My experience at my first OTB Classical tournament, from an online-only player

A week ago I made a post asking for advice before going to my first OTB tournament. Some people asked me to give an update once it was done, and I think in general this post might be interesting to people who mostly play online but are curious about trying OTB classical. Sorry about the long post - I left some key notes if you want to just read that and skip to the comments.

Some background on me: I'm 24, an "adult improver". I started playing chess online in early 2021, with no other prior experience to speak of. I reached 1750 rapid on chesscom, then switched to Lichess where I float around 2000 rapid, 1900 blitz and 2100 classical. Most of my chess prep for the tournament was learning a new white opening, as my white repertoire wasn't very good. I also worked on my tactics with a compositions book and lichess's tactics trainer. Not that it matters for much, but I'm at around 2300-2400 puzzles on lichess.

Some key notes for those who don't want to read the full post:

• Forget the "1700 Lichess = 1400 chesscom = 1250 FIDE" equivalences or tables you might have seen. That is completely off the mark, it doesn't work like that at all. In fact, even within the FIDE Elo system, I faced some 1300s that played like 1700s and 1600s that played like 1200s. Most of my opponents were higher rated than me FIDE, but were much worse than me at rapid or blitz online. Different formats will have different ratings, and classical OTB is such a unique format that is is not feasible to directly correlate it like that. I've played rapid and blitz for over a year, so my rating in those formats is good. The same can't be said for classical OTB.
• From what I've found, FIDE ratings between regions change a lot too. In my country, a 1300 is a solid player. Since it is a small country with not as many events or players, I feel rating deflation might be a factor. The 1300s from neighbouring countries weren't as good, but still way more solid than what you'd expect from even a 1500-1600 on chesscom.
• Building on top of this - games at the tournament weren't blunder-fests in the slightest. I was in the lowest section of the tournament and even 1200s made sure to not blunder as much as possible. The level of complications needed to get a winning advantage or generate a meaningful tactic is MUCH higher than what we're used to online. Tactics aside, converting an advantage is way more difficult too. Players are just more resilient, have better mental fortitude and experience in those settings, and will keep fighting hard even if they're a piece down. Conversely, often being one or two pawns up is enough to push for a win "based on that" instead of going for more material or the king. If they're even a pawn up, players will be extremely defensive and try to trade it down as much as possible. Online, players seem to give away pawns like skittles. Not here, oh no. The tactics we're used to in rapid are the level of struggle we have to fight over a single pawn sometimes.
• The time format becomes an issue in ways you wouldn't expect. If you're used to rapid or even 20-30 min games as your maximum, exhaustion is a major factor. You can "force yourself" to check for tactics and threats and so on every move all you want, but maintaining good focus for 3-4 hours is simply not an easy thing and it is a skill of its own that needs to be improved. I lost 2 games where I was clearly winning (both material and positional advantage) and failed to defend 2 equal end-games simply due to tiredness and lack of focus in the later stages of the game.
• Online skills and tactics do somewhat translate to OTB, so don't worry. You can get used to the board vision after a couple of games, even if it's not perfect like you're used to.
• Sometimes, online, it feels like getting black or white matters less than knowing your opening well. It wasn't the case here. Even at a lower level, games as white or black were very different. This wasn't solely my experience, other players at the lower level said as much too, but in my case I got winning advantages in all of my white games, and had to defend to a draw all of the black ones (and failed to do so, I only won as white). I'm not much better at my white openings than my black ones. Be ready to defend hard positions for hours against players whose rating you would've mocked here. Be ready to hope for draws in those positions.
• This WILL improve your chess. The tournament isn't even over for me yet (last round is tomorrow morning), but I already feel way better online. Chess online just feels so much easier now. Everything is clearer, it's not only easier to see lines but maneuvers and structure transformations. As grueling as it might be, I recommend it to anyone hoping to get better. Just...don't think too much about results or rating at first lol.
• My experience is probably biased to my region, tournament, etc. but like 90% of the games I saw were 1. d4. People, especially kids, don't seem to want to dig into the complications and theory of 1. e4. So other than my English, all I saw were Queen's Gambits, Catalans and Londons. Even Trompowskys and Colles made an appearance, but I didn't see a single Ruy - every 1. e4 was answered by Caro, Sicilian, or another response that takes the e4 player away from their "intended" e4-e5 opening.
• The mind game matters a lot. Knowing you're facing a higher rated player, or feeling the pressure of previous losses, will alter your mental state.
• If the format is anything like mine, you will be exhausted. You'll reach the last couple of rounds feeling like your brain is pudding.
• Temper your expectations. Most players that go to tournaments are as invested or more than you. They've nearly all worked for years, some decades, on their games. Many of them take classes at a premium, many of them come from very far to attend the tournament. If you're an online player trying a tournament out for the first time, you're likely to be one of the least invested people there, even if - like me - you spent months working on endgames or openings. Watching YouTube videos, doing some Chessable courses, solving tactics and grinding ladder isn't really comparable to paying for private lessons for years, attending clubs regularly, and being a regular appearance in tournaments.

Alright, so onto the main post itself.

Before the tournament, I did two months of prep for openings. I've always had issues picking a white opening, jumped around a lot, and now I learned a way of playing the English that I'm happy with. This prep seemed to pay off, as I was at least +5 at some point in all of my white games (and knew it). In two of them, I managed to blunder that advantage away due to exhaustion leading me to make hasty moves. As part of my prep, I started going to a chess club on the weekends and just practicing playing with others, trying out 30-minute games while writing down the notation to analyze later, among other things.

I was honestly not ready for the format to tire me this much, and for players to be this resilient. Online, converting an advantage is much easier (and I felt I gave opponents that ease when converting against me). But let's get onto the tournament itself.

The time format was 90 mins + 30 seconds per move, with games being on average between 2 and 3 hours. It was a swiss open tournament with 300 players. For those that don't know, swiss tournaments start off by splitting the table (ordered by ELO) and then setting mismatches. If it's a 100 person tournament, then player #1 plays #51, #2 plays #52, etc. Then, after the first round, you face people in tables "adjacent" to yours (tables are ordered by match) that have the same number of points. Win = 1 point, Draw = 1/2 point. In this case, since we had too many players, they split the table up in four, so I matched a 1600 in my first round. The average and median Elo of the tournament was around 1850.

As a sidenote, this system feels a bit unfair to some mid and lower-rated players. They keep jumping between losing to 1800s-1900s and then beating unrated guys who they can't win Elo from.

The schedule was 6 days of games with two days with double rounds. I had work before each game, so that may be part of why I was so exhausted. Most of the other players were either kids on vacation, retirees, or took the week off to be there.

I cloned my private analysis study to a public one without any names, so I'll only refer to people by their rating here.

Round 1: Black vs 1580

• Probably my worst chess played overall. I'm really not proud of this game at all. I was extremely nervous and my focus was completely off from the get go. I even broke the rules a couple of times by mistake with the clock/piece moving, but the opponent was very nice about it.
• The London system is always very annoying to face since there aren't many points to attack, but I was happy to have an advantage at some point. I second guessed myself too much, and at some point I could've gotten counterplay by sacking the exchange. Whoops. Ended up getting my king chased around the board.
• My spirits were very low after this game. I expected more of myself, and the blunder with letting the queen in with the knights was something I don't think I would've done online.

Round 2: White vs 1360

• I was looking to make up for the previous game, and luckily the opponent played right into a common attack in the Karpov Variation of the English, something I studied a fair bit. Even so, I end up missing the key continuation that would've kept the attack alive and deadly, and despite losing a pawn the opponent manages to stabilize. The game then goes on to last for 4h+ until the end of the conversion, with the opponent playing on the last 30 secs of her clock constantly. This felt way harder than it needed to be.
• Despite being a W, this game completely killed my stamina. It was the last game of the tournament where I was able to focus after the 3h mark. Morality was up, but the rest of the games suffered as a result.
• Btw, the opponent here was a 11 year old girl - I know age doesn't matter in chess, but it was still humbling to see someone so young be so resilient. In her place, I would've folded much earlier (which was the case later on).

Round 3: Black vs 1890

• Yeah so I was completely outmatched on this one, absolutely no contest. I have never faced this system online before, I was very confused to see an exchange Slav be continued with e4 and f3, but apparently it's pretty good. I had no clue what to answer this with, and after some analysis I think I was too passive.
• This was only three hours after the end of round 2. I only had time to go home, shower, eat and come back. Needless to say, I was completely wiped, so I didn't expect much of a result in this game anyways.

Round 4: White vs 1555

• One of the three games that really broke my heart in this tournament. I was completely winning, had control of the middle game, managed to snag a pawn and was pushing well into a winning end-game...and then the exhaustion set in. Knowing I was winning but being very tired, I tried to find a winning tactic to "put it away" with the bishop, and then missed a basic interference tactic. Obviously I know about interference tactics, and obviously I would've noticed it if I checked properly, but this is where the mental game is a factor and where my ability to hold focus for longer periods of time faltered.
• I was considering between forcing a queen trade and transitioning to Rook+Rook vs Rook+Knight+Bishop, and went what I thought would be the quickest win. And it wasn't a win at all.
• The interesting part is that while the bishop blunder is losing, I could maybe still hold it if I was accurate after it. But mentally I wasn't up to the task. My opponent was VERY low on time so I thought if I played fast I could maybe find a draw, but I only ended up making it worse and getting mated.

Round 5: Black vs 1348

• Teens with good end-game technique will be the bane of me. I simply couldn't find a way through. It was obviously a draw and I should've taken it or offered it and repeated. I felt I had to compensate for the last game, tried to win and over-extended, leading into a big blunder and a terrible end-game a few pawns down. This guy played extremely slow too, so the blunder happened pretty late. Common theme, I should just not mention it in any of the others.
• This is one of the guys that I felt got screwed by the tournament format. He starts off losing to a 1900, then beats an unrated player, then loses to a 2000 and a 1800, then beats me, then loses to another 1800, then beats another unrated player. So he seems to be a pretty solid player, he right now has 3 points for the tournament, and his tournament performance is 1400, but his ELO differential is -20. He has a 1700 in the last round and I'm rooting for him, but damn.

Round 6: White vs 1200

• Probably the only player that played like I expected for his rating. Managed to trap his queen a few moves in and then just traded down into a quick conversion.
• It was an 8 year old kid lol I'm not exactly proud of this one. Nothing game.
• The only game of this tournament for me that didn't reach the 3h mark.

Round 7: Black vs 1350

• Remember what I mentioned with teens and endgames? This guy is apparently all about endgames, he offered one as soon as he could and I accepted it, none the wiser. I talked with him after the game about it and apparently he's halfway through Dvoretsky's manual with his chess coach.
• This was a draw, I'm a dumbass and bad at endgames. Exhaustion and the mental aspect is an excuse sure, but I really should've been able to draw this at the end, taken my time and calculated it all out. I'm really disappointed with myself. Hey, it's something I know I have to work on, so this game is at least a teachable moment.
• This kid's tournament performance is 1700. He beat a 1800 first round, then drew a 1900 WIM with black, then was sent to the top room facing a 2300 NM. After that he kept facing higher rated players and lost all games until mine. I'm not sure what's going on here, but nothing is like I expected it.

Round 8: White vs 1340

• I was completely checked out of the tournament at this point. My morale was in the shits, I just overall didn't feel like playing at all. I arrived to this game late because I was coming off of work (and had to leave early), and spent the first 15 minutes getting myself straight during the opening.
• Keeping with the theme of the tournament - get an advantage with white and then blunder it away in the dumbest way possible when the opponent is too resilient. I really should've taken my time, being up a Bishop.
• I'm just annoyed at myself. I honestly wanted to drop out of the tournament after this even though there's only one round left. It was too many games that were too long in too much of a quick succession, and what you get is blundering mate in one in a winning endgame. There's not much to learn from this game, just need to get experienced with the time format.

There's a last round tomorrow, but it's against a 1000 that lost all of his games, so it's probably not worth talking about much. I wish I had better results, but other than the blunders in the third hour I'm not that disappointed with my chess, and now I have some idea of what to do to get better:

• Work on endgames 100%
• Get a more aggressive black opening against 1. d4. The slav is good, but clearly my knowledge of it is inadequate to push for an advantage against strong players (and even not-strong ones).
• In general become more of a proactive player. Higher rated players would've had different overall strategies - they wouldn't even have to think about the issue of blundering in the late game against 1300s because the game would've been solved long before that. I'm too passive, don't apply enough pressure, and my plans - although I have them and try to execute them - are often misguided and don't work in the long run if answered correctly. One of my main take-aways from the tournament is seeing high rated players next to me finish their games very fast and leave while I'm still struggling in some random ass endgame.
• Gain experience with the format and become used to focusing for long spans of time
• Work on my mental game (??? no clue how) so tilting is less of an issue

I'd love other suggestions from anyone who takes the time to see some of these games.

Overall, despite feeling like shit at the end of half of these games, I think the chess itself - not the results were ok and I feel myself improving by the day. There's nothing like a trial by fire to push someone to improve. I feel like I see lines further, like I have a better idea of how malleable pawn structures can be, of what maneuvers would be useful, etc. Still not nearly enough for what it needs to be, but better than what I was.

The environment around the tournament was also pretty positive. People playing blitz outside and reviewing the games, people in the main auditorium watching the GMs play, analysis everywhere, people of all ages and genders and places. I still wish I felt better after the games and had better results, but it could've gone worse I suppose.