David's Chess Journey - Installment 19

First Lesson
I really enjoyed my first lesson with my new coach. She divides the time equally between the opening, middlegame and endgame. The opening was fun - we did blitz games with White and Black. I did fine with White and we stopped the game. I got crushed with Black. I tried to play the Caro and she did a move I hadn't seen before and responded incorrectly which put me into a completely losing position. I said "oops" and she said "Yeah, that wasn't very good." It was reminiscent of Silman's responses to his students in An Amateur's Mind:)

In the middlegame we worked through positions and examined famous games with her asking me questions at key points of the game. She was patient as I struggled to see what she wanted me to see. It was very instructive.

For the endgame, we studied opposition. I had worked through the concept in Silman's endgame manual, but it really came to live during the lesson.

Finally, she gave me homework in the form of positions to analyze and solve. I did my best, but I'm pretty sure that I will not get amazing marks on my first attempt. I will share the feedback in the next installment!

Beginner Tips
I'm going to start creating a running list of tips for beginners, adding some tips per week. Learning as a beginner is just different than learning as a non-beginner. The goal is to have a good outline for a beginner book or course after a period of time. Feel free to refine my thinking!

Beginner Tips:

• Fun should be your first priority. Remember, this is a hobby. There is nothing wrong with hard work and not every moment will be enjoyable. But, if the general theme of fun is not the predominate theme in your chess journey, it is time to recalibrate. This is a great blog from GM avetik_ChessMood related to this tip: https://lichess.org/@/Avetik_ChessMood/blog/the-secret-to-lasting-love-for-chess/gvoomnBH

• Get a coach. Coaches are more affordable that you think and worth the investment. I would recommend looking to the Coaches tab on Lichess (Learn/Coaches). I admit that the number of options can be overwhelming. I have vetted two that are very good if you would like a recommendation. Here is a great blog from FM nikhildixit on the topic: https://lichess.org/@/nikhildixit/blog/is-a-chess-coach-worth-it-a-perfect-guide/qqED9EO3

• Don't buy opening courses. I've made this mistake. The reality is that we are not ready for studying openings as beginners. I recommend studying Fine's 10 opening principles and applying those in the opening stage of the game. Don't worry, openings are not very important at our level. If you need help finding Fine's 10 opening principles, please let me know and I'm happy to share them.

• Play a lot of rapid games and use the "Learn From Your Mistakes" function after each game. 10+5 or 15+1- are great time controls to get in a lot of games but still afford sufficient time to think. Classical games are just too long and we don't calculate deeply enough yet to justify the significant time commitment. Blitz games are too short and will create bad habits. Playing Blitz is like a beginning golfer going to a driving range and just trying to hit a driver as far as she can. Not the best path forward!

• Find/create a community. This was a key point made in Ben Johnson's great book Perpetual Chess Improvement, and has been hugely important to me. The Chess Dojo has been a great way to create community for me. My local chess club has been okay, but difficult to find the flexibility to make the matches. Also, I have found that as you talk about chess with the people in your live, the community grows. For example, I have a chess board outside of my office and the office plays me on a continual basis. I call it "Beat Your Lawyer at Chess." That game has created a lot of great chess relationships.

• Work on Tactics. When you aren't playing you should be working on tactics! Most blunders will be missing your opponent's tactical options or missing your own. The best advice that I received was working on the following Tactical themes on Lichess (Puzzle/Puzzle Dashboards/Puzzle Themes) on a schedule. The schedule is to work on one theme each day for 2 weeks - that will get you through all the themes over that two week period at which point you start over.

  1st week:
  Day 1 - Fork
  Day 2 - Pin
  Day 3 - Skewer
  Day 4 - Hanging Piece
  Day 5 - Capture The Defender
  Day 6 - Discovered Attack
  Day 7 - Trapped Piece

  2nd week:
  Day 1 - Attraction
  Day 2 - Double Check
  Day 3 - Clearance
  Day 4 - Deflection
  Day 5 - Interference
  Day 6 - Sacrifice
  Day 7 - Advanced Pawn