Stuck at an embarrassing 800 rating with no clue why I'm losing games.

 

Hi,

Hoping to get some help here. This loss pretty much sums up where I'm at at present. I seem to have many games where I get my chances, or even worse a winning position and then blow it. I thought I played the opening here fairly well considering but had a few moments where I walked myself into trouble and then tried something desperate to try and save myself. During the middle stages of the game, I often felt like I had an idea but was constantly forced to change horses midstream as far as plans go, by necessity, in order to fend off my opponent's attacks. I think I still had chances to save the game even later but I'm just not tactically adept enough.

I'm 52, returning to chess after many years away. I'm watching John Bartholomew's videos, studying tactics daily here and with Chessable and watching Dan Heisman's videos but I seem embarrassingly  stuck in the 800 rating range. I accept losing as part of the learning process but I feel like I'm making the same mistakes over and over with, obvious piece hanging blunders aside, no idea they're even mistakes until I get the game report telling me so.

Should I get a coach? Expensive but maybe necessary? I've got the diamond membership here, so maybe I could better utilize my daily study time?

Any help greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Andrew

,

 

i use a coach and the first thing he told me to do (especially as an adult beginner) was to start playing otb tournament games at my local chess club

so- instead of going over my chess.com games we would have games where, theoretically, i will have spent all of my energy doing as well as i can do and then going over them

this really helped me

mainly because i would have a better “answer” as to why did i do “x”?

in addition to this, he also recommended i dont play anything shorter than 30 min games and even play 30/30 or even 45/45

i also use chessable and have a few opening books (coach recommended 1. d4 john bartholomew’s free course for white; and i have one for the caro kann and slav defense; i also use 1001 chess exercises for beginners (excellent tactics book); and tuning your chess antennae (tactics and “mindset” book)

the coach gives me exercise (positions) to analyze and go over before our lessons and these really help too

the coach flat out said that the only adults he coaches who improve are those who play classical otb games as much as they can

———

you can immediately start by sticking to 30 min rapid games and then doing an annotation/analysis after each game (so 1hr for game and another 1hr for a thorough analysis after)

i only use chess.com via ios app ao i got a cheap ios chess database software where i can “copy” my chess.com games and “paste” them in the database and it makes analysis and annotations very efficient and easy (in fact this helped my chess game alot too)

i usually will play only one game a day when i play along with the analysis after

i do my chessables everyday but i am kind of in maintenance mode there as i am not “learning” new lines or material but just “reviewing”

Concentrate more on your rapid games. If you want to play blitz, play at 10 minutes time control instead of 3 minutes that you  playing.

 

Discipline yourself at following these to reduce blunders.

1. Always study your opponent's last move.

2. Always look at the whole board.

3. Before you make a move,check if there is a tactical drawback.

A small piece of advice before I get into the main basic issue I saw with that game. When attacking a piece in such a way that you would favorably take in the next move, assume your opponent will either move it out of the way or protect it. Consider what the board will look like after you attack and they defend/move out of the way, and if that new board doesn't leave you in better shape than the current board pre-attack does, don't make that attack.

Blundering away pieces because you don't seem to consider what the actual attack is the next move is a big offender to me. To name some examples. 

On move 7, when your pawn forks their bishop and knight, they have their bishop attack your queen in move 8. By simply moving up your pawn to protect the queen and attack the bishop, you maintain a pawn attack on both bishop and knight, keeping your fork and forcing a favorable trade of pawn for a piece next move. Instead you move your knight in the way, leaving the bishop unmolested and allowing the knight to now escape without repercussion on their bishop.

On move 16, their knight attacks your white squared bishop, threatening a free take. While your black squared bishop takes a free pawn and threatens the rook, their rook will easily move out of the way and attack your black bishop, leaving both your bishops under attack so that when one moves out of the way the other dies, and so it is as your black bishop dances around the board, once it finally escapes the white bishop is killed for free by the knight. 

On move 27 the knight attacks both your bishop and rook. A knight exchanging itself for a bishop is not the worst of trades, both pieces are valued roughly the same, (the the hypothetical point system chess uses to approximate a piece's value both are roughly 3 points,) and neither of those pieces are doing anything to stand out beyond a general value anyways. If you moved your rook out of the way but keep it defending the bishop all that happens is a fair exchange. Instead your bishop flees to take 1 pawn and they take your rook for essentially nothing. A rook for a pawn is not a fair deal.

On move 30 their knight attacks your pawn. Rather than move the pawn out of the way, which would conveniently attack their knight as well, you decide to attack their knight with the bishop. Given the knight is planning on taking the pawn in their next move, they simply do that, making your move pointless, and in fact detrimental, as the knight is now attacking your bishop for free tempo as your bishop flees, putting you down both a pawn and two moves.

Now, what eventually kills you is their black squared bishop pinning your king to a single row, the back rank, allowing their rook to checkmate you. Simply moving your knight next to the king to attack their bishop and forcing it to move out of the way, as their bishop is putting in above average work and is certainly not wanting to be exchanged right now, would relieve your king from this back rank pin and escape through a diagonal, forcing the game to continue. This option was available to you for several moves, but it was especially noteworthy on move 35 because not only does this attack drive the bishop away, but since they had just put their rook next to your king, if their bishop does not force otherwise, you can take their rook for free. This actually might force them to put you in check with the bishop for you to take it for free just so they have a move to get their rook out of the way. So the attack that would eventually kill you was essentially a blunder that should have cost them a piece.

 

"... for those that want to be as good as they can be, they'll have to work hard.
Play opponents who are better than you … . Learn basic endgames. Create a simple opening repertoire (understanding the moves are far more important than memorizing them). Study tactics. And pick up tons of patterns. That’s the drumbeat of success. ..." - IM Jeremy Silman (December 27, 2018)
https://www.chess.com/article/view/little-things-that-help-your-game
https://www.chess.com/article/view/how-to-start-out-in-chess

https://www.chess.com/blog/michechess89/8-tips-to-increase-your-online-rating
https://www.chess.com/news/view/a-new-years-resolution-improve-your-chess-with-new-lessons

https://www.chess.com/article/view/mastery-chess-lessons-are-here
"... In order to maximize the benefits of [theory and practice], these two should be approached in a balanced manner. ... Play as many slow games (60 5 or preferably slower) as possible, ... The other side of improvement is theory. ... This can be reading books, taking lessons, watching videos, doing problems on software, etc. ..." - NM Dan Heisman (2002)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627084053/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman19.pdf
"... If it’s instruction, you look for an author that addresses players at your level (buying something that’s too advanced won’t help you at all). This means that a classic book that is revered by many people might not be useful for you. ..." - IM Jeremy Silman (2015)
https://www.chess.com/article/view/the-best-chess-books-ever
Here are some reading possibilities that I often mention:
Simple Attacking Plans by Fred Wilson (2012)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090402/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review874.pdf
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Simple-Attacking-Plans-77p3731.htm
Logical Chess: Move by Move by Irving Chernev (1957)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708104437/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/logichess.pdf
The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played by Irving Chernev (1965)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/most-instructive-games-of-chess-ever-played/
Winning Chess by Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld (1948)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708093415/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review919.pdf
Back to Basics: Tactics by Dan Heisman (2007)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708233537/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review585.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-back-to-basics-tactics
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5856bd64ff7c50433c3803db/t/5895fc0ca5790af7895297e4/1486224396755/btbtactics2excerpt.pdf
Discovering Chess Openings by GM John Emms (2006)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627114655/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen91.pdf
Openings for Amateurs by Pete Tamburro (2014)
http://kenilworthian.blogspot.com/2014/05/review-of-pete-tamburros-openings-for.html
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/openings-for-amateurs/

https://www.chess.com/blog/ForwardChess/book-of-the-week-openings-for-amateurs
https://www.mongoosepress.com/catalog/excerpts/openings_amateurs.pdf
Chess Endgames for Kids by Karsten Müller (2015)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/chess-endgames-for-kids/
http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/Chess_Endgames_for_Kids.pdf
A Guide to Chess Improvement by Dan Heisman (2010)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708105628/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review781.pdf
Studying Chess Made Easy by Andrew Soltis (2009)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090448/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review750.pdf
Seirawan stuff:
http://seagaard.dk/review/eng/bo_beginner/ev_winning_chess.asp?KATID=BO&ID=BO-Beginner

https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090229/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review492.pdf
http://www.nystar.com/tamarkin/review1.htm
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627132508/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen173.pdf

https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-winning-chess-openings

https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-winning-chess-endings
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708092617/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review560.pdf

"As Black, I think that [players with very limited experience] would do well … playing 1...e5 versus 1 e4 …" - IM John Watson (2010)

1 e4 e6 is one of the standard ways for a chess game to start, but perhaps not a good choice for someone with a rating below 900.

Totally agree.

Agree with @theturtlemoves. It's just good old-fashioned blunders. The key to reducing those is TIME. As others have said, play ONLY longer time controls. I would recommend no shorter than 30 minute rapid at this point.

Playing a lot of blitz or bullet chess is only practicing playing badly. Even masters will play worse chess in short games than they will in classic formats, it stands to reason.

So your #1 discipline at this point should be to slow down: ask why your opponent played their last move, look at every piece on the board, look for threats, look for opportunities, and before you move... always hover the piece over the landing square and take another look round.

"Am I doing anything stupid here? What will happen if I make this move? What are my alternatives?"

This is a short video I made specifically to help sub-1000 players advance past the 1000 rating barrier.

Agree with the comments above.  You need to study tactics and play 1.e4 as White and play the central pawns to the center as Black.  Your rating will rise when, on every move, you are aware (for both sides) of where the under defended pieces are (all of them), where the pieces with restricted mobility are and where the pieces line up for forks, skewers and pins.  See my notes to your game.

 

All you play is bullet, blitz, and rapid. 

How are you expecting to improve, when you're not giving yourself time to think?

When your opponent moves you have to ask yourself "Does he have any checks or captures that he can play on the next move?" At several critical times in your game you left pieces unprotected or under-protected. You got away with it a few times, because your opponent wasn't asking the same questions, but eventually it sank your position.

 

It's somewhat tedious, but study the endgame. When I brush up on my endgame study I become a better player.

---

 

One thing we tend to forget is that as soon as that clock starts we don't stop calculating. Chess is extremely intense, don't ease up unless it's a strategic break.

---

 

Play longer time controls - 30|0 is a great control for improvement.

Watch Mikhail Tal’s games; they will resonate deeply in your mind and can only be entrenched for a very prolonged period of time. His sheer inventiveness of moves can simply not be forgotten.

It might be of interest to look at the table of contents of A COMPLETE CHESS COURSE by Antonio Gude: "... 3 Openings and Basic Principles 33 ... 4 Putting Your Pieces to Work 52 ... 5 Strategy and Tactics 76 ... 6 Endgame Play and Further Openings 106 … 7 Combinations and Tactical Themes 128 ... 8 Attacking Play 163 ... 9 Your First Opening Repertoire 194 …"
http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/A_Complete_Chess_Course.pdf

Hi guys and thanks so much for all the support and suggestions and also the links to resources and the especially helpful analysis.
You’re all quite correct I need to slow down and think. I try to play 15/10 as much as I can as recommended by John Bartholomew. I’ve been working from home the last few weeks (I’m a woodwind teacher in public schools and it’s our end of year holidays here.I get to repair 120 assorted flutes, clarinets, saxophones, etc).
I play 3 minute blitz with absolutely no expectation of winning at at this point. I play the blitz mainly because a) it appears to be the most popular online time control and certainly shorter games would seem to be the future of chess in the online world.
b) It gives me a chance to bash out my openings and get to see the same patterns repeatedly with some small hope of eventually recognising them. Mostly though it’s because c) I can get a 3 minute game in when the wife calls out “dinner will be ready in 10 minutes,” etc.
As good as all the tactics books might be, is there any digital versions that are similar to the puzzle mode here on chess.com or are physical books and physical board and pieces a better option?

"... Most internet players think that 30 5 is slow, but that is unlikely slow enough to play 'real' chess. You need a game slow enough so that for most of the game you have time to consider all your candidate moves as well as your opponent’s possible replies that at least include his checks, captures, and serious threats, to make sure you can meet all of them. For the average OTB player G/90 is about the fastest, which might be roughly 60 10 online, where there is some delay. But there is no absolute; some people think faster than others and others can play real chess faster because of experience. Many internet players are reluctant to play slower than 30 5 so you might have to settle for that as a 'slow' game." - NM Dan Heisman (2002)

https://web.archive.org/web/20140627010008/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman12.pdf

 

Thanks for your input.  Now instead of just blindly following Dan Heisman's advice I now know of someone who got a lot better by just playing in OTB tournaments as well as having his coach tell him to do it.  I'm trying to get to the 100 game mark this new year!

OP, you, like many others, are at the beginning stages of becoming a good chess player.  People call it "wading through the mud," but I don't believe chess is the only discipline where one has to "wade through the mud."  Just like any discipline, right now, you suck at it.  Michael Jordan wasn't born a good basketball player.  He had to acquire the skills after long hours of practice daily.  Also, he failed a lot.  That's the thing about success.  You haven't succeeded until you have failed many many times.

It's normal to start out doing something new and failing all the time.  That's the process of learning.  You can't get "good" until you've practiced "x" amount of hours.  It's especially normal for chess.  I saw your game and I can already tell you are a typical 800 player who misses tactics almost all the time and so does your opponent, and the reason why you lost is that you blundered a little more than your opponent.  Even at my level, games are usually decided by blunders, however, our blunders are less frequent and sometimes more convoluted to the point where it is a lot harder to see the blunder, but, after it has happened, you can see the position, and easily capitalize on it, if you are the winning side.

You are like the 50 millionthed person who has asked this same question though.  I don't know why beginners always ask the same questions over and over again, but anyway, at least you know now so you don't have to worry.  It's normal to suck at something when you first start doing it....  Yeah I know it's not as simple as that you've probably been playing for a year or so or whatever and havn't improved yada yada yada.  Truth is we don't know how long you've been playing because you didn't give us that information.  All you did was tell us you suck, showed one of your games, and expect us to be clairvoyant or something and ask us to tell you something only you can know the answer to, after asking the right questions.  This is the wrong question.  I hope you don't mind my curtness, but we get people like you that ask this same question over and over again and after they ask the question we never hear from them ever again.  I think you will fall into this category.  It's not productive to focus on a general idea like, "Why do I suck at chess?"  It's better to ask specific questions on how to improve in chess, like, How do I study Tactics?"  You may think you know the answer, but the answer you might get here may differ from what you thought was true.

Think before you write.  

I have analysed your game below, commenting on almost every move you made. I hope you find it useful. Looking through games like this and analysing what you did is a really great way to improve. So I encourage you to do this with more of your games.

After the game I will make some key remarks you need to look at to improve. 

 

Based on this I can detect three specific things you can do. 

1. Make sure you are comfortable with opening principles (moving pawns before pieces, moving one piece only once, for example). It didn't cost you here. But moving d6 and d5 on your second and third moves was easily avoidable. A better player than white would have punished you badly for that. 

2. Before you commit to each move check (a) whether you could have taken any opponent piece, (b) whether any of your pieces are under threat and (c) whether you have a check. Doing this would have enabled you to see 9. ... Qa5+ and would have helped you see that you knight on e7 was en prise for so long).

3. Understand that - certainly once the queens are off the board - a quick mate is unlikely. You need to think about how you can win. Around move 27 you were winning. At that point seek to simplify (exchanges help the player who is up in material in most cases) and think about how to get a pawn to queen. You should have focussed your attention on white's a2 pawn and then look to push your two queenside pawns. This would have put white under intolerable pressure and you would have won more material still. Instead you played 27. ... Bxf2 and didn't even notice that white could take your rook. 

I hope you find this useful. As other people have said, everyone was at level 800 at some stage. Most importantly enjoy playing!!!