So, on Friday I sent off a PM to a few of the masters that contribute on this site, basically asking about what they do to train (or what they did that helped them reach the Master level) as well as their input on my training plan.

So far, augelmo was gracious enough to respond and very promptly I might add. I asked about posting responses in my journal so that anyone else who might be following along could review in case they were interested. Here is what augelmo - recent winner of the MN Open in case you missed his videos - had to say:

I think your training plan looks very good. My training is not regular but it looks something like this:

1. Tactics: a couple of problems a day on average... many days none, some days for up to 30 minutes worth. I do problems from chess.com

2. Opening study: I subscribe to chesspublishing.com and get up-to-date theory. I don't use all of it, but it helps me to think in new and creative ways, especially with the annotations. Just looking at games isn't enough for me, so I'm sure it isn't for you either, I need annotations. Also, I do some of my own analysis irregularly when I find a line I am interested in.

3. Endgames/Middlegame: I don't do much work in general. I used to do some positional work with Chess Mentor on chess.com, though books are good, too. Understanding positional chess is a very tough thing to do and takes a lot of time. Transition from opening to middle-game is the most important point in the game, in my opinion. If you can find videos/books on this then that is great. Otherwise, find annotated games and look for ! and ?! moves, try to understand why they are annotated that way then check and see if the annotations back that up.

4. Training games: I play matches against friends in order to test out certain openings. This way I learn a couple of openings I don't have a lot of experience with pretty well.

That's all I do right now... in the past I have spent more time working on endgames, but those come very naturally to me. Rook/pawn endings are very important, as are Bishop vs Knight, so I would start there.

Hope that helps,
Frank

I admire your enthusiasm.

ketchup lover:

1. Thanks for the kinds words.
2. I love ketchup too!




Got another reply which I will share with all of you, this one from our popular Dennis M:


Hi studentofchess,

Just a quick reply...

First, it's not clear that what someone did to become a master will help you become one, too. The point is that initial improvement is easier, and someone might make (and plateau at) master without having done anything too special. Maybe you plateaued at 2100-2150 earlier, and breaking past that will take something special, just as a 2250-2300 might have to do something new and special to reach 2400. There's the further issue of how your long layoff will affect you, and what you ought to do differently, if anything, as a middle-aged adult. (One likely difference is that you'll have to work harder on tactics now, and your opening understanding will likely need some updating as well.)

Second, without filling in details, the standard wisdom these days is that you need to put in lots of hours of intense practice, practice that fully engages you, that simulates competition. It's important to gather information as well, but it's the time you spend breaking your head against challenging positions that will make the most difference.

Third, feedback can be useful, getting insight from a stronger player about your weaknesses and blind spots. (I give lessons, but I'm not trying to recruit you here.)

That's it - good luck!

Loved the masters' comments, especially Dennis M's point on training plateaus and position analysis! I've been working to include some more positional study from master games into my training, keep up the good work on your blog =)

Week of April 5th:

Monday - I think I was actually a bit mentally "fatigued" from the rather thorough analysis work (approx 2 hrs worth) I did on an idea I came up with in the opening variation played in my Rd 1 game last weekend. That, and a fairly stressful day at work. So, all I did was a few tactics problems.
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 10 Chess Tempo.


Tuesday - Between work & stuff at home, didn't get much time for training this day.
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 7 Chess Tempo.

Wednesday - Again got home late from work and had some stuff at home to take care of (in case anyone is interested, it appears we have had a mouse - hopefully just one - get into the house somewhere and then go and die on us. I know, I know, how rude. I've been all through the attic and checked around and under the house; based upon where the smell is coming from, I believe it's final resting place is in the walls somewhere...).
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 10 Chess Tempo.
2. Analysis - Rd1 game, reviewed main lines for the variation played and added notes to game.

Thursday -
1. 35min watching video on ICC re. KID - Saemisch Gambit.
2. Tactics - 3 TT + 5 Chess Tempo
3. Analysis / Opening - Reviewed several variations / games from Rd 1 game last tourny.
4. Reviewed games from recent state championship (potential opponents in next weekends class tournament).

Friday -
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 6 Chess Tempo
2. Analysis / Opening - Began reviewing opening from Rd2 game from last tourny and deciding how I want to approach the system Black used in the future.

Saturday -
Woke up early so worked on Opening / analysis from Rd 2 game some more - this took longer than it should have I think as I worked through the transpositional possibilities and looking up Master games in the on-line database before deciding on a line I was comfortable with. Then went back to bed. The rest of the day was devoted to work on the house and family time, so not much study this day.


Sunday - Left the house at "O-Dark-Hundred" to drive to daughter's VBall tourny - spent almost the whole day there. Managed to get in about 15 min on an endgame study, but was too tired to do much else. Tried to watch a video after returning, but fell asleep 5 min into it.

I'm beginning to think that maybe too large a portion of my training time is spent on tactics, given how long it takes me to get through my cycle of books I'm reading. This is also based upon the feedback I recently received from some of the Masters/Experts on this site, which I will expound upon later. So, from now on I'm going to cut back to the 3 free "Tactics Trainer" problems on Chess.com's site, which are timed, as well as 5 problems on Chess Tempo.

My goal for this week:
This week I am going to focus on opening preparation given that I have an important tournament coming up this weekend. This tourny is a class tournament (Master / Expert) and is important for the following reasons:
1. My performance will give me some feedback on how my training is going and possibly what I need to focus my efforts on.
2. Since most of the games will be with similarly rated opponents, a fairly successful score - say 3/5 or better - should help my rating recover somewhat getting me closer to my goal of qualifying for next year's state championship.
3. Some of my opponents this weekend likely are potential opponents in next year's state championship should I qualify.

So, my goal will be to review:
1. The lines / concepts in the major variations I play w/n my repertoire, and
2. All tournament games / notes since coming out of retirement with particular attention on those games against possible opponents.

I already know that I won't have much time for study on Tues eve after work (board meeting) and Fri after work (Bday party here at the house), so Wed & Thur evenings will be crucial. However, if possible I will also take a few hours off work in order to provide some additional time.

Monday -
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 5 CT

Tuesday - (board meeting)
Got home earlier than planned, so had some "found" time:
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 5 CT
2. Opening prep

Wednesday -
1. Tactics - 3 TT + 5 CT
2. Opening prep

Thursday -
1. Opening Prep

Friday - (BDay party)

Saturday/Sunday - Master/Expert Class Tournament

Well, this week's training has been less about long-term goals (i.e. general improvement, reaching 2200, qualifying for state invitational) and more short-term focused, i.e. preparing for this weekend's tournament. I'll try and keep you all posted on how it goes.

As I write this on Friday morning, I have to say I am very much looking forward to again competing, and also seeing how I measure up as likely most / all the games will be against competition rated 2000 or higher. Getting anxious and can't wait for Round 1 to start tomorrow morning....

OK, time to get back to work after taking a little time off. I decided after playing in the class tournament the weekend-before-last, to take a little time off the following week. This was for two reasons:
1. Just to keep me fresh in my training, and
2. Spend a little more time with the wife and family (the wife is great in allowing "me time" to feed my competitive fire; out of appreciation I periodically forego that just to reaffirm where the real priorities are).

I noticed a few people were periodically checking in during the last week, so for those of you who may have been curious, here is the recap from the Class Tournament. First of all, there was a fairly low turnout - 6 or 7 in the Master/Expert Section with a similar number in the Class A section. The "bad news" in my view being that I wasn't going to get 5 games against M/E competition; as it turned out based upon the way I was playing, this was probably a good thing. I ended up scoring 3/5 - which is what I would've considered a success if I were playing all 5 games against M/E opponents. However, this was actually 3 wins vs A players and 2 losses vs Masters - which I would consider neither good nor bad, but what one would expect based upon the ratings/strengths of the players. I guess you could say my evaluation of where I am on the path toward reaching my goals was "inconclusive." But actually, in going beyond the results and evaluating my play - or maybe more correctly, my thinking - I was not pleased. What I mean by this was that there were way too many instances where my thought process was unclear, as well as simply missing too many moves that my opponents played.

I've been giving some thought to my training plan based upon the responses I got from the Masters/Experts on this site, as well as Silman's "Reassess" book that I started, and his replies to questions in his weekly article on chess.com. Because of this, I am going to make some adjustments in my training. Basically, while tactics are important, at my level I think I am spending too much of my available training time on them and need to spend more time on the "heavy lifting" of analyzing my games and/or tabiyas that will result from my particular opening repertoire (the same could be send for endings). I will expand on this a little later, as I'm running out of time right now.

Last week, all I really did was get all my games input into my database and complete my "first review" of them where I enter all my comments / thoughts from the game.
This week, all I've been working on is analyzing a key position from my game in Round 4 - I'll post that later as well.

OK, I've been thinking about the responses I got from the M/E's on this site (w/ one more potentially to come from zibbit who was busy in a tourny when I sent my original email requesting feedback). I went back and reviewed them and would summarize as follows:

Tactics -
Obviously important, but I'm thinking that at my level, or maybe more accurately I should say to get to the NEXT level, this is not the most important thing. If time was not an issue, then sure I could do at least a couple dozen problems every single day. I mean, this is obviously beneficial. However, I don't think it is what is going to make the breakthrough to the next level.

Analysis -
Here is the key I believe. This was pretty much a consensus (I like how Dennis M put it: "breaking your head against challenging positions"). As I think about the in-depth analysis I've done of a couple positions from recent games, I can see how much better I understand those positions. So this needs to be a bigger part of my training. Also, pobble pointed out something very insightful - most of the training I've been doing up to this point has been "passive" as opposed to "active" (playing & analyzing).

Of course, this should start with the most common tabiyas from my opening repertoire and include more general understanding of the position, plans, transition into middlegame.

Opening -
1. Doing own analysis (as above) as well as finding games with analysis.
2. Reviewing latest games for current theory / creative or new ideas.
3. Playing thematic games (i.e. certain openings or variations) to gain more experience w/n them (I've actually already been doing this by playing in chess.com thematic tournys).

Middlegame / Positional understanding -
1. Books.
2. Finding games (preferably w/ analysis) that fit certain themes (e.g. certain pawn structure, weak/strong piece, etc.).
3. Feedback / Coaching

Endings -
I think this is also critical as understanding this part of the game can probably make alot of 1/2 point improvements in results. I am amazed sometimes at A and B players lack of understanding of very basic concepts in endings. Given their higher frequency, probably should focus on:
1. Rook endings.
2. Bishop vs Knight endings.

Week of May 10:

Monday -
1. Tactics. 3TT + 5CT
2. Analysis. English / Queen's Indian tabiya from recent tournament. I've spent a few hours on this thus far.
3. Correspondence Chess

Tuesday -
n/a (Board meeting)

Wednesday -
1. Correspondence Chess

Thursday -
1. Tactics. 3 TT + 5 CT
2. Opening Study.
3. Correspondence Chess.

I think the refinements you've made to your training regimen sound eminently sensible. If you keep at, I'll be shocked if you don't move up a class fairly quickly. Good luck!

It's been a while since my last update. The last couple weeks have been busy at work as I had a conference last week out of town, and the week before, and this week were busy with getting work done before leaving / catching up after returning.

My training has been less structured during these last couple weeks. Partially due to time constraints, but also I've found that I "over-committed" myself in number of correspondence games I have going on chess.com (entered too many tournaments). So, this has been helpful for reviewing openings / learning a new opening (Old Indian Defense), as well as actual game experience; but it has also prevented me from having as much time as desired to "break my head" against challenging positions and do in-depth study of key opening tabiyas from my repertoire. I'm starting to get the number of games going wittled down to a more manageable level so hopefully I can return to a more consistent level of training.

I've also managed to do periodic Tactics Training, but not every day as I was doing before. I've also tried to spend at least 15 min every day working through a book of mine on the English Opening.

Tournament Update: I had hoped to play in the one-day Game/60 tourny last Saturday, but had a couple family Bday parties on that day. There is also one of the larger tournys in the area this Memorial Day weekend, but giving up all 3 days of the weekend would not be fair for my family at this stage of life. So, the next tourny on the calendar for me will be June 19-20 and I'm already getting excited. This will be my one-year anniversary as this tourny was my first since returning to the game last year.

Yesterday (Thursday):

1. Tactics - 3TT+4CT
2. Openings (white repertoire) - 45 min, book study (Marin)

Friday - After work, the wife and I went to dinner w/ friends and hung out w/ them the rest of the evening....no training.

Saturday -
After a full day of watching movies w/ kids, working in garden, visiting family, and getting together with friends again, I spent some time after the wife went to bed working on tactics problems, and making up for missing Friday. I actually did about 15 problems and finished around 1 am. Did not do very well - was this rust from not being very consistent over the last month, or just being tired?

Sunday -
1. Morning - Openings (white repertoire) - 35 min, book study (Marin)
2. Evening - Did a few tactics problem, again not doing very well.

Monday - I have the day off today, wife is at work and kids are w/ cousins, so all is quiet at the house and I'm going to get some serious training done.
1. Tactics - Started off doing some more problems, again not as sharp as I should be. So I think this is telling me that my 44 year old brain needs a steady diet of tactics problems; at least managing to get a few in every day in order to not get fat and lazy. So, while I don't want tactics training to become too large a portion of my training as I think it was before, it is probably also equally important to make sure I am at least getting a few problems completed 5 or 6 days out of a week.