rinna’s chess study plan

Week 1

I’ve really appreciated having a more structured plan going on. I have done some extracurricular studying hehe, because the study plan has helped me get even more excited about chess (also because I have some spaced repetition stuff going on, so I’m obviously not gonna abandon that just because I’ve also got this study plan).

The plan has also helped to ensure I actually play games. :) The blitz games are helping me learn to use my time more efficiently.

My first daily game has been going really excitingly. I’ve included an animated GIF below showing the game so far (up through move 19 for both white and black). I have the black pieces.

Week 2

From this week on, the study plan decreases the games played a little to make room for studying the games from Logical Chess Move by Move. Which is a fun book! It’s a bit of an old book, so some of the analyses are by now demonstrably erroneous due to further developments in the understanding of chess (and the advent of chess engines), but it’s interesting. It goes through a bunch of historical master-level games and explains the ideas behind (and sometimes flaws in) each move.

Yesterday I also got to get started on Winning Chess Openings (okay, that’s a lie, i’ve been doing a bit of extracurricular reading on it already. but i did more yesterday). Which is also a great book. I’ve reached the section of the book where it’s basically giving a whirlwind tour of every classical king’s pawn opening (which is to say, ones beginning 1. e4 e5, with both players moving the pawn in front of their king two squares). Next it’s gonna do the same for classical queen’s pawn openings (1. d4 d5), and then for modern king’s/queen’s pawn openings (where the second player doesn’t mirror the first’s move, intending to contest or attack their position in the center in some other way).

The games this week were all blitz games. I went 6-6, (3-1, 2-2, and 1-3 across the different days I played them). Looking back I notice I went 6-1 with the white pieces and 0-5 with the black pieces. Huh. (And the black games were all in the Caro-Kann, which is how I respond to 1. e4.) Gonna need to work on that I guess, hehe.

I won my daily game that was going really excitingly. Played another game against the same person as well as starting a new game. The rematch went in my favor again, and now we’re doing another (now unrated) game. The new daily game I got a bit reckless and tried a Qa5+ tactic (this is moving your queen to check the opponent’s king with the intention of then capturing a different piece with the queen when they have to move to defend; awkwardly I failed to notice that they could both block the check and defend the piece I was going after by moving their queen) that hasn’t panned out so I had to spend several moves getting my queen to safety. I’ve managed to stabilize the situation so we’ll see how that works out. :)

Week 3

Blitz games didn’t go so hot this week. My big weakness there was not thinking quickly enough and getting short on time. Week 4 will be all blitz games so hopefully that’ll help me work on that. The rapid games went well, though. :) Daily games remain fun but have slowed down a bit.

I finished up the Classical King’s Pawn Openings chapter in the openings book. And part 1 of the endgames book! Next week will be Classical Queen’s Pawn Openings time, plus some less noob-level endgame study.

Outside the study plan per se, I’ve been working some on my opening repertoire. I ended up watching some videos from a chess coach who advocates an approach based on going deep on a main line (both in the sense of going all the way into the middlegame, and also in the sense of thoroughly analyzing the line so as to develop a strong understanding of the plans and motivations of both sides throughout), then working backwards and analyzing in similar depth any branches where the opponent might make a different move. It’s an intriguing approach, and I want to give it a try. I’ve gone deep on one main line in the Ruy Lopez (which is what I aim to play with the white pieces), though I haven’t done the branching out yet. I haven’t really done similarly on other openings yet either. I kinda need to decide what defense I want to use against 1. d4. I’ve gone back and forth on it (I have played very few games against it lately tbh), but I think at this point I’m deciding between the Grünfeld Defense and an approach based on the Nimzo-Indian and either Queen’s Indian or Bogo-Indian. I might also consider trying to switch from the Caro-Kann against 1. e4 to a Sicilian Defense. I like the Caro-Kann, but it’s hard to find a good source on the theory, and it doesn’t seem too successful or popular at the top-level lately so I can’t look at those games for ideas either. In contrast the Sicilian is the most common response to 1. e4, and I’ve found some great books and such on it. Anyway, interesting stuff. ^^

That’s been week 3.

Week 4

Once again I’ve done poorly in blitz, alas (0-4, 1-3, and 2-2 on the three days I played blitz games). My big weak points in those games were:

1. Opening unfamiliarity, which isn’t necessarily a big deal at my level in slower time controls, but in blitz it means I have to spend a lot of time thinking about it early on and I suffer from time pressure later.
2. Time management (contributed to by the preceding and contributing to the following).
3. Blundering my pieces. >.>

I did have some quite effective attacking play in the wins, including one where I used it to recover from a mistake into a win. I think I really need to work on thinking faster, though. Which probably means I should do more tactics puzzles, possibly in a more structured way. That won’t necessarily help me actually think faster, but it’ll train my ability to recognize important tactical patterns faster anyway. So that would mean I don’t need to expend as much explicit thinking on that sort of thing.

My daily games have gone well. Both my rated game and my unrated game against TPTCOAT started out with me on the back foot a bit, but then I managed to outplay my opponent and start gradually closing out the game. After winning both of those, I started another rated game and another unrated game, and have won the latter already with a somewhat early checkmate. The rated game is about to end in my favor. I experimented with the Sicilian Defense there, though my opponent went for the Closed Sicilian, which I haven’t looked into at all. I ended up pulling off a windmill that took four of their pawns for free. Later I realized that I had gained the ability to checkmate them about halfway through that, but eh, no harm in grabbing the material just in case I miscalculated the mate.

My opening study and preparation is getting more thorough now. I’ve studied the main lines of the Grünfeld (my defense against 1. d4) and prepared my preferred response against the Caro-Kann and the trickier variant of the Scandinavian Defense as white. I’ve also studied the main lines of the Najdorf Sicilian (my main defense against 1. e4, although I’ll need to do a bit more studying to know how to handle a couple of different ways White can play instead of going into open Sicilian positions).

This week is back to some rapid games, so I think those will go better for me. :)

Week 5

Hey, I was right. This week’s rapid games did go better for me! I also went 2-2 in my blitz games (not counting the tournament where most of my opponents were much higher-rated than me). My blitz rating fell quite a bit because of blundering mate-in-1 against the one lower-rated player I played in the tournament, but I’m satisfied with my performance, especially after noticing that that one lower-rated player is much higher rated than me in slower time controls.

I’m getting stronger in aggressive play in rapid and daily games! Also in blitz games but I still struggle with time pressure at times.

I’ve begun playing the Sicilian as my response to 1. e4! It’s been fun, and it’s been well-suited to playing aggressively.

I did two chess.com tournaments for people rated under 1200 in 5+5 blitz and 10+0 rapid². I lost all my games in both but I’m pretty satisfied with the experience, especially in the rapid tournament. The 10+0 time control was rough, though, but a 15+10 tournament would take something like 3 hours, so… tradeoffs.

In the openings book, I still need next week to finish reading about the Queen’s Gambit Declined. In my endgame study I finished reading the second part of Silman’s Endgame Course. Next week I’ll do the tests for part 2.

In extracurricular studies, I’ve tried studying from the series of comprehensive chess training books from Artur Yusupov. They’re really tough, but the first chapter on Mating Motifs immediately helped out when I won games using the Arabian mate, and began noticing the threat of it and other common mates in a lot of my games as things to defend against. I achieved a “Good” scored (12/16) on the exercises, which were very tough. Chapter 2 is not sticking with me as well so maybe I should re-read it…

Anyway, week 6 will be a blitz week, so… it’ll be a challenge but hopefully it’ll help me get better at thinking more quickly.

Week 6

Blitz games this week didn’t go too hot for me, though my rating stayed stable. Partly I just was really off my game on Sunday at least. Friday I did do pretty well on time management and went 3-1. Really I need to improve on consistency I guess, which may partly be a matter of improving in physical health (mostly in terms of getting adequate rest, but tbh that’ll have to wait for next month at earliest).

I played some extracurricular rapid games and did quite well in them. I also played some games against Will when he came up to visit me before my move. Our record ended up perfectly even across Saturday and Sunday at 3½-3½. I think we might have played a game or two on Friday but I don’t remember.

Finished up the coverage of the Queen’s Gambit Declined in Seirawan’s openings book, and started on modern king’s pawn openings (covered the Alekhine, Scandinavian, and a bit of the French). Maybe finishing up the section on the French Defense will help me finally figure out how I want to play against it with the white pieces.

In my endgame studies, I finished the tests from part 2 in Silman’s endgame book, and did some of the practice problems lichess has for pawn endgames. Not sure where I’ll go from here for next week, as the further parts of Silman’s book are intended for much stronger players than me.

We’ll see how next week goes.

Week 7

Went completely even in my games this week, which resulted in a slight drop in my blitz rating and a slight increase in my rapid rating. Also I caught and mostly recovered from COVID.

Looking back over the study plan so far, I feel confident I’ve improved somewhat. My blitz rating has gone down a bit from what it was after that first week, but my rapid rating has slowly but steadily increased. I’ve also been continuing to do very well in my correspondence games, though I haven’t tracked those in the table.

My main current extracurricular study project is working through the very basic book of chess puzzles Manual of Chess Combinations Volume 1a, with the intention of trying the Woodpecker method with it. My goal there is to work on calculating simple variations and quickly recognizing tactical patterns. That method is a training approach aimed at improving pattern recognition that was described in a book titled the Woodpecker Method. The idea is: you spend a four week period solving as many puzzles from some set of exercises as you can, then take a day or two break before doing the same exercises again, but faster. The ideal is you manage to halve the time it takes each cycle and eventually end up able to solve all of them within a day (possibly a rather long day hehe). The problems in the Woodpecker Method book itself are too difficult to make sense for me to do the method with (if I’m spending ~8 minutes a problem and still only getting a bit above half the points… idk that I’m going to get much out of repeatedly solving it hehe), so I’m going with the much easier book for the puzzles. Perhaps if I find the methodology helpful I’ll give it a try with the puzzles in the original book someday when I’m stronger!

My beloved Sofía has been helping me with that study project by checking my solutions for me (the solution pages are very compact in the Manual of Chess Combinations so it’s tricky to avoid accidentally seeing a glimpse of later problems’ solutions), which has been fun. ^.

My endgame study on those days is a little unfocused at this point since I finished the level-appropriate bits of Silman’s endgame book. I should probably figure out a clearer plan for those days by the end of this week.

Opening study has continued to be interesting. I finished up the Seirawan book’s coverage of the French Defense and started in on the Caro-Kann. This week I’ll continue starting with the Short Variation of the Caro-Kann Advance Variation and then move on to the Sicilian Defense, which will probably last at least into the following week. The Sicilian is an exciting opening, and it’s also my current main response to 1. e4, although I’m considering switching to playing 1. e4 e5 just to see a broader variety of positions and build a broader variety of skills.

Week 8

This was a blitz week for the study plan. The blitz games did not go super great, although I had my first ever draw (other than the time I blundered a stalemate in a Queen vs. King ending against Will).

I did play a bunch of extracurricular rapid games, which went much better. Amusingly apparently I played as many rapid games as blitz games.

I’m planning to start studying Jesús de la Villa Garcia’s 100 Endgames You Must Know for my endgame study going forward. This week I only made it through the introduction, but next week I’ll start on the chapter on basic endings, which will mostly be review, but will hopefully improve my comfort and accuracy with the stuff it covers.

I’ve continued working on the puzzles from Manual of Chess Combinations, Volume 1a. I’ve done 318 puzzles of 719 in the book after 13 days. I made it past the simple mate in one puzzles. After those, it had various “win a [piece]” puzzles, followed by endgame positions with the goal to secure a draw. At the spot where I’m at as I write this, it’s various themed mate-in-2 problems (first “by means of a double check”, then “by means of a Queen sacrifice”). I really liked the draw puzzles and the mate in 2 problems are also proving very enjoyable.

Week 9

This week went well. I played a lot of games and had 28 wins, 6 losses, and 1 draw. My rapid rating went up a lotttt, and now I’m higher rated than my friend Will. :3

I’ve reached the third (and final) “stage” of the puzzle book. I’m on target to finish the whole thing in the four weeks, though some of the remaining days might be a lot of work (I have to do ~28.5 puzzles each remaining day).

There’s a chess.com official tournament for correspondence games for people rated under 1000 that started this morning as I write this (the morning after Week 9 ended). I look forward to seeing how I do in that (it’ll take ages, as there’s 4528 players signed up…, 6 person group size, so it’ll take 5 rounds, at up to 3 days a move). But that’s more of a next week thing anyway!

I started in on the new endgame book’s “basic endings” chapter, which has been covering the basics of King + Pawn v. King endings so far. It’s review for me, although its coverage makes some things clearer or more explicit than in my previous studies.

I’m still not through the Sicilian Defense coverage from the openings book, which is more remarkable for the fact that it’s being very summary about some major variations.

As for my own openings, I’ve continued my experiment with replying classically to 1. e4 with e5 as black. I’ve been having difficulty with some of the sharper openings (the Vienna Game mostly this week), but it’s otherwise been going pretty well. I might try learning the Nimzo-Indian and Queen’s Indian as my responses to 1. d4. They’re a bit more flexible and less focused on specific lines compared the Queen’s Gambit Declined, which is kinda nice given that I rarely actually face 1. d4 openings (and even more rarely the Queen’s Gambit).

I’ve started a spreadsheet (going back to the start of this month, November) of my performance in different openings. My big weak spot definitely looks to be the sharper king’s pawn (1. e4 e5) openings, so depending on if they improve by the end of the month I might switch back to the Sicilian or put in a lot of effort next month on studying those.

All in all, a great week for chess for me. I’ll be writing next week’s update from Argentina!

Week 10

Blitz games didn’t go well this week, as usual. Extracurricular rapid games did tho!

The correspondence tournament is going well: so far I’ve won four games and lost zero so far (I also won two against the person in my group who just timed out against everybody, but those are hardly worth counting). As for the remaining four games in round 1: one I’m very ahead and should win; another I feel pretty good about; and the other two are very hard for me to judge (they’re still early, material is even, and neither of us have a clearly better position).

I didn’t get in very much endgame study this week due to having just arrived in Argentina. In the openings book I made it on to the modern queen’s pawn openings chapter, and just barely to the start of the covering of the Indian Defenses (1. d4 Nf6 openings). Looking forward to the rest of the coverage of those, as well as to reading about rarer defenses to 1. d4.

Two weeks left! I have clearly improved a lot at rapid time controls so far! Not so much at blitz, but ah well! When it ends I’ll definitely continue with another study plan, but I’m not yet sure if I’ll try the more advanced variant of the beginner plan, or move on to the intermediate plan (I’m not at the suggested rating for that but still considering it), or come up with something custom. Tbd!

Week 11

This was the penultimate week of the study plan! Played a fair number of rapid games, with more losses than I’ve usually had lately (although one of those was due to losing internet during the game, so idk if I would have lost it otherwise), and three hard-fought draws. The blitz day went alright, 2-2 and zero net effect on my rating.

I finished up my first woodpecker cycle and am two days into my second cycle now. I’m pretty sure I’m going significantly faster on the early mate in 1 problems, although it’s hard to say just how much faster since they were also relatively fast last time around, and I didn’t keep time records the first couple days of the first cycle.

Since I’ve been in Argentina, for the playing through games from Logical Chess Move By Move, I’ve been doing that on a physical board with my fiancée, which is fun. It might be a little benefit in terms of requiring me to explain stuff sometimes to zir, who is less experienced with chess, though I’m not sure.

I reached a decision about what plan to follow after the final week: the playing-lots-of-games version of the Intermediate plan from ChessGoals. I was talking about the decision with Sofía and was describing it, and explained how in addition to the base tasks for each day of each week, it has guidance on what to do as “extra credit” if you want to spend more time on chess. Which, guidance on how to prioritize additional time beyond the base tasks is exactly something I had considered a lack in the beginner plan! So, perfect for my preferences. That plan leaves certain topics a bit more at the student’s discretion, by saying essentially “okay, you should pick a resource you want to use to study strategy” and then just sometimes having a “go study your strategy resource” task, so I’ll have to pick things for those, which I’ll probably do over this next week and be ready to start the new plan after that!

The chess.com official correspondence tournament is going well. I have one game unfinished, with the others all won (two more unfortunately won due to a time-out by the opponent), and that last game is just a matter of time until I win. It will be a whiiiiile before the next round probably, but ah well.

The openings book has just gotten to the Indian Defenses! Excited to learn more about the Nimzo and Queen’s Indian. My own opening prep review has kinda fallen by the wayside, so I should probably get back in the habit of doing that. I’m working my way through the basic review in 100 Endgames You Must Know still.

In extracurricular study news, I’ve been reading and enjoying Seirawan’s other book Play Winning Chess. It starts out very basic (with an introduction explaining how the pieces move), but quickly moves into less simple topics. Its chapter structure is:

1. The Evolution of Chess (introduces the game and discusses its historical development, both in terms of rules and in terms of play styles and theory).
2. A chapter each on four key principles: force (what most would call material, although Seirawan also uses it to discuss local imbalances of force), time, space, and pawn structure. In addition to explaining the principles, these chapters seem to go into more detailed coverage of how to incorporate them into your play. For example, the chapter on force includes sections on tactics and on traps, the role of the king in the endgame, and the impact of material advantages in the endgame.
3. A chapter of annotated games, intended to illustrate the principles and how they interact.
4. A final chapter titled the Four Principles and You, which I don’t really know what it covers yet (since it isn’t explained in the introduction).

There are also little quizzes to test yourself in the midst of each chapter, and a series of tests at the end of each chapter. Some of them so far have been pretty tough for an introductory book! Anyway, I’m midway through the chapter on force (currently at the section on traps), so I’m excited to read more. :)

Week 12: the End

I’ve completed the study plan, and I’m very pleased with how it’s gone. I’ll be starting a new one tomorrow. I’ve also planned out a (5-week, to be reassessed and repeated after that) study plan for my Spanish learning, to emphasize how pleased I’ve been with this approach.

I’ve gotten a lot better at chess, if not at blitz time controls, over these twelve weeks. Rating-wise, I’ve gone from 429 (or 508 after the first week) to 1023 in Chess.com Rapid rating. Blitz has fallen from 686 after that good first week (before which I had not played any blitz) to 588, so it feels safe to say I haven’t really improved at fast time controls; I still struggle to play quickly and not get into time pressure, and sometimes make horrific blunders due to trying to play quickly. I hadn’t been tracking the progress of my daily rating, but I’m certainly also doing well at that. My daily rating was something like 326 at the start, and is now 1053. I’ve only lost a single daily game out of 30 I’ve played in that time.

The books the study plan recommended have been very helpful, as has it just forcing me to play regularly. It is also true that the “extra-curricular” studies I’ve gotten up to have certainly contributed to my improvement, though they probably wouldn’t have helped nearly as much without the opportunities to integrate them through actual play. As well, I suspect the study plan helped to ensure I maintained focus on improving at chess.

Tomorrow I’ll start with one of their intermediate plans. :)