Linearnew member (General)
Hello everybody!
My name is Mihaela Sandu, I am WFM and I have just joined the chess team on improveyourchess.com.
I am member of the coaching team for the moment, but I intend to develop new study material on endings and maybe openings.
Any suggestion on what you would like it to be is welcomed.
new member
? Hello everybody!
? My name is Mihaela Sandu, I am WFM and I have just joined the chess team
? on improveyourchess.com.
? I am member of the coaching team for the moment, but I intend to develop
? new study material on endings and maybe openings.
? Any suggestion on what you would like it to be is welcomed.
Hello to you, too!
I am possibly the most amateur member here. I base that assumption on other questions posted here which are usually saying things like how easy the advanced tactics puzzles are, or something like that. I don't find those easy, and even have a difficult time imagining a day when I would find them trivial.
Something I wish there was more of here is strategy. Probably focussing more on the middle game. Silman has some books that do this pretty well, but once you have read them you can't really go back and do those assessments again because you recognize them instead of figuring them out. It would be great to have a section here that has middle game positions that get you in the habit of looking at the board and evaluating the imbalances in the position, formulating a plan, assessing candidate moves, then finally selecting the best move that helps you toward accomplishing your long-term plan.
There is really good material here, but most all of it, even the stuff calling itself strategy, is really more tactical than strategic. Even the HGIYC, one of my favorite features here, doesn't usually go into much strategic planning. Moves are selected or refuted based on tactical success or refutation.
Having said all this, it is certainly much easier to say that a cool strategy section like this would be a nice addition. Implementing something like that would be a lot of work. Finding positions would be easy as there are millions of middle game positions to choose from, but then those positions need to be analyzed and content developed around them. I know it would help me though, and I am sure it would help a lot of others as well.
I just had a game on Sunday night vs a 1800 something player, and I had him fussing and squirming through about move 20, then it all fell apart. When I got home and put the game through Fritz I found myself in a very solid position, with at one time a 3 pawn positional advantage (material was even), and then I attacked on the wrong side of the board.
It looked logical to me. I had more space over there, plenty of firepower, but it was still the wrong thing to do and even now I don't know why, I just know it was obviously wrong because I lost, and because Fritz kept recommending moves on the other side and the more I moved on the wrong side the more my advantage withered away until I was completely hosed.
I would like to be able to say that is a rare event, but I am finding as I practice tactics more and more that when I play a challenging opponent I get into stable positions where I eventually get outplayed and don't know what has happened until it is too late, and I am not losing material, I am just getting squished.
new member
by Tony Kosten 
, France, Wednesday, October 11, 2006, 11:58 (7005 days ago) @ Don Lester
What about Glenn's strategy stuff, do you really find that tactical?
Obviously you would greatly beenfit from the coaching, have you tried it yet? 
new member
? What about Glenn's strategy stuff, do you really find that tactical?
? Obviously you would greatly beenfit from the coaching, have you tried it
? yet?
Maybe what is driving my perception is a definitions barrier. When I think of something as tactical I think of a position that you can calculate the solution. Most puzzles are structured that way, which is the whole point of the tactical section, and most endgame scenarios fall into this category as well (which is most of what Glenn Flear has done the past few months). That isn't to say anything negative about what he is doing, it just isn't the kind of long term strategic planning I was describing in my earlier message.
Admittedly I have spent a lot of time on endgames. I have watched Roman Dzindzichashvili's endgame series to pass time while riding my exercise bike more times than I could ever count, and have all but worn out the copy of Pal Benko's Chess Endgame Lessons I found on eBay last year. Almost everything I have read about learning chess has said you are better off studying endgames first, and I did.
When I think of strategy, I think of moves that have no immediate tactical advantage, and to the strategically challenged (like me) they will oftentimes even look like wasted moves. These are the moves you make to ultimately induce a tactical opportunity, or moves you make to marginally improve your position when the position is closed and there aren't yet any attacking opportunities.
It is this more subtle aspect of chess that is still a complete mystery to me. I have recently begun spending a lot more time studying pawn structure as that seems to be a major key to this whole puzzle, but I could be wrong. To be honest, I just don't know. If I knew more about what I don't know, I would better know how to proceed (if that makes any sense).
You may be right about the coaching thing too. I have often felt (perhaps incorrectly) that I wasn't ready for that because I still have significant holes that I know how to fill. Since I started studying at the endgame side before anything else, I really am not very good at all at openings. Those have two aspects to them, from my naive perspective. One side is just memorizing move sequences, which is about as exciting as watching paint dry. The other aspect does touch quite a bit on my whole middle game mystery. With true opening knowledge you play toward a strategy you have had in mind since the beginning of the game. I am a long way from that kind of proactive play! The best I can muster right now is that when I am in a relatively even position in the late middle game I can usually trade it down to a position I know I can win.
If none of this makes any sense to you, don't feel bad. It doesn't make any sense to me either ;)
new member
Hello Don,
I feel that what you are misssing is to play more games, get some practice, doubled by some coaching if possible.
I think you've already made your first step by playing a game and being very critical about it.
Strategy has many facets and that's why you'll find several columns on the site dealing with it, but in a different way.
Glenn's strategy, for instance, is specially designed for long term understanding and planning, the classical approach to strategy.
Tony's middlegame and endgame sections deal with thematic patterns. They help you develop a general feel for the position and help you quickly get rid of the bad choices. This way you can concentrate on the important issues.
I am amazed that you don't find HGIYC strategical. There is a lot of long term planning in those games (unless it's a very tactical game, which is quite rare), and the tactics only come at the end to finish the game.
Maybe, after finishing it, you should go over it once again, only to notice the way pieces maneouvre, and the way many strategical themes work together at the same time.
I will end here saying that a grandmaster knows tens of thousands of patterns which they learn throughout their lives. Some come from self learning, the rest comes from 'battlefield learning', when they're trying to apply their knowledge to new positions. And even they have problems sometimes in finding the right plan or the right move.
I hope what I have written here helped you in some way,
I wish you good luck in your next game!
Mihaela Sandu
PS: You shouldn't worry about the advanced tactics, they are meant to be very tough. If you don't solve them, understanding why you didn't is already a big step towards improvement.
new member
I was doing some reading and it occurred to me that our disconnect on this thread was likely caused by a not entirely accurate use of terminology on my part.
What I was referring to as 'strategy' seems to be more specifically referred to as 'position assessment'. The latter appears to more accurately reflect what I was trying to request as content. Beyond the basic assessment, making a decision on a correct course of action (short and long term plan, which is where I was getting strategy) based on the strengths/weaknesses of the current position.
Does that make more sense?
new member
Hi Don,
The way I see it you used the term strategy for what I find to be chess itself that is:
"making a decision on a correct course of action (short and long term plan)".
Strategy is, in my view, the sum of abstract concepts, like pawn structure, piece coordination, weak squares, etc, which, like a skeleton, sustains the body of the game. But you cannot have a body of bones, you need flesh to it, that is the tactical part, where you calculate your moves in such a way as to restrain your opponent from fighting against your plan.
So, in order to make a correct decision, you need to make a strategical assessment, which guides you towards your plan, but only by calculating will you be able to actually materialize it.
I think that all you need to develop is here on Improve Your Chess.com, both strategy and tactics, but I also think that playing more will help you gain strength in the tactical implementation of strategy.
I might try to create some material on this theme,
Good luck with your next game,
Mihaela Sandu.
? I was doing some reading and it occurred to me that our disconnect on this
? thread was likely caused by a not entirely accurate use of terminology on
? my part.
?
? What I was referring to as 'strategy' seems to be more specifically
? referred to as 'position assessment'. The latter appears to more
? accurately reflect what I was trying to request as content. Beyond the
? basic assessment, making a decision on a correct course of action (short
? and long term plan, which is where I was getting strategy) based on the
? strengths/weaknesses of the current position.
?
? Does that make more sense?
