Personal Coaching (General)

by Fungus, Wednesday, August 17, 2005, 21:05 (7185 days ago) @ paaneater

? Could some one share their experience with personal coaching as envisaged
? in this site?

I have signed up for the personal coaching. The example given is a very good indication of what to expect. I paid my first two months in advance and sent of three of my games. A week later an IM sent back my games with his comments which were useful.

I always analyse my games using Fritz and check my openings books. This will pick up any tactical blunders and show if I went wrong in the opening but sometimes there are middle game strategic issues where it is useful to have guidance from a stronger player. In particular there was a game where I got a good position out of the opening but only drew the game and thought I could have done better. The IM advised how I could have improved my play and taken advantage of my pressure.

He also asked if there were any openings I had problems with and suggested I send in some games on this opening in the next month. This I did and was given useful advice on how to play against this opening.

The odd thing is I have not been contacted about sending in payment and games for the next months coaching - initially the coaching was to be for a six month period. I believe having six games analysed has been sufficient for me. There are only some games for which analyses by top level players is useful. At my level many games are decided by blunders and therefore there is not much point in sending in these games for analyses, unless there are particular aspects earlier in the game which you would appreciate help with. When sending in my games in the annotations I would ask questions on the particular moves where I thought I could have played better.

I hope this helps.