Over the last few days I've been using Chess Tactics Exam. I finished the whole book and have calculated my results. I also took this test a few years back (2008 or 2009, I think) so I have a basis for comparison. I don't think I remembered the problems so far on so the new result should be valid. Here are the results.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/53253458@N ... hotostream

Some comments:
As you can see, I've gone up by around 200 points overall. I was pleased with this, but obviously it can still get much better!
I have hugely improved my opening tactics. I think the main reason for this is GM Boris Altermann's Gambit Guide!
The tactics I'm missing are often defensive. I need to lnot give up if a position initially looks bad and look for resources to force a draw!
I should study more deflection tactics.
The one result which really surprised me was the Entering Standard Endgame result. My knowledge of endings is better than ever so I shouldn't be missing these opportunities. Maybe this is a product of knowing it's a tactics puzzle and pushing for an immediate win.

An interesting exercise. Let me know what you think!

Score (2009) Score (2011) Out of Rating (2009) Category (2009) Rating (2011) Category (2011)
Overall 362 408 600 1620 B 1809 A

Type of Combination
Attack 221 250 330 1695 B 2029 Expert
Defence 141 158 270 1472 C 1631 B

Phase
Opening 76 109 120 1516 C 2210 Master
Middlegame 155 158 260 1628 B 1700 B
Endgame 131 141 220 1740 B 1905 A

Motivation
Advanced Pawn 20 35 55 1089 E 1692 B
BR Mate 43 35 70 1787 B 1423 C
Mating Net 47 65 95 1435 C 1842 A
Misplaced Piece 130 148 190 1748 B 2022 Expert
Simplification 45 37 85 1497 C 1332 D
Lack of Protection 77 87 105 1950 A 2156 Expert

Objective
Checkmate 64 78 125 1446 C 1672 B
Promote Pawn 25 48 70 1098 E 1884 B
Win Material 209 245 295 1756 B 2130 Expert
Get Std. Ending 26 11 35 2100 Expert 1330 D
Forcing Draw 38 26 75 1634 B 1262 D

Theme
Decoy 82 97 160 1507 C 1643 B
Clearance 56 59 90 1688 B 1784 B
Remove Guard 41 58 85 1453 C 1888 A
Deflection 115 124 225 1439 C 1500 C
Discovery 82 79 125 1764 B 1739 B
Double Attack 82 95 155 1509 C 1620 B
Zwichenzug 146 156 240 1731 B 1814 A
Interference 29 56 80 1232 D 2052 Expert
Pin 100 126 160 1620 B 2144 Expert
Skewer 39 53 80 1307 D 1810 A
Trap 46 48 70 1720 B 1808 A

Result
Win 323 374 515 1600 B 1906 A
Draw 39 34 85 1498 C 1266 D

Crpytic ^^
SO, this is from the Chess Exam book or sth you can do online ? Looks interesting

In 2009 you scored 2100 in the category of Entering Standard Endgame, so from 2100 ==> 1330 in 2011. I note that the "Standard Endgame" score has only 35 points possible, the fewest in the entire test.

I think the exercise book and scores should be taken with a grain of salt. It is also multiple-choice A-D, so a blind monkey will score 25% overall and might even do fairly well in a limited category as a result of chance alone.

You are clearly improving and that is the important thing though.

EDIT: Amazing that it puts you at 1809 ELO, which seems equivalent to your rating "in real life".

GW,

Unfortunately CVTV has taken away my formatting. Very annoying! See the post before for a photo.

See my reply to Katar for a link to the book.

Yes, I noticed this too. The ones with most significant value are the ones I listed towards the top. I think the attack vs. defence thing shows something important in the way my tactical mind is developing- I look for aggression and am a good front runner but when my position is worse I have not been doing so well recently. I think this is becasue I'm a bit obsessed with playing something perfect from start to finish and lose interest. After all, they have played better so they 'deserve' to win. This is an attitude I'm trying to eliminate.


The original "chess exam" was excellent at this job IMO. Get it. such an easy way to assess your own strengths and weaknesses!

http://www.amazon.com/Chess-Exam-Traini ... gy_b_img_b

How's your training been? Haven't seen a post in a while.

I have moved to China for my new job and at the moment I am concentrating on that. I hope to resume my studies soon...

Awesome! How's your new job going?

The new job is going great! I'm teaching at an International School in China (English for now, but will be Physics come February!) I'm working hard, but the kids are responding well to my lessons and I'm enjoying life.

Chess update:

I've moved to China and I've not had much time for chess. I've had to shelve my idea of making a video on my opening repertoire. I just don't know enough to present videos for others and I don't have the books or time to learn them properly. I'm concentrating what little time I have for chess on playing games for fun and watching videos. Having been to China before, I know that opportunities to play chess will be severely limited. I am living just over an hour (by bullet train) from Shanghai where there is a club but it's not really practical to get there. Maybe for a tournament some time if such things exist here but so far I can only find top international competitions!

I'm playing on ICC now and am playing some decent blitz and my rating is going up. Here's one of my latest games: a 5 min played against a 1563 rated opponent.



Other than that, I'm following Joel Benjamin's course on isolated pawns. I'm hoping to educate myself on the middlegame in a fun and painless way! I only managed to bring a few books with me to China and they're mostly endgame books. If I get time, that's where I'll devote most of my serious study.

Well, it's been a long time since I posted in my training journal, so what's new?

I'm playing chess again (at least if online chess can be called "chess") and I think overall I'm playing pretty well! Just now I finished a simple win in some kind of weird Sicilian. In fact, I dominated an opponent who was meant to be around 80 elo above me (and I'm already at an all-time high of 1750). Now I've known for wuite some time that I should be playing around the 1800 level, it's just that I'm only now getting around to proving it. Hope I don't get investigated for computer use, because I played Komodo's first choice moves for the whole game up to the point where I was winning!

I'm watching quite a few chess videos and am playing quite a bit on ICC, but have neglected books. I really want to be studying the endgame but openings always seem to distract me!

Talking of openings, I've taken on a whole new approach as black: playing in a very classical way! That means replying to 1.e4 and 1.c4 with 1...e5 and 1.d4 and 1.Nf3 with 1...d5. The way someone like Morphy would have. The reason for this is that I feel I understand the ideas behind those openings much easier than something like the Siclian. However, I'm not going totally 'Morphy'. Against the Ruy Lopez, I've chosen the Janisch (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 f5!?) which I feel goes hand-in-hand with my coice of the Vienna Gambit as white (1.e4 e5 2.Nc3 Nf6 (Nc6) 3.f4!?). Against the Italian I have chosen to follow the 2 Knights mainline rather than Katar's Urasov line or whatever it's called. All other openings I am playing the 'Katar' black repertoire. I always have the Sicilian as my backup!

In terms of videos, I want to correct my last post- it's John Watson's course on isolated pawns (not Joel Benjamin) and it's called 'Beyond the Opening'. I'm nearly up to date, having watched most of the series. So far, he's covered pawn chains (5 lecutures, watched them all), doubled pawns (10 lecutres, watched about 4), isolated pawns (15? lectures, watched them all) and the centre (3 lectures so far, watched them all). It's great light viewing and I think I'm understanding pawn strucutre better than before I started watching so hurrah! Of course, I'm also keeping up with Dennis' videos and am currently going through his Quick Ruy Lopez series which is currently on the Janisch which obviously fits in well with the new repertoire! Other than that, I am watching Steve Farmer's annotated games from the US chess league, along with a few other videos from other posters.

I think I'll go make a video on my last few 'longplay' games of chess and will post resulting video here. Stay tuned!

Awww, this warms my heart. Janisch gambit and 2knights are totally Morphy-style! Party like it's 1859. One can easily argue these are more intuitive or more practical than the lines i covered in my video series.

Hope you will continue to give updates on how you are getting on.

Cheers Katar.

At the beginning of the week I was at around 1750 ICC standard, 1750 ChessTempo std and 1720 blitz. I set myself the target of reaching 1775 ICC and CT standard and hav managed to make 1800 in both and also 1775 in CT blitz. Calculation and tactics definitely used to be the worst part of my game, but I am really coming along recently

Tactics training aside, I have scored 12.5/15 in my most recent ICC games against I would guess 1700 opposition, and I see no real obstacles through to 1850 or 1900. Add some study to that and who knows, maybe I can go back to England in a year's time playing at 2000 (ICC) level!

Next up for me is to annotate those 15 games (I have already looked at them briefly) and use them to pick out my relative strengths and weaknesses. Hopefully I will make a video on them.