“Alas, there are very few chessplayers who train. The majority of them merely process information.” ~ Mark Dvoretsky

(linkablez.info likes to steal material from here and claim someone else wrote it, so expect this to be showing up there, soon.)

“Don’t believe it if someone tries to convince you that they know the only correct method of improvement. Such a method does not exist, and such claims are at best self-deception and at worst a deliberate attempt to delude pupils or readers.” Mark Dvoretsky, 2009 in “Controversial Thoughts”

Strong words, but if any chess instructor has the “street cred” to back them up, it’s him.

What does he mean? That a specific study recipe that improves everyone as efficiently as possible, whether it’s “all tactics, all the time” or “endgames above all” or anything else, flat-out doesn’t exist. Everyone’s different, more importantly, everyone learns differently.

So does that mean we’re all doomed to fail, or worse, to pay high fees for personal instructors in the game? No. (That is, unless you’re intending to pay me those high fees, then of course it’s true! Um, that’s a joke, son.)

It also means that generic, off-the-shelf, one size fits all classes are no match for dedicated individual work, with or without a trainer.

I get asked questions about learning how to play, by parents asking for their kids, and by adults asking for themselves. “Is there a book you’d recommend?” is frequently the “opening gambit” of the conversation.

I don’t like to recommend books without knowing the person I’m recommending them for, because there are several choices and every person is different, so what works best for one might not work for another. But there are a few titles that keep recurring. I’ll reproduce the list here, along with some notes.
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I’ve written a couple of times comparing the merits of Chess Assistant and ChessBase. Since I’m no GM and so don’t get my copies for free, I can only afford to keep one database going and up to date, so which one is will it be?

(drum roll, please)

Chess Assistant.

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A story that’s always impressed me is the one about how Richard Feynmann prepared himself for an Exam. He bought a blank notebook, entitled it “What I don’t know” and over the next few weeks completely organized everything he knew about physics. He reconstructed it, reconnected the parts of it into the whole. When he was done, he had a complete outline of what he knew about physics.

Then why the title? Because you can’t begin to identify what you don’t know, until you have identified what you do know.

So here’s your challenge: over the next few weeks, re-create this notebook, but about chess. Document what you know.

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How do I get better? That’s the question students ask more often than any other question. And then wait with bated breath, expecting me to reveal the secret move or idea that will guarantee good results. They know there’s a simple secret that will win game after game for them.

And my answer always disappoints. Read the rest of this entry »

Since I’m now retired, I think I should probably dump some of my experiences here. Perhaps some of you can learn from my mistakes and improve on my results as an organizer. I’d like to think I did a pretty good job, but I made mistakes and failed to solve some problems at all.

So let me talk a bit about the problems draws cause an organizer. Not the hard-fought earned draws; they’re no problem at all. But I mean the “tactical draws,” the short ones players make because of tournament standings, when they take a draw with their main competition for the event in a dozen moves or so. They’re part of the game, like playing “safe” in billiards they keep a player from damaging their own chances while at the same time blocking an opponent’s advance. I’ve said before that from a player’s perspective, these draws absolutely make sense.

But from an organizer’s perspective, they’re trouble. For two reasons. Read the rest of this entry »

The Popeye moment has arrived: “That’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more!”

All things must pass. This decision wasn’t easy for me to make; in fact it’s overdue. I feel like I’m letting Fred and Marshall and Pearle down. But I just can’t do it anymore. The game has changed. The players have changed. I’ve changed. I would hope they would understand. Read the rest of this entry »

Bobby Fischer is dead.There’s a lot that could be said at this point, both good and bad. There’s the brash young kid who wanted to be the youngest world champion ever. There’s the bitter old man, spewing invective at everyone.

People will tell stories. And, in the end, we’ll all remember what we choose to remember.

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We’ve all heard the saying, “No combination exists without a positional advantage.” I’ve struggled with implementing that for years, and I’ve given up. While the statement is quite probably true (at least I’m not going to dispute it) I’ve come to the conclusion it’s also quite useless as advice.

It’s a lot like the adage “there’s no smoke without fire.” The fire may not always be visible, so looking for it doesn’t help you find the smoke. And just as some fires burn without smoke, sometimes there are positional advantages without a combination available at the moment to exploit them.

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