Chess forum by Grandmasters

New article: The doctor who only used ChessMood to raise 400 points in 1 year

A ChessMood student raised 400 points in 1 year while being a full-time doctor.

How did he do it? In today’s story, you’ll find out:
 

✅How he rediscovered his passion for chess.

✅How he improved his chess without any books or private coaches.

✅The tournament where he beat 5 higher-rated players in a row while working his job in the morning!

…and more.
 

Read the full story here? 

https://chessmood.com/feedback/doctor-shahinur-haque-chess-improver

And once you finish reading, share your thought and drop your wishes under this forum thread.

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Very well done Dr.Shahinur. Hope you strike FIDE 2000 soon. I am 60 y.o. and fighting back aging to recover my old 1780. If I scored 1800 I would be pleased ?

Llorenc, just change your “if” to “when.” Haha. 
Seriously. It's a way to trick our brains. 

Great job Doctor Shahinur!!! Keep on! You are an example !!!

Can we have a course on calculation and visualization?

Hi, Not sure if this has already been thought of my our fantastic content creators. I was wondering if we can have a course on calculation and visualization, as this in my view is the singlemost thing that most club level players below 1800 can improve on. Of course this is just a suggestion, and if this topic is getting combined with some of our other courses, that also works. Cheers..

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I'd love to see such a course too. At 2200 FIDE, calculation/visualization is still my biggest weakness.

I'd love to see a course on calculation and visualization too!! I hope GMs will read this! ?

I think a big question is whether most people would be better off focusing on improving their tactical pattern recognition or improving their calculation ability. The ability to spot simple tactics consistently and quickly is a massive advantage and makes all aspects of chess much easier. I would say that if your best 5min Puzzle Rush score is under 35 (or preferably 40) then you should definitely be focusing more on drilling fundamental tactical patterns than working on advanced calculation.

Hello,

Courses about calculations and tactics have some similarities. Understanding that U2000 level players need to rarely calculate long forced lines, instead need to have a sharp tactical vision we created the course Tactic Ninja. Going from easier to hard levels the course can be very good training in that sense and will help to improve tactics to a decent level.

Calculations and visualization is an interesting topic, and we might consider that opportunity in the future, but as you can see now we are working on more practical courses of openings, middlegames, and endgames.

Thank you!

Below 1700 FIDE long-play (and 2000 blitz / rapid?) calculation and visualisation is a much less needed skill, but going beyond it starts to gain importance. Yes it's often wrapped up with tactics, and solving puzzles and tactics regularly helps this skill. It is however also an endgame skill as often endgames are decided by a tempo or so and not forced the same way as tactical sequences. I've lost track of the number of games won or saved by performing better in the endgame which often calls for calculating. Endgame performance is one of the big differences between 1700 and 1900 FIDE. As demonstrated by my last long-play game in which I chose a wrong middlegame plan, but came back and won the ending. I would forget Kotov trees and long or highly branched sequences, although it can make good training if you can put up with the difficulty. Rarely will you ever need to go 5 moves ahead (pawn and king races as an exception are often simplified with rules, counting and usually not branching), and often practical play is made of 2 or 3 move sequences. The deeper it goes, the more likely there is a mistake, so there are also practical considerations to avoiding long lines and tailoring them to your skill and the chance you are wrong (conversely you also need to have confidence in your ability and not shy away if you think you're right). The main things to practise are 'seeing' the final position correctly and not missing an opponent's resource, 'moving' a piece twice, sticky pieces and so on. It also needs checking for opponent's counterplay. The problem with relying solely on tactics to train is that you know there is a win, even if there is some hidden counterplay. Plus it doesn't help the endgame so much. OTB you might have a lovely variation but it turns out it doesn't work.

I'm finding that solving about 5 mates in 4 on lichess daily appears to be helping this a lot.

An idea for the website

Hi everyone! Recently after studying the Accelerated Dragon I took the quiz and I really liked it as it helps to grow our memory so in my mind an idea came that if Chessmood can create a feature where we enter a pgn and it creates a quiz on it's basis this might be very helpful for people like me who don't necessarily play all the openings of Chessmood. I hope my idea is taken seriously. Appreciate the wonderful work by the team? Vedant

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Oops just checked I put a typo of ? after team I meant !

Course reviews disappearing/not appearing

Hi there This is an update to a previous question found here https://chessmood.com/forum/main-channel/course-review-rating-not-appearing I don't know if anyone else is having this problem, but currently none of my new review scores/comments are appearing and one review that had not appeared and was kindly fixed by ChessmoodOdysseus to appear has now disappeared again. This is all happening (or should I say not happening?!) in the Endgame Mastery courses. My review scores appear for the first two courses, but after that there is nada. What is going on and can it be fixed? Cheers in advance.

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Don't worry, I informed the technical team and it should be fixed very soon. Thanks 🙏❤️!

New course:Fearless Warrior - Attack smartly and fearlessly

Our brother GM Gabuzyan is about to make the most important move in his life. 

And a day before GM Gabuzyan’s life changes forever, we’re launching the course, Fearless Warrior. 

In this course, GM Gabuzyan will help you understand the fundamentals of attacking in chess, all of which are packed into 10 simple concepts. You’ll learn: 
 

✅When to start an attack?

✅The different strategies to get your pieces into an attack.

✅How do you attack when the Kings are castled on the same side?

✅How to punish reckless attacks from your opponent?

…and much more.
 

Start watching from here 👇🏻

https://chessmood.com/course/chess-attack
 

As for GM Gabuzyan’s most important move, he’s getting married tomorrow 😊 Send him your wishes.

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Congratulations to GM Gabuzyan!

Looking for the section in grand prix where black plays e6 after we play bishop c4.

Hello all. I am unable to find the section in the grand prix where black plays e6 after we play bishop c4. I don't think there was anything about this variation in the whitemood course. I only remember e6 before we played bishop c4. Maybe this section is in the main course. If anyone could point me to this section it would be greatly appreciated. I am facing a lot of e6 after bishop c4 on a lower level people realize how strong that bishop is. Thanks for your time.

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I found it in the main course I think we play d4 is that correct? Do we only play d4 if black fianchetto's there king or do we always play d4 after bishop c4 e6?

If it was in the simplified Whitemood courses you might want to check the Anti Sicilian courses to figure that out. They go in far greater detail.

Daily puzzle /underpromotion 12.10.2022

Hello, In this position, promotion in rook is also mating. But it said "wrong". That s sad.

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Exactly, I did it right then I tried both underpromotion to rook and it says wrong while it's not cause anyway black must take with Bishop after g8=R+ and its # even with a8=R#

I've gotten the last couple of daily puzzles correct but wasn't given the moodcoins. Today's one has a nice Novotny theme.

Lost control of the centre

In the attached position, I'd followed the ideas in the hybrid e6 a6 advanced section, but since Black played d6 delaying the advance d5 until after o-o-o (which seems a lot more sensible). Unfortunately I go wrong here and try to get some space on the qside with b3, with the idea of getting in c3, and get busted with a great attack from my opponent. Obviously right now the Bg2 is bad, but it's acting as a king shield from the g-file and long diagonal if Black can open it, and maybe later could be used in the game. Any suggestions for learning to handle such sort of positions. I know post-game it's easy to know that the centre needs to be controlled to stop Black's plan of b4 o-o-o Rg8 d5 Rxg2 Nxe4 etc. White can keep the advantage with Nd5 which at first glance messes up the pawns, but then c4 is coming after.

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The full game: https://lichess.org/641iKS2TKBtP

Perhaps a useful way to think about this position is statics vs dynamics. Statically, white is worse because there is an open file onto their king. So if black can complete development and castle long the position will likely favour them. But dynamically, white is better because 3 vs 2 minor pieces developed, they are already castled, and black has a loose piece on f6. All that points to white needing to play with some urgency to disrupt black. Therefore forcing moves like Nd5 and Bg5 (also a decent move) should be high on the list of candidates. I agree the pawn structure after exd5 looks a bit ugly at first sight. The cramping effect of the d5 pawn is nice though. It might just be one of those patterns that we learn from experience.

CM Grand Prix line with 6.. e6 - knockout win

CM came through for me in an OTB game yesterday.

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French Tarrach 3.Nd2

In the short black opening version it says after 3.Nd2 Nc6 4.Ngf3 Nf6, ,,, that there is more to see/study in the main course. But I cannot find the Main course - where do I find it (I only find black playing sicilian, caro-cann and a few more,)?

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Dear Erik, 
After finishing the courses that we are doing now on middlegame and endgame, we will go back to openings, publishing the Main course of the French attack which will be a complete repertoire targeted for advanced players. At the moment, there is only the French Attack course, which is enough to start playing it and get a good feel for it until 2000 rating. 
Of course since it is a practical repertoire the lines are not analyzed deeply in purpose.
If you are an advanced player and are very interested in this line, I would recommend you in the meanwhile the fantastic book by Dmitry Kryakvin The Modern French Volume 1 Tarrasch and Various Lines from 2020 where he also teaches this line with Nd2 and Nc6 and has very good analysis.?

French Attack

Dear Avetik, you sometimes refer to the 'main course'. Where is this, or what is meant by that. Love your site's content. Best wishes Thomas

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Dear Thomas, 
After finishing the courses that we are doing now, we will publish the Main course of the French attack which will be a complete repertoire targetted for advanced players. At the moment, there is only the French Attack course, which is enough to start playing it and get a good feel for it until 2000 rating. 

Where is the main section for French playing as black?

In the Simplified Black Opening courses, references are made to more advance options in the "main section". May I know where can I find the main section to learn more about French when playing as black? In particular looking for the exchange variation with 4.c4, where Avetik recommend bishop develop to d4 instead of e7... Many Thanks in advance.

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I think that's planned for later. Right now they're working on a number of middle and endgame courses as a priority. Unfortunately unless someone has a cloning machine there 2 GMs and not enough time right now. I would expect some time early next year as the earliest opportunity for more opening updates.

After finishing the courses that we are doing now on middlegame and endgame, we will go back to openings, publishing the Main course of the French attack which will be a complete repertoire targeted for advanced players. At the moment, there is only the French Attack course, which is enough to start playing it and get a good feel for it until 2000 rating. 
Of course since it is a practical repertoire the lines are not analyzed deeply in purpose.

3 weeks to go training programme

I have 3 weeks (actually 4 but I'm on holiday for a week) left before a long play tournament, most of the competition is around the 1900-2100 FIDE level. Interesting in suggestions for a warm-up training plan to get ready for it spending 2 hours a day.

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General thoughts & ideas: - Regular solving of moderately challenging positions over the next 1-2 weeks, focusing on quality over quantity. Setup the positions on a physical board. - Switch solving to easier tactics in the final week. - Play some rapid games online, 15+10 or slower. 100% focus. Emphasis on disciplined thinking. - One or two OTB training games using the same time control as the tournament if you can manage it - Review a few favourite classical games for inspiration. If they are from a ChessMood course, use physical board as well as the video. - Take some days off so you turn up fresh and ready for battle. For openings, some light review. If you haven't already, check your online stats and perhaps put a little extra work into the weak spots. Think about who else is in the tournament and whether it's possible to predict some likely opponents. If so, it might be worth preparing some specific lines for a few people. Good luck!

I've got two drills worked out so far. The first is solving mate in 4 as was suggested by Coach Andras on YouTube. While the lichess mates aren't too difficult (if they were the study type it would be very difficult!) it helps get into the process of looking roughly in order of checks, captures threats. It also helps visualising a 4 move sequence. It doesn't train is looking for (or making) other targets than the king (and you know there is something there in 4) and the degree of visualisation is limited often to one or two pieces around the king's area. However it's a useful thing to do in isolation. The second I'm planning to do is to go through a number of games, but the purpose here is to take a side and visualise the next move and blunder check it. Again working on a small unit of the whole: visualising the next move, asking can it be taken, did it address the threats on the board, what threats the opponent now has, what does that move unprotect, etc. Perhaps looking through the games of sub 1700 players might be a good here since if it were a master game you'd expect to get lazy in that almost all moves (and more still in a published game) won't be blunders. Sub1700 though, some of those moves will be dreadful, particularly in faster games.

I was pondering this question again recently. I'm not sure what the stats are, but it seems there is a good chance of having at least one game that reaches an endgame and is played out in the increment, i.e. with just 30sec/move thinking time. So perhaps sparring some endgame positions, using a time control of something like 5min+30sec, would simulate such conditions and thus be a good warmup. And yes, I stole this idea from Chess Dojo, but if it works use it!

Stream missed opportunity

Was looking at the old stream how to crush 2000 ELO field. This game takes place about 50 minutes in. White (GM Avetik) plays the good h3 here, but the opponent manages the eventually draw. However there is a brilliant move here which destroys Black's position and leads to a win of material in many lines. I'll not spoil it right now. From Avetik_ChessMood vs ddd123ddd123 2019.02.21 (first match)

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Nice shot!

Nice one David, nicely spotted!!?

The orange glasses

What were the orange glasses the GMs were using (I know the brand got mentioned once but I forgot it). I'm finding that after a week using orange filters a couple of hours before bed is helping my quality of sleep, more than just setting a nighttime filter on the laptop. Problem is LEDs are in the lights, TV, etc. It also means I can use that as study time rather than have to come away from the laptop much earlier. Unfortunately I'm experimenting using my ski-googles which makes me look a bit of a .... Anything I use would need to fit over glasses, and preferably not make my wife want to call the funny farm.

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I would also be interested in learning more about these glasses! Alas, I think it is too late to stop my wife from calling the funny farm though...

There are different variants. 
I always bought Gunnar. 
https://gunnar.com/

 Or you can find them on Amazon too. The first days feels strange. But then you can't sit in front of the computer without them :) 
Enjoy. 

Course Review Rating Not Appearing

Hi There I rated the latest course I did a couple of days ago, but the rating is not showing up. Normally when I rate a course it appears the same day, but not this time. Is there a glitch; the mods are a bit behind and I should wait or should I just give another rating in case it was something I did wrong? Course in question is https://chessmood.com/course/endgame-rook-vs-pawn Thanks in advance.

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Thanks for letting us know Casey! No need to rate the course again, it is already reflected. By the way, if you could add some comment this will give us some feedback and it would be greatly appreciated. 
???

ChessMood club on Chess.com

This club seems rather inactive for the last year or so. Is not any admin interested in arranging Vote chess with our ChessMood openings? According to my experience a lot of interesting discussions and study opportunities will atise in this form of chess.

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I think it is a lost opportunity to really create a community study group. I think chessmood is awesome but would be even better if we were encouraged to work with each other to help our development. I think active learning in a group (for example look at Chess Dojo), if done well would turbo charge the chessmood effectiveness.

Official discord channel?

It would be useful to have an official discord channel (there are a few unofficial ones, and not all associated with chessmood only). This could also be an extra benefit of being a pro member.

Uses:
 . To find adhoc partners to practise with or prepare for matches or adhoc games / tournament organising, particularly where more permanent arrangements don't work for busy schedules
 . Study and other analysis
 . Discussions (chess or Chessmood) that are more fluent that posting on the forum, including from Chessmood to its members to get opinions or to maintain a sense of family
 . Announcements from Chessmood (such as when a stream is about to begin)
 . General social (not chess) chit-chat that isn't possible otherwise (would need some house rules to request it not become offensive [either to groups or individuals], facilitate distribution of copyright materials or be of a nature unsuitable for children)

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I agree with you. i do need more training partners for openings study and mdidelgame work

Hi David,

Great idea, especially for finding training partners

+1

We will have to think about this because one of the things of Discord is that everyone's data is visible I believe. It is not a bad idea at all, the more the merrier and it may be interesting and maybe useful to some members. In the meanwhile I seem to remember that Kevin, Jay, Abhi and some others already were using a a channel for the same purpose? Can you tell us how is the experience?

Still some interest around this? Found some discord server that seems quite dormant. I feel a platform that's more direct than this forum and more free-style than the FB group could be beneficial. Are there any unofficial ones that are good?

Jobava line with f3

What about the following: 1.d4 Nf6 2. Bf4 g6 3. Nc3 d5 4. f3!? ? I didn't find this covered, but I feel 4.. c5 should be the right move, but then white plays 5. e3 proceeds to play Qd2 and castle long, and black needs to either allow white to capture on c5 with pressure on the d5 pawn, or themselves capture on d4, after which the white queen-bishop battery is opened.

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I checked this move on several books and courses like for exemple the Grunfeld repertoire by Svidler and it does not appear anywhere. Let's see if we can find some idea in the forum?.

4...c5 looks fine to me. If White has nothing better than 5.e3, it's not clear to me what they accomplished with an early 4.f3. dxc5 is usually well met by ..Nbd7 or ..Qa5. Sometimes we sacrifice d5 in exchange for counterplay. For example, because Nc3xd5 Nf6xd5 opens our Bg7, we might have ..Bxb2 followed by ..Bc3+. If White castles long without first playing dxc5, a pawn storm with ..c4 followed by ..b5 (with or without preparation) and ..b4 becomes a serious option.

Hello,

Yes, black is playing c5-Nc6 building a good center with pawns and the pieces. Later on if white castles long there could be attacking chances on the queenside.

BlackMood Advance Repertoires

Is there going to be a Blackmood "Advanced" repertoire eventually? I think I read that somewhere or am I mistaken? Looking for some Classical Dutch with the 1...e6 move order for the future :)

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Yes, this is the plan as Avetik said in some webinars. 
Still, with the Dutch Attack, even if it is not very deep, you can start to win anyways, no need to wait… ?