The Beginning
Greetings Chess friends and welcome to my Chess Journey!
This blog will document my journey as I attempt to improve from 0 to Grandmaster, the highest title available awarded by FIDE.
I will write in this blog to use it like a training journal, write in more detail about how many hours I spent on each training segment, the theme and subject, what I did, and what I accomplished.
My FIDE rating stats
Standard: 1635
Rapid: 1680
Blitz: Not yet rated
My main and final goal Become a Grandmaster.
My smaller goal right now
I want to become the 11th best player in my club, (right now I am 13) and to accomplish this I have to increase my rating by 81 points, by the end of this year .
My training program
I will use a weekly modern chess training program (with some modifications). You can find the link to the program here: "The formula of succeess: ELO 2200 + 2 years of training = International Master!".
Below you can take a look at an example of the original program:
Where to Start (Tips from my coach GM Vlade Rabrenovic)
Learn the basics and basic strategy. A good starting point is to find a good book or a YouTube video series. Having a friend that can teach you or to practice this against can be invaluable.
Playing Online
To get a taste of competition playing against people chess.com or chess24 is a good place to start. These sites are perhaps the most popular, and they integrate videos, tactics trainers and other resources.
One of the benefits of playing chess online is that each server has its rating system that can give you an indication of your improvement. These rating systems are essentially variations of what’s known as the Elo rating system, which is also used by FIDE (the world chess federation) and the Australian Chess Federation.
Without going into too much detail, what all chess rating systems have in common (whether it’s FIDE, ACF, chess.com, chess24, LiChess, Internet Chess Club etc) is that they use game results to rank players on a scale. Beginners that know basic strategy and have only been playing for a few months would typically have a rating of 400-800. Players that are rated 800-1200 have a good grasp of the fundamentals and are ready to play in over-the-board tournaments. Seasoned club-level players are usually rated 1200-1600. 1600-2000 rated players can hold their own against most State-level players. Players rated more than 2000 are called Experts, and higher still are the Masters. The highest FIDE rating of all time is 2882, achieved by Magnus Carlsen, the current World Champion.
Books
A good chess book has perhaps become the old-fashioned way to learn (compared to all the online resources and apps) and books are often neglected by today’s players. But chess literature has developed over the centuries, and the pages contain a wealth of knowledge passed onto us by the masters. The two books my coach reccomend to beginners and intermediate-level players are My System by Aron Nimzowitsch (a chess classic) and How to Reassess Your Chess by Jeremy Silman.
Reading chess books is a challenge in itself, as one has to learn to read chess notation. But this will pay off in the long run, as this will allow you to read more advanced material as you progress. The only caveat with chess books is that there is huge variation in difficulty, and if you buy an advanced book it may end up collecting dust until your game is strong enough to tackle it.
Chess Clubs
So you’ve spent a few months in quiet training, either with friends, with books or online. Now you’re wondering about clubs or tournaments you can play.
Playing over-the-board for the first time may seem daunting, but tournament chess is an exciting thing to get into once you step past that hurdle. When you play tournaments, you do more than compete against other players: you join a community of people that share a passion.
A Rough Journey Ahead
Getting good at chess is not easy. For most people, it takes years of dedicated training and regular competition before substantial results start to show. As I explained at the beginning of the article, you can become a chess master even if you only start playing chess in adulthood. But also believe that regardless of how clever you may be, no one can get good at chess without hard work.
The initial progression (let’s say, up to about 1200 rating) is mostly learning the fundamentals of the game: basic checkmate patterns, the strengths and weaknesses of each pieces, basic tactics and opening principles. The next step is to play chess at competitions regularly, keep building your knowledge of the principles, and practice lots of tactics. This should get you to about 1400 in rating.
With each leap you make, it gets harder. The amount of work for each level you pass keeps increasing. But for most players, the enjoyment they receive from chess also increases, and gradually the beautiful game sucks them in.
Honing Your Skills
Players that get to about 1500-1600 are about halfway to being master players. By this stage, they would have played in competitions for several years and have had to invest a considerable amount of work along the way. At tournaments, you would be strong enough to beat most club players, but you still haven’t beaten a titled player, despite several failed attempts. So what does it takes to beat these guys?
Most club level players understand the basic principles taught in books, and are able to comprehend games by strong players. The main difference between a player that is rated 1500-1600 and 2000-2100, is the ability to apply these principles in practice.
Strong players intuitively feel the positions they should be aiming for, and spend most of their time at the board figuring out ways to get there, by calculating variations. Less experienced players need time to figure out what they should actually be doing in a certain position, and therefore overlook opportunities.
Reaching the Summit
To elevate your game from a club player to a master, you need to redouble your efforts and devote yourself to the game. This lifestyle is not for everyone, and it includes memorizing variation after variation from Opening encyclopedias or databases, rigorously dissecting your tournament games for the smallest mistakes, and doing the equivalent of chess push-ups: the tactics puzzles. For more advanced books, at this point Think Like a Grandmaster by Alexander Kotov, is a great guide to introducing discipline into your chess.
Convergent Paths to Mastery
Although people discover the game of chess in different ways, one of the important themes, is that the path to chess improvement becomes narrower. Ultimately, the chess masters tend to follow similar patterns in their thought processes, and they follow the same principles that guide their moves. By and large, although chess masters start on different paths, they end up on the same road.
You may come to chess at school, a parent may teach you the game or you may learn from friends. Some kids get drilled the fundamentals by their coaches, while others may learn the tricks from playing online. But if at some point you develop a deep passion for chess and are prepared to devote yourself to the game, you will gradually understand the game the way chess masters do around the world.
