Simian's Chess Chatter: Praxis Practice 1

I'm about half-way through Fred Reinfeld's "1001 Winng Chess Sacrifices and Combinations" for the first time now, so about 100 problems attempted once, 100 attempted and reviewed, 100 attempted and reviewed twice...

In practice (by which I mean unrated 2 12 blitz games... hmmm...) it's starting to work; I see the board better, I find some tactics, and when I have winning positions I can find 'finishing' moves. I'm not really winning games so much as being able to capitalise on my opponent's mistakes - in part due to the policy of setting my hair on fire - but the results are starting to appear on the scoreboard.

It's time to move the practical side of this excercise to the next level. The next step is to start playing some rated blitz games, the longish ones that real blitzers hate, so i'll start seeking with 5 12 time controls which is about equivalent to a 15 minute rapid game. This sort of game gives you the opportunity to spend a couple of minutes looking at the critical positions, then blitz on your increments with some understanding of what's going on and a general plan to follow.

One chronic weakness I still have is that while I'm seeing more things I can do, I still miss even simple tactics my opponents can play. One technique I used to overcome this a few years ago was to 'flip' the board - this is not the same thing as 'looking for the penny under the board' when you're losing!

Playing Internet Chess, we become conditioned to play up the board with our pieces starting at the bottom of the screen and theirs starting at the top. Flipping the board and playing top-to-bottom is surprisingly disconcerting, it becomes much easier to get into your opponent's position but proportionally harder to find your own moves. I'll use this technique in 2 12 unrated games to break that psychological barrier.

I'll need to start playing some shortish standard games soon too - minimum 30 30, and at least a couple of those a week. I'll start imposing on some of my Current Affairs team mates soon, when I don't feel like I'm completely wasting their time blundering around.