?

You must be universal. You'll need to find or choose the best moves (per your understanding) whatever situation is on the board - wildly tactical or calmly positional. You'll get both of them as chess is a two-players game. Look through great players games with great commentaries. Kasparov great books can be your source of them.

[Egidijus Zeromskis]

I play at the Guelph club every Wednesday night from about 7-11 then I study about 10 hours week generally doing opening studying but recently working on my middle game as I feel that is my weakest part of my game I finish off every session with half an hour of tactics

Whom and what do you play at the club? Can you make someone as a studying buddy?

10 h -> it's like two-hours a day. Decrease time you spend on openings, instead study/solve tactics and endgames. The less quantity of pieces will make your calculations more precise and deeper. Devote more time to go through (great) games to get ideas what to do in middle game and endgame. It's good when they match your openings. Though it might be difficult to find high rated players playing your 1...Nc6.

[Egidijus Zeromskis]

yes thank you that was very instructive im gonna work on those positions all this week and then I am playing the 6 rounder in hart house ill be playing u1600 instead (usually I would play up in u1900) so this will ne a good test to see what I can do!

You're quite active. That's great! Don't forget to exchange your thoughts with opponents after games. That's the part of training too. At home spend time analyzing those games. Write moves down. Come back later, reanalyze and at the end compare with engines or post them here :) Don't go easy way to fire up engines after the game. Easy come, easy go.

Also take care of your physical status. (aka strong body strong soul) A full tournament game is quite tiring; at the end of the game mistakes start appear to everyone. You'll just need not miss them, and don't make own :)


White to move.

Game continued:

61. Kc2 f1Q 62. Bg6 Kd7 63. e8Q ... (and I checkmated the opponent with a newly promoted knight)

Both two half-moves shall be with "??" Can you spot why? :)

Thus, do what I write, not what I do LOL

[Henri Hughes]

You're quite active. That's great! Don't forget to exchange your thoughts with opponents after games. That's the part of training too. At home spend time analyzing those games. Write moves down. Come back later, reanalyze and at the end compare with engines or post them here :) Don't go easy way to fire up engines after the game. Easy come, easy go.

Also take care of your physical status. (aka strong body strong soul) A full tournament game is quite tiring; at the end of the game mistakes start appear to everyone. You'll just need not miss them, and don't make own :)


White to move.

Game continued:

61. Kc2 f1Q 62. Bg6 Kd7 63. e8Q ... (and I checkmated the opponent with a newly promoted knight)

Both two half-moves shall be with "??" Can you spot why? :)

Thus, do what I write, not what I do LOL

wow thats fairly instructive!! I often times find I don't know how I should be analyzing my games

[Henri Hughes]

Whom and what do you play at the club? Can you make someone as a studying buddy?

10 h -> it's like two-hours a day. Decrease time you spend on openings, instead study/solve tactics and endgames. The less quantity of pieces will make your calculations more precise and deeper. Devote more time to go through (great) games to get ideas what to do in middle game and endgame. It's good when they match your openings. Though it might be difficult to find high rated players playing your 1...Nc6.

well I play club tournaments all the time with the players there and often do 4-5 game matches against Hal bond the club is where ive had the most successful play (in one of our recent tourneys scoring a draw against a 2120 at the time) my strongest was when I went 9.5/11 about 2 years back although struggled in some recent games.

on top of that yes I am a very active player I play about 6-12 tournaments every year ( last year I had 22 different rated events actually)