THOUGHTS OF A CHESS ADDICT

Sometimes I wonder to myself what would be the most satisfying moment for a chess trainer? Is it the huge amounts of money that he can get from dishing out lessons, or rather, just the joy of the students' faces when they have achieved their goals? So far, 2010 has been a good year for me. Most of the students that were with me for more than a year have achieved mostly 50-60 rating point increases. The ones that joined me this year, some for just 5 months or less, have also performed well. I would rather not mention their names (mainly to protect the innocent) but display their photos. S has been with me for more than 2 years now, he has seen steady improvement from the days of scoring 3 to 3.5 pts out of 7 back in 2008.  His latest  SCF rating stands 1358 as compared to 1008 when he started. 350 pts in 2 years. He has just scored 5.5/7 and finished 6th place out of 120 registered players at the recent Toa Payoh West CC Primary School section.  The chief factor that prope...

Apart from the books that I have recommended, there's some works that the aspiring chess-player should at least read, once, in his career: This is the pioneering work by GM Alexander Kotov that explores the idea of how one should conduct his game in terms of thinking. Though a little dated in approach perhaps, one should at least attempt to start thinking systematically first before branching out into other methods. The Tree of Analysis indeed gives one a structure to organise a player's thoughts. So I highly recommend this book as a starting treatise before venturing to other books. It is indeed puzzling to see some marvel about joint analysis of positions as a possible training method. Kotov has explained that he embarked on this discipline, filling his notebooks with variations he calculated (without moving the pieces of course) over complex positions derived from actual games. It is propelled him from a finalist in the Russian Championships to GM. So honestly, deep analysi...

It is indeed hard for a non-chess player to write about chess if he does not speak the lingo of chess-players. Little wonder then that all of us chess-players will tend to misconstrue his intentions. Analysing why an outcome has occurred after the event, piecing the pieces of evidence that led to the outcome is called post-mortem analysis, not technical evaluation. All good chess players do that at the end of each game for it is rare that both players would arrive at the same conclusions at every juncture after each move, maybe except for the 1st few moves of the opening where it is accepted conventional wisdom. Aided by a reasonable thought process, it is mainly the evaluation of the position after analysis to determine if the move or idea is playable. Through analysis, one learns a great deal about his/her strengths and weaknesses, particularly in the area of chess study and character shortcomings which need to be addressed. Any amount of analysis will reveal, for the loser, errors i...

I've just come across an interesting remark made by a supposedly non-competitive chess player in that you will need "need the tools of developed judgement, understanding and advanced thinking skills " to come up with possibilities to save yourself when you are in trouble in a game.  This is under the scope of Technical Evaluation. Highly interesting because I am still trying to fathom the author's intent in the previous statement, as he has often renounced the importance of having the technical knowledge but rather the need of maintaining the right emotional balance to solve problems on the chessboard. What I find issue here is that much of the emotional stress that is generated is often in the player not having found the solution to his problem at hand in the first place. This can be address through good preparation in the realm of analysis of the players own games by discovering his faults and actively correcting them. After following the TV series "House"...

Chess maxims are abound, especially from acclaimed players like Siegbert Tarrasch who was the authority in explaining the importance of chess rules in his time. Today we have a summarised guide of these bits of advice in the form of the 2 books below:  This is the principles book for the intermediate player rated perhaps 1500 and above. The 17 chapters offer a wide range of advice from Attack, Move Selection, Calculation, Defence, Tactics and even Tournament tactics. I like #137:   "The most important novelties are hidden in the games of the old masters" That's why the study of the games of Alekhine, Nimzowitsch and Capablanca will gain you valuable insights on some of the plans they've used and are likely to spin off in positions of current theory.                                         ...

When one talks about confidence, a quiet knowing, what exactly does that mean?  I can only deduce that this confidence comes with fore-knowledge of a particular course of action leading to a predictable outcome. In chess, this translates to knowledge - in fact, GMs have about 100,000 bits of this knowledge in the form of principles of the 3 phases of the game, plus other patterns of chess tactics such as mating patterns, even endgame patterns where 1 look at the arrangement of pawns can determine the course of action to take. It is this knowledge that players need to seek, whether through the study of games, or by deduction in the course of analysing his/her own game. There will always be some positions where it will be impossible to calculate owing to the many ramifications of the variations pending on the player's understanding of the game. In fact, some of the correct moves may not even be discovered during the course of the game as that possibility may not have existed owing to...

What are they? I am afraid some of these names below may be alien to young chess players, who may not have even known who I am talking about. Let me just flash out the titles first, then I will go in depth on my next posting. I own most of them by the way.

 Books that teach yourself are abound in the 80's and I present some of the well written ones, such as Zak's "Improve Your Chess Results". I chanced upon this book while playing in the Merdeka tournament in 1990 at the Times bookstore in KL. The title attracted me so I started to pore over its contents. It was a revelation. Zak is a famous Russian chess trainer having coached many top players, such as Boris Spassky the 10th World Champion, Yermolinsky among others. He was a believer in the attack from the first move and advocated a thorough study of the Two Knight's Defence for young players.   The major topics covered were: How Skill Develops, Typical Mistakes by Young Players, Developing a Repertoire which are relevant to the chess coaching nature in me. Let expand on the topic Typical mistakes by Young Players. The main sub-title under this chapter was " Playing openings without understanding the ideas". I quote: " If a player learns variations w...

I've engaged someone across the Causeway in his postings about the process of creating a GM or grandmaster. Though he approaches it from the motivational speaker point of view, it is laughable ignorance on his part perhaps that several bloggers have tried to dispel  his thoughts which they think will only serve to misguide. So I guess its time to prove myself in what I know about his area of expertise (motivation and mind training) when it comes to chess players. He is not wrong in that there are components in chess by listing the 2 player's minds, the chessboard, the clock. So I shall attempt to recommend the various books below which can help him understand the subject of chess better. Having been around the chess training scene since 1982, although a volunteer then, I have researched quite a bit on the thinking process of the chess player and how it affects his/her  game. 2 landmark books come to mind: Adrian De Groot's classic thesis on the thinking of chess players (fr...

Here are some of my recommendations for good endgame books to read. This covers the area of exact or theoretical endgames. You need only to study the 30 that I have outlined from the huge lot.  What I like about these books is that they have lots of explanations in how the winning method is achieved. Some are even directed towards the level of players and what they should know - eg Silman.   Basic Chess Endings has been around for years as the 1st encyclopedia of chess endgames. Though there are quite a few errors, what I like about this book is that it gives sound advice on what to do when you have no definite idea how to proceed. Take for example pawn endings. So you have 1 pawn more than your opponent. Fine's advice? " The winning process in endings with a pawn ahead as follows: 1 Force a passed pawn 2 Sacrifice the pawn at a moment to get either a a pawn that queens by force b a sufficient proponderence (means more) of material c a win in one of the basic posit...

As promised, I shall now dwell on the business of chess improvement based on my experience. Most players, weak or strong,  fear and respect the endgame respectively. Unlike opening variations where one can devote time to learn 'tricks' to catch the opponent off-guard to snare a piece, a queen or even mate, the endgame does not reward the student in this manner.  I agree with Andy Soltis when he says the chief phobia about endgames is chiefly caused by the chess authors way of presenting the subject. Tons of exact endgames knowledge (where if you know the moves you can win) in the form of encyclopedic information about  how if your pieces lie within the zone you win, if not you draw, or who wins if he has the move etc. Too much of such information is utterly useless as the when the time does come to apply such information over the board, much of it would have been forgotten. On the other hand, there's the other area of practical endgame strategems such as the fortress, cre...

Quite a big word, subliminal. I had just learnt it from reading Andy Soltis's STUDYING CHESS MADE EASY.  I would recommend this book for the serious player wanting answers on how to improve his/her chess through the various ways of studying chess. There are many methods which I find I had in common with the ones he explained in his book. The one I liked best was Subliminal learning - using methods to input chess knowledge to the mind subconsciously. How can this be done? Reading chess books and analysing every diagram one comes across. In his book he gives countless examples of top players doing that, Each time the book is read, different thoughts and perceptions are picked up by the player. One such book I find which does this is Nimzowitsch's MY SYSTEM . You can read this book at different phases and it tells you different things. The other way which Soltis does not talk about and is my own invention, is Chess Game watching. You will need a game-viewer or Chess database like ...

Back in the last 30 years, most of what's known as theoretical chess knowledge existed purely in the form of the printed word - chess magazines, chess books, Informants. These were the main source of information one can get on the latest trends in opening theory, or the presentation of great games played by the masters with great comments from the authors. That trend was completely changed with the Computer Age - the use of chess databases, playing programs like Fritz or Rybka and instruction videos. The poor chess student is really flooded with tons of information coming at a ridiculous rate that it is near impossible to find the time to rummage through, let alone study, the essence of the material. With time controls of 25 mins or less per player to complete the game, one wonders why is there the need to invest time and effort to learn chess when there is hardly enough time for the student to ponder about the plans and strategies one has learnt, hoping to find some use for it in ...

Another year has passed, and going by the records in the Primary School Open, Under 11 and Under 9 sections, Nanyang Primary has done well again. At a glance the winners  in each Primary School category: BOYS                   1st                           2nd                     3rd Open       Nanyang Primary   North View Primary   ACS Primary A Under 11   Nanyang Primary   ACS Primary A          SJI Junior A Under 9   Nanyang Primary Tao Nan School A      ...

Where does one get to play a human opponent face to face Friday ? Fret not, Thomson CC Chess Club opens its doors on the 3rd floor activity room next to the elevator. The Chess Club starts 7.30pm and ends 10.00pm . Members are advised to sms 97985479 to check if the club is open for that day as we depend on volunteers to open the premises each week. Chess sets are available, players with chess clocks are advised to bring one. Address : 194 Upper Thomson Road (Opp Long House Eating House)

Ah, what a day it was for Thomson Chess Club. The arrival of the chess King with his old friend Zurab Azmaiparasvilli and others receiving him.   The crowd at Thomson CC listening to his every word  As Kasparov gathered momentum by explaining how chess beauty cannot be created by oneself alone, he gave equal credit to his opponent GM Topalov for taking up the challenge by producing the diagram below:   Yes, that brilliant move Rd7! which refutes Topalov's notion that Black is winning ...in 1 move! It was enough to entrall the audience of the greatness of chess beauty coupled with brilliant intuition on the part of the 13th World Champion, who confessed that he was acting on a hunch when he first sacrificed a rook, then two to reach the above position.

The 13th World Chess Champion, Grandmaster Garry Kasparov, will be in Singapore on 15th August 2010 (Sunday) to play in exhibition blitz chess matches against two of Singapore’s top chess players, battle against thirty local chess players of different age groups in simultaneous chess matches, autograph his chess books for fans and deliver a motivational talk on “How Life Imitates Chess”. The one-day event is jointly organized by Conrad Centennial Singapore, Serangoon Gardens Country Club, Thomson Community Club and the "Chess is for Everybody in Singapore" movement Singapore chess players, fans and parents will be extremely delighted as this is the first ever visit by a living chess legend, Garry Kasparov, to Singapore. This event follows soon after the successful hosting of the 12th World Chess Champion Grandmaster Anatoly Karpov’s visit to Singapore on 17 July 2010. Grandmaster Garry Kasparov was the youngest player to have won the title of world chess champion from 1985 to...

The last Karpov visit to Singapore was in 1997, just after his 1996 triumph over Gata Kamsky in Elista. This weekend, Karpov is once again on Singapore soil in a goodwill tour of Asia,accompanied by Richard Conn and Hamid Majid. They will be here to meet chessplayers and Karpov shall play a short exhibition blitz tournament with 7 Singapore juniors. Playing Karpov, whether in a simul or one-to-one, is a great experience which I thoroughly enjoyed back on 28 November 1997. As 1 of the 26 boards, I prepared for this encounter by studying 3 opening systems to 1 e4, 1 d4 and 1 c4. Karpov was alternating these 3 opening moves and when he came to me, it was 1. c4. I essayed the same variation that he played against P Nikolic in 1988 and lost. 12 moves passed and when he say the position in front of him at my board, he froze. The picture above said it all. Trying to compose his thoughts he looked at me wryly and stood there for a good 2 minutes. Photographers saw it as a perfect photo opportu...

Vishy Anand's twelve game win with Black secured his World Chess Championship title for another 2 years till 2012. Flashback 1991 when he first visited Singapore and gave a 6 year old girl a draw at a simul at Cairnhill CC. That was 19 years ago. We had a meal with some chessplayers and talked a bit. Till this day, he has not lost the friendly, cordial manner at all. What are some lessons we can learn from the way he approached this match? If I may use the Art of War from Sun Tzu to help illustrate, the following maxims were deemed useful: KNOW THY ENEMY Anand's wise choice of openings steered clear of his opponent's theoretical preparation and avoided playing into the strengths of Topalov - great imagination in unbalanced positions, a strong tactical flair (witness his 1st game win), willing to take risks in order to win. In many ways Topalov resembles Fischer, but one quality he lacks is patience. Playing the Slav is a little dicey for Anand who had to doggedly defend an ...

1981 It was the year when ACS was dominating the InterSchool Team chess scene the last time in the 80's in the Under 18's. RI's Under 16 team won the National School's Team Championship U16 trophy, the U14s also did well. From 1982 till 1988, RI then swept the top honours in the National Junior and School Team Championships each year, with the exception in 1985 when CJC took the Under 18. Another photo from 1984: What was the secret? The mentorship that Soh Kok Hong (on extreme left) and I (6th from right) provided, coming back to our Grange Road RI every Saturday afternoon in helping with the training of the boys during these years that made the difference. The bond between us and the boys gave them the necessary confidence to do their best and return with the titles. One of my methods was to have the boys focus their games onto an empty chessboard and I would throw a book in the air that will hit the floor with a loud thud. The student that got distracted would be ...