Narz's Training Diary

[narz]

Hi.  I'm Tony, my USCF just reached it's all-time high of 1905.  My goal is the win the 2010 World Open this July in the Under 2000 section which will net my $13K which will definitely be helpful since I have a baby to take care of now!

I've found chess tempo very helpful & a lot of fun.  Sometimes I'll spend 10, 15, 20, 30 minutes on a single problem.  I love that *click* moment when the problem morphs from a disorganized jumble of pieces into a coherent whole & you start seeing the tactical ideas.

I'm 30 years old & didn't start playing seriously until age 19.  And my early chess "diet" (until just a couple of years ago) was mostly blitz.  Now I focus on longer games & solving tactics, taking as long as I need to to solve them.  I keep this book by my bed & usually gun through about 12-36 mate-in-3's before I goto bed every night.  I also have Lev Albert's "Chess Training Pocket Book" in my car.  I'm about 2/3 of the way through it & once I'm done I plan to go through it again to further strengthen the tactical connections in my brain.

I'm up in Western Massachusetts (United States) now where there's not a whole lot of chess action but soon I will be moving back to New Jersey which has much more chess activity & there I'll be hitting up tournaments every week.  My only fear (perhaps a bit hubristic of me) is that I break 2000 before mid-June, disqualifying me for U-2000 section.

At present my chesstempo standard rating is 1977 and my endgame rating is 1724.  I hope to get up to around 2150 & 1950 by this summer.

I play correspondence chess on chess.com but I have mixed feelings about how good it is for my game.

Thanks for listening.

Best,
Tony

[drahacikfm]

Hi.  I'm Tony, my USCF just reached it's all-time high of 1905.  My goal is the win the 2010 World Open this July in the Under 2000 section which will net my $13K which will definitely be helpful since I have a baby to take care of now!

Good luck in your training and in the World Open!  It will be very hard to win the Under 2000 section though.  There are always 3 or 4 players who have been "saving up" for that tournament by studying and training several years without playing any tournaments (so their rating doesn't go over 2000).  The winner of that section is usually someone with true strength around 2200 USCF or more.

[narz]

Yes, I know the odds are against me.  However, I'll be happy placing in the top five.

[andreacoda]

Thanks for joining us and for sharing!

I am very happy to have another high rated player with us, and I am looking forward to hearing back from you soon!

Good luck with your tournament!!!

Kind regards,

Andrea

[narz]

Thanks Andrea.

Just broke 2000 here in tactics.  Quite pleased.  I think having a 1950 endgame rating is a bit unrealistic though.  Perhaps 1800 is a reasonable goal.  It's frustrating losing so many points for moves that mate two moves later.

I haven't participated in any tournaments in over a month now & I'm fiending!

At the end of this month I'll be visiting a friend in South (New) Jersey & going to hit up three tournaments in three days (a 5 round G-10, a 5 round G-30 and a G-60 quad).

I've set the goal to go over at least one annotated master game a day but for some reason I keep finding excuses to put it off.  Any ideas to get myself to do it?

[narz]

Well I managed to go thru two full games in one of my opening books.

[andreacoda]

Now make sure you don't spend two weeks catching up, by not touching a master game anymore! 

[narz]

Thanks Andrea!  I did two more today.  Also a bunch of tactics & some endgames.  Last night I watched a chesslecture.com video on an opening I play.

[narz]

Gone over about five games since I last posted.  Did very poorly in some causal games at the chess club yesterday evening.  Frustrating but I went over one of them (the only one I wrote down, three of them were G-15) and learned something.

Rating up to 2023 on CT.

[narz]

Fell out of practice again going over Master games.

Did three tournaments last weekend (one Fri, one Sat, one Sun).  Did fairly well, especially pleased with winning my quad on Sunday with a perfect score.

My rating on CT took a bit of a hit, still above 2000 though.

Entering another tournament this Saturday.

Lot of transition in my life right now, I'd get into more details but it's rather personal.  I hope I can stay focused on chess at least 1/2 hour a day or so.

[narz]

Reunited with my partner & our daughter!  So a bit hectic & definitely a change.  I also lost my car (accident, can't afford to fix) and am needing to find a new job.  So new location, lifestyle & I need to bike everywhere!  Unfortunately the closest regular tournaments are 18 miles away & that's a bit of a bike ride, especially in New Jersey traffic (full of SUV's & cell-phone addicts!).  Well, there's always NYC tournaments at the Marshall chess club but those are very expensive.

Played some quality games at the semi-local quads in Westfield lately.  However, I have a tendency to panic somewhat in time trouble & have lost a couple of otherwise beautiful games against strong players where I had a large initiative because of this.

My ChessTempo rating has gone up & down, fluctuating around 2030.  The other night I spent FORTY minutes on one problem.  I just couldn't goto sleep until I got it! (fortunately I got it right!)

I sprung for premeium one month for $4 but now back to basic & only two endgame puzzles a day.  Even the two endgames a day I find are very useful.  Feels like taking a multivitamin for my chess game.  No substitute for a rigorously healthy endgame diet & exercise but definitely that no action on the endings whatsoever.

My USCF reached 1950 before dropping to 1924 after a less than stellar performance (.5 of 3) at last weeks quads.

By the way, since I lost my car I created This thread to help myself (and hopefully others) find rideshares to USCF events.  Hopefully it will work!

Cheers,
Narz

Just wanted to update.  Thanks for listening.

[narz]

Since I've been spending so much time with my daughter & looking for work I haven't had a whole lot of time for chess study.  However, I do what I can & have been going to as many tournaments as I can.

I think the goal of going to the World Open >2000 is a bit unrealistic at this time (monetarily & also the competition will be too fierce to win a top prize, most likely) but I'm still enjoying playing.

Won my Quad ($50 yeah! ) last Sunday (though with a couple less than beautiful games, may make some YouTubes on them).

Haven't had much time to Tempo but I'm going to try to at least get two endgames & one tactic in a day.  My ChessTempo rating is 2051 at present & USCF (Live) is 1936.

[narz]

CT rating at 2056 from a high of 2075.

I've also been going thru Silman's endgame course (starting last night) as I've recognized in my tournament games that my endgames definitely need work.

I started all the way back at the D-player section & am going to work my way through to expert.  Obviously I already know most of the material for D and C players but the refresher course is refreshing.

I've given myself the simply goal of daily doing "2, 2 & 2" : studying two endgames (usually turns into a dozen or so positions), 2 openings (not whole lines full of variations & subvariations but just two variations overall) & 2 tactical puzzles (usually I end up doing 5 or 6 ).

So that's my plan right now.  I also think going over complete games is invaluable but I want to set my goals small for now.  Better to do something daily than nothing at all because the idea of getting started is too intimidating.

It's difficult to focus with a toddler running around, climbing onto your lap (while you're on the comp) asking to watch doggie videos but I do the best I can.

I plan to make some vids (or maybe just one) of my games from last tournament.  Hopefully I'll have the time to do that today while my daughter takes her nap.

There is a tournament I'd like to attend next Saturday but unfortunately it may be cancelled due to insufficient turnout.   If that doesn't work out I still plan to hit the Westfield quads.

Cheers,
Narz

[narz]

My endgame rating is still just 1732.  I'm hoping to get this up to 1800 within a few weeks, maybe a month or two.

[jsobo]

I really like Silmans endgame course... I keep revisiting the C & B section.  I like this page for some review and practice... http://www.chessvideos.tv/endgame-training/endgame-simulations.php