From 1200+ to 1500. Do I need to study a lot?

Hi gents,

I think I've reached my plateau at 1250, went through most of the tutorials and lessons from chess.com website. Took my 1 year and I'm reasonably indifferent to my chess status. Is there more to look forward apart from in-depth study and memorising from this point on? Did you had any keen interest to go into 1500+ range?

Your stats show only 36 lessons done.  There are thousands. You've barely scratched the surface. It's certainly not mostly memorisation ahead of you.

However, if you say you are indifferent to your chess status and you aren't hooked after nearly 5000 games, it's up to you.

 

 

Respectfully, you’re nowhere near the level where memorising (assume you mean openings) should now be the main focus for you. Tactics and calculation exercises are the way forward for sub 2000, both for pattern recognition and to instil calculation as a habit itself, as many mistakes people make U2000 could be avoided simply by checking what the opponents response would be after making your move and how you would deal with that. Many people don’t do this and just intuitively make a move as it “looks” good.

In addition to drilling tactics - look at rook endgames and pawn endgames. That’s what I’ve focused on and I’m just shy of 1900 blitz and just over 2000 rapid.

Openings, basic tactics, and  basic endgames. I did not bother strategy books when I was online 1200. I learned some strategy by playing my memorized openings choices a lot.

Always check your intended move is no blunder before you play it. That alone is enough to get you to 1500. As long as you hang pieces and pawns all study is in vain.
"All games between players rated <1800 are decided on pieces being blundered on almost every move. " - Carlsen

All great replies. You dont need to rely to much on memorisation. Calculation, tactical knowledge, strategic knowledge, planning, and principles play are all areas that can be improved. Small improvements across all these will get you to 1500. The most important is not to blunder pieces. A lot of games are lost by giving away pieces and playing to passively.

We are all different. I memorized openings as a beginner. Just like what Beth Harmon did. So I never regret the memorization part. As I got stronger it feels like needed to read strategy books and more endgames.

Practice the puzzles more. Aim to reach 1500 in puzzles. Then in your games you will notice tactics more often and win a higher percentage of your games.

That is the easiest way to get your rating up.

Broadly speaking, the main difference between a 1200 player and a 1500 player is a 1500 player sees tactics instantly.

I've recently achieved 1500, if you want we could play some games and I could analyse them for you

As a 1500, my advice would be to limit the games you play each day to 1 or 2. Put everything into them and analyze them afterwards. Hopefully this helped; good luck!

The main difference between 1 200 and 1 500 (for longer games at least) is that 1 500 rated player probably knows more about every aspect of the game.

1 200 rated player knows about opening principles and in most cases follows them. Other thing 1 200 does in longer games is that they don't just put pieces to be taken every game (as players below 1 000 often do) and are not that often a casualty of simple tactics. You can get to roughly 1 200 by following opening principles and just play moves that doesn't lose pieces outright.

From a 2 000 rated players this is what 1 500 rated players does as well, but 1 500 rated players know more about the game. They have to feel some pressure to blunder (they do blunder without provocation as well, but that is not often done, especially not every game as some people rated 2 000 believe). There is generally a reason behind a blunder. It is either somewhat weaker position, an unknown position or something like that. 

1 500 is significantly better tactically, somewhat positionally (they can at some capacity understand the concepts of weak squares, what trades are good, what pieces can be good, and which are bad, etc). 1 500 are still not great at openings, they rarely know thematic plans (except for the openings they have the most experience with, so they are still better than 1 200 rated player, not in the sense of memorization, but at experience playing some openings). 1 500 are still bad at endgames, but some of them knows at least some basic stuff. 

They are certainly better at calculation and are tactically better pretty much always than 1 200 player. 

Now do you need to study a lot to get to 1 500? It depends. Some people will get to it just by playing games. Some people will get to 2 000 just by playing games and picking up concepts along the way, but that is not true for most of the people. 

For most of the people, doing tactics, learning about the game (from a book, or by watching educational videos), playing longer games and analyzing will get you to 1 500 and beyond. But the speed of improvement is not guaranteed. Someone will get to 1 500 after 2-3 months after getting to 1 200. Someone else will need a year or more (of course it depends how willing and how able you are to improve as well).

Lolololololol

No. I think of all the increases in ability in chess, going from 1200 to 1500 is probably the easiest. I can't even tell the difference anymore when playing people in that range, they usually seem the same. I sometimes even lose to 1200s MORE than 1500s. 

Yeah but you are playing blitz mainly. In those games probably anything goes, especially in that range.  

I am not saying that you will not lose against lower rated players in longer games (it can always happen), but there is a bigger chance that you will make a mistake in shorter games, and if you are a piece down, it is tough to turn it around, even against a lower rated player.

But of course, as you are 1 800 in blitz, for you it is almost the same. Even though you are not 400 points higher than 1 500, you will still win the vast majority of games.

But you are right, it is certainly easier to go from 1 200 to 1 500 than from 1 500 to 1 800. The lower you are, the faster the climb can be.  

This quote is a lie. Here is the real quote

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/stop-misquoting-carlsen

It took me 5 months to get from 100 to 1287 in rapid but i fell to 1120 or so and then advanced a month later to 1300 or so. Then it took me 3 months and a week to get to 1600. I reached 1500 blitz a few days after but fell below in 2 days.

I'm interested to hear about your experience in improving your chess rating. It's impressive that you were able to climb from 100 to 1287 in rapid in just 5 months. That's a significant improvement!

I just played a confusing opening.