Ok, not quite an improvement thread, but here are a list of personal goals for 2009.

1) Reach 2200 (USCF). I'm 2158 now, so only 42 points to go here...should be attainable.


2) Beat a Fide Master. I've drawn FMs 3 times (twice last year, once in 2007). It's time to finally get a victory.


3) Reach the top 10 list for Ohio players. Right now, I'm #30, while the #10 player is 2230. There are a few other up and comers who I expect to be up around that rating by the end of the year so I may have to aim for 2250 here. Goal #1 will certainly be reached if I achieve this.


4) Become a better technical player. This is more of a qualitative goal, but I think my endgame technique could use a little work still. Watching Kramnik's ability to handle endgames makes me want to improve this aspect of my play.


5) Get my FIDE loss percentage with black down below 50%. Right now, my FIDE rating only reflects 21 games: 12 black, 9 white. I have a very good percentage with white, that surely won't stand and is purely an advantage of pairings and number of games. Black is a different story though, and I think is a reasonable indicator of a weakness in my game. I've had to work on my play on the white side in the past and have seen improvements in my winning percentage and rating, so now I need to focus on the black side in the same way. Right now with black I have 17% win, 25% draw, 58% loss. Although this may be more of a qualitative measure as well (improve my play with black), this is a way to measure it, though it may not be precise.


There are other general things I need to work on, but these seem to be the most measurable. I'll check these off as I achieve them, and am optimistic that I should hit all 5.

These seem like solid goals. At 2158 you have already shown that you are Master Material.

Best of Luck Abba!

Here's what I've been doing to try to improve my play during the dormat period (No tournaments from mid-November to mid-January):

1) Reading Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual. I want to read it cover to cover first, then continue to go back through and solve the endgame puzzles. There's a lot of material here, but I feel encouraged that IM Sam Shankland recommends this book to advanced players. I've also read Silman's Endgame Manual, but it isn't quite to the level that I get from this one.

2) Watching ICC's Game of the Day whenever it is available. In the past I've gone through GM games on my own through Monroi.com, but this is even more helpful with a GM breaking down each move. I should try to do my own analysis on Monroi and even focus on IM vs. FM games where the higher rated player might show how to exploit common mistakes.

3) Using Chess Tactics Server regularly. It's similar to playing blitz but focused specifically on tactics and I find it useful to keep me sharp. I do also play ICC, and have noticed my blitz rating finally reach 2300 (which is a good sign as my USCF rating has never surpassed my blitz rating...clearing some room).

4) Create opening "games". This is specifically aimed at improvement with black. To help with some memorization, I've analyzed out common positions I may reach with black and then saved the positions. I can run through these in the 2 weeks prior to a tournament to refresh my memory about these openings. Right now I have about 15-20 of these. I'd like to get it up to about 100-200. It seems easier to see the pieces move on my Dasher system than to try to memorize algebraic words from a book.

5) Think about chess. I've noticed that if I'm doing something mindless like driving home from work, running on the treadmill at the gym, taking a shower, or killing time somewhere away from home I can help myself by thinking about chess. It helps keep some rust off and can be useful for trying to understand positions. If I sit and think about why can't white play this move in the Slav, and then figure out on my own away from a board why they can or can't, then it helps both with my understanding of that position, memorization, and calculating ability.

Thanks for the support!

Solid enough goals. I should probably consider setting goals this way for specific areas, rather than my current method of just setting a rating goal, then a list of things to work on to get there.

About your specific points:

Do you use the Chess Tactics Server at emrald.com (or whatever that address is)? I never liked the blitz aspect of having a time limit there. Someone here on CF recommend chesstempo.com recently, and I looked at it last night. You can play in either blitz (timed) or standard (untimed) modes. Thus, you can alternate between trying to spot easy stuff quickly or trying to calculate very deeply. I definitely like this one better and intend to start using it regularly.

Saving your openings electronically so you can go through them easily is a good idea. I'm starting to do that a little, too. As I mentioned in my improvement thread, I'm currently reading "Starting Out: The Dutch Defense", but I'm using the pgn of the entire book found on the publisher's web site to make it easier to read. I also created a second pgn file where I'm saving just the games or sequences that stand out to me as key theoretical lines that I need to memorize. So by the time I finish the book, I should have maybe 15-25 of those that I can review quickly and easily in the future to refresh my memory about how to play all the key lines. This definitely seems easier than looking at lines in a book. I definitely want to create pgn files for some of my other openings this way.

Good luck with these goals! Let us know when you hit master!

--Fromper

I've heard about ChessTempo and may check it out. I do use the one at ChessEmerald, which is good because I still get about 75% of them right, and it helps for spotting the tactics quickly. I'd say I could solve almost all of them given enough time, but it is helpful also to try to get them quickly. Occasionally there will be a tactical motif on there I didn't recognize, which I am always very happy to pick up.

I haven't done a write up about what I do in preparation for a tournament, but I do use that thing a lot the week of a tournament to sharpen up. I have noticed that I've been very tactically alert since I've decided to give up all blitz games (ICC) the week of a tournament and instead use only ChessEmerald.

Likewise, I enjoy the visual stuff much better than book work. Every time I watch a video lecture in Fritz, my rating shoots up 200 points or so. I watched one on the Alekhine Defense and finally acheived an (Internet) rating of 2018.

My goal is to become a B player this year.

good luck everybody

So it's now 2 weeks until my next tournament, so I'm switching into preparation for it. So what does that mean exactly? Here's what I'm going to be doing for the next 2 weeks:

1) Tactics...lots of them to get sharp...probably just sticking to Chess Tactics Server for now as it has worked in the past. No more ICC during this 2 week stretch.

2) Review and possibly fine-tune openings. I want to review my response on the black side of the Alapin Sicilian and review some major lines in the King's Indian and Dragon. I feel like I've been "solid" on the white side lately, so my focus is mostly on the black side for this tournament.

3) Do the endgame puzzles in Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual. I've been mostly reading through the book, and I'm about halfway through, and while I'll continue to read it some more over the next 2 weeks, most of my focus will be on attempting the exercises as a review and also to keep myself sharp and aware of endgame motifs.

4) Cat and Mouse / Grinding. Silman's Endgame Course has a great chapter on Cat and Mouse. I usually re-read it if I haven't looked at it in awhile to try to get myself into the mindset of slowly grinding down opposition. If you watch a lot of these top games, one player often has a very tiny advantage that he will nurse and can often convert. They may be holdable positions, but if you keep after it and tighten the screws, you can often gather the full point.

Sounds like a Sea-worthy method of tourney prep. (My biggest question right now is how much time to take off, before the start of the tourney. At least three days, I am thinking.)

Dvoretsky's Material is highly recommended by GMs. It's tough, but what nice rewards...