Thursday, May 31, 2007

hello brick wall, it's me again



Tactical Study:   I trained units 16-21 in PCT 2007, 200 CTS puzzles, fifty 1.c4 opening traps (twice), and a knight vision exercise (four times).

For the second week in a row, my CTS rating didn't go up--it's still hovering around 1326. Another brick wall has inexplicably appeared on the road to chess mastery. But I've climbed walls before. I will climb this one!

On the plus side, I'm solving 96% of the puzzles correctly.

Games:   I played fifteen 2+12 blitz games on FICS and annotated them.

I usually play for a winning endgame, but since reading Euwe's Master vs Amateur, I'm attacking more often in the middlegame. He says if you have a development lead, you must break open the center and attack!

My attacks often lead to a won position, but then I miss a key continuation, and suddenly my opponent's back in the game. If the game reaches an endgame I usually win, even if I'm down a couple pawns.

Life:   My family is visiting this weekend!   :)

4 comments:

hisbestfriend said...

I give this recommendation everytime someone hits a wall.

Stop doing chess for awhile. A wall often means that your brain is in a reconciliation/confusion/overconfidence process. There are a lot of reasons for this.

But stopping gives your brain the ability to work this out.

You tend to also find that it will be easier to train for awhile after the break.

Not too long, 1-2 weeks. But sleep, rest, repair. Then start training again.

transformation said...

i just spent half an hour writing you a big dk gothic comment, but now it is gone and my heart is gone....

i have techniques for not lossing my stuff, but my penchant for misspelling has me constantly googling words, and the page back ate me.

sorrow.

likesforests said...

lol. sorry about that, dk, and thanks for writing it once!

likesforests said...

hisbestfriend, I've been on break the last four days, minus a couple demonstrations for family members. Let's see what happens.