QUEEN'S GAMBIT DECLINED, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING

HOW MUCH WILL YOU COMMIT?

One of the biggest factors in chess success is the extent to which someone is willing to commit. To be the best you can be at something you need to dedicate your life to it. With lower levels of commitment it's possible to become a good amateur, but you can then run this alongside having a job and family.

In my own case I managed to commit myself to chess enough to become an International Master in my early 20s, though I did not then commit to getting the Grandmaster title until my early 30s. After that I started looking for some of the normal things in life, turned to chess coaching as my main activity and had something like a normal life. Other people I know went for the job and family option much earlier, others never did! There are pros and cons to all of these options and everyone has to decide what they want for themselves.

Is there a best option? If someone has the ability to make it as a professional, there's a case for being fully committed until, say, your early 30s, and then think about alternatives after that. If you haven't made it by your 30s, the odds are against becoming a lot stronger. Some might argue that players today go downhill after their teens!

If someone doesn't have the kind of ability to become a top professional, there can still be a case for heavy chess involvement. I've been fortunate enough to visit many different countries and experience many different cultures. This would never have happened without chess, and for that I am truly grateful.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature positions from the Black Queen's Gambit Declined Repertoire, which is a very high quality repertoire played by champions:

Sunday March 23rd at 5pm UK Time: QGD Tartakower with 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Bg5 Be7 5.Nf3 h6 6.Bh4 0-0 7.e3 b6

Sunday March 23rd at 6.15pm UK Time: QGD Semi-Tarrasch with 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Nf3 c5

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley. Hopefully I can continue the good form from the World Senior Team Championships and help the team to one of the top places.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm still hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
I decided not to wait for an invite and just enter, and I've gone for the Championship itself rather than one of the old folks sections. Obviously this will be full of underrated juniors, I'll just have to play better against them this time. You can find details here.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

ARTICLES, COACHING, FRENCH DEFENCE, POSITIONAL PLAY, PSYCHOLOGY, TRAINING

HOW TO BEAT GEN CHESSABLE

One of the most dramatic changes in chess has been the advent of Gen Chessable, by which I mean the generation of players who are learning openings by repeating moves from Chessable courses. For those who have the stomach for this kind of work this can be a fast track to having very good opening play. At the same time I believe it leaves some serious weaknesses in its wake.

The major issue is that rote memorization of computer generated lines does not particularly foster a deep understanding. So if an opponent varies, players relying mainly on memorization may not be able to improvise effectively. This means that their opponents might do well to steer clear of big forcing lines in which there are long series of 'best' moves, instead they might go for less charted territory in which there are plenty of playable options.

There are quite a few suitable vehicles for this approach, mainly closed openings in which manoeuvres take place behind lines of pawns. One good example is the Eastern Clamp Sicilian in which White meets 1.e4 c5 with 2.d3 followed by 3.f4. Another is the Old Indian Defence (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 d6), which hands White some space but is almost entirely reliant on plans and understanding. Almost all the Flank Openings are eminently suitable, and I would recommend 1.g3, for example.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments return to the Eastern Clamp Sicilian, which is an excellent line for those wishing to avoid theory. The two tournaments feature the following move orders:

Sunday March 16th at 5pm UK Time: Eastern Clamp with 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.f4 d5

Sunday March 16th at 6.15pm UK Time: Eastern Clamp with 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.f4 g6

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley. Hopefully I can continue the good form from the World Senior Team Championships and help the team to one of the top places.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

ARTICLES, FRENCH DEFENCE, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING

YOUR ONLY JOB WHEN PLAYING CHESS

Students often ask me about chess psychology and how to handle various tournament situations. Actually I have a very simple answer, but it seems so simple that nobody quite believes it. I tell them that they only have one job, which is to find the next move, and they should focus on that rather than anything else.

I came to this conclusion after decades of playing myself and watching others overcomplicate matters. People go into games thinking about their rating, prizes, norms and glory, in fact everything except what really matters. Even top players manage to do this and distract themselves during key games.

There was a great example of this in the Candidates Tournament in 2013. Going into the last round Magnus Carlsen and Vladimir Kramnik were tied for first, yet they both lost their games. In the end it was Carlsen who qualified on tie break, going on to become World Champion by defeating Vishwanathan Anand. Yet it could all have ended very differrently had Kramnik not been distracted too.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature lines from the French Defence, which are give both in the French Defence course and Building an Opening Repertoire:

Sunday March 9th at 5pm UK Time: French Advance with 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.c3 Nc6 5.Nf3 Nge7

Sunday March 9th at 6.15pm UK Time: Colle vs Gruenfeld with 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.e3 d5

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley. Hopefully I can continue the good form from the World Senior Team Championships and help the team to one of the top places.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

NEWS

WORLD SENIOR TEAM CHAMPIONSHIPS

The World Senior Team Championships ended with England retaining their 65+ title but missing out on a medal in the 50+. They needed to beat Kazakhstan in the last round to get bronze, but finished with a 2-2 draw. This meant that England 2, where I was playing board 1, even caught them on match points.

I personally managed to score and unbeaten 7/9, gaining around 15 rating points. My improved performance was largely down to concentration and calculation training, the unexpected part of which is solving Shogi Tsume puzzles. The concentration required with these seems to have jolted my brain out of atrophy, I found myself calculating surprisingly well and gained confidence as a result.

In last week's newsletter I suggested that the powerful US team were favourites, and in the end they managed to pip Italy at the post to get gold. Meanwhile the Kazakhstan team got bronze, had they beaten England 1 in the last round they would have been the champions.

There has been some controversy over the selections for the 50+ first team, but I think they made sense at the time and the team played pretty well. Note that the powerful Iceland team also faltered, despite excellent previous results in these events.
 

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature another two lines from the Building an Opening Repertoire course, this time from White's perspective:

Sunday March 2nd at 5pm UK Time: Colle vs KID with 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.e3 d6

Sunday March 2nd at 6.15pm UK Time: Colle vs Gruenfeld with 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.e3 d5

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I finally got confirmation that I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

BUILDING AN OPENING REPERTOIRE, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING

WHAT MAKES A GOOD TEAM?

At the time of writing I'm at the World Senior Team Championships in Prague, playing top board for the England 50+ second team. We don't have a realistic chance of a medal, so there's a more relaxed atmosphere than in the first team. The event is also becoming stronger, newcomers this time round being a Kazakhstan men's and women's team.

What makes a good team? First off it's having good players, all other things being equal the best team will have the best chance of winning. Above and beyond that it does help to have players who get on with each other and are motivated to get the best possible result for the team. I think this explains how Kazakhstan and India have outperformed in recent Olympiads, they were teams of young players who were highly motivated, and this can offset minor differences in strength.

Who will win this year's Senior 50+ Championship? I think that the powerful US team has to be the favourite, but the Kazakhstan men's team is also in with a shot. They seem highly motivated and well prepared, which goes a very long way. This time next week we'll know if I am right.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments return to a couple of lines from the Building an Opening Repertoire Course:

Sunday February 23rd at 5pm UK Time: QGD Meran with 5.e3 Bd6

Sunday February 23rd at 6.15pm UK Time: QGD with 5.Bg5 Be7

My Upcoming Events


Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I finally got confirmation that I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

MIDDLEGAMES, OPENINGS, POSITIONAL PLAY, TIGER CHESS THEMED TRAINING TOURNAMENTS, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING

THE EASTERN CLAMP ANTI-SICILIAN

This week I published a first series of videos on of a new set of 1.e4 openings for White. I had previously balked at the idea of doing so as I felt that 1.e4 was too chaotic to allow the assimilation of positional ideas and too theoretical for amateurs to play with confidence. I changed my mind after discovering 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.f4, which I've dubbed The Eastern Clamp Anti-Sicilian. 

What's the idea behind this line? There are several. In the late 1980s I used to play 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.g3 in order to get a Closed Sicilian but without White's knight on c3. However I struggled against 3...d5 4.Nd2 Nf6 5.Bg2 e5 6.Ngf3 Be7; White's position is playable here but he's certainly not better. Reluctantly I gave it up and started using 1.d4 and Flank Openings instead, but I wish I'd taken a closer look at 3.f4. Yuri Balashov, a Closed Sicilian aficionado, was already playing this in the 1980s and it was also being advocated by Mikhail Shereshevsky, a famous coach. White takes central space, and the onus is on Black to try and offset this somehow.

From an amateur's perspective the advantage of this line is that it does not require a lot of theoretical knowledge, or any updates of such knowledge on an ongoing basis. It can be played mainly with ideas and plans, and the one sharp line looks rather dubious for Black. There are other low maintainance lines with 1.e4 and I will be covering more of these over the coming months. As an example, the Caro-Kann (1.e4 c6 2.d3 d5) can be met with 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3, the strategically clear Exchange Variation.
 

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature the Eastern Clamp Anti-Sicilian, with two major branches from Black:

Sunday February 16th at 5pm UK Time: Eastern Clamp Anti-Sicilian with 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.f4 d5

Sunday February 16th at 6.15pm UK Time: Eastern Clamp Anti-Sicilian with 1.e4 c5 2.d3 Nc6 3.f4 g6

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

February 16-27, 2025: World Senior Team Championship
I've accepted a place in the 50+ second team which means I'll play a much stronger field than on bottom board of the first team. Although this diminishes my chances of winning a medal I'm looking forward to the challenge.

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I finally got confirmation that I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley.

April 24-28 2025: English Senior Championships

I'm hoping to be invited to these and may now be eligible for either section. You can find details here. 

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

OPENINGS, TACTICS, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING, Uncategorized

ENERGY, FOCUS & CALCULATION SKILLS

It was good to see that Arjun Erigaisi recovered somewhat in the Tata Steel Masters, in the process inflicting the first defeat on Gukesh Dommaraju in a classical game, since he became World Champion. I'm quite sure that this will be just a blip on a great career for Erigaisi, that might well include becoming World Champion himself.

I have been looking at some Erigaisi games of late, partially in an attempt to understand the young generation players who almost effortlessly storm the ranks. From what I can tell they bring together a potent combination of energy, focus and calculating skills. If you play against a good calculator you are under tremendous pressure to avoid mistakes, one slip can be the end of you.

One of Erigaisi's interesting choices on the opening has been the ZOOM Scandinavian, and a couple of his games appeared in the webinar devoted to the Tigerchess.com Themed Training Tournaments. I think he sees it as a line that gets White thinking early on, with the pawn structure offering him chances to outplay his opponent. This series is on special offer this week and it also features in the training tournamets.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature the French Defence, and the basic positions in the Classical and Tarrasch Variations:

Sunday February 9th at 5pm UK Time: ZOOM Scandinavian with 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qd6 4.d4 Nf6 5.Nf3 g6

Sunday February 9th at 5pm UK Time: ZOOM Scandinavian with 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.d4 Nc6

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

February 16-27, 2025: World Senior Team Championship
I've accepted a place in the 50+ second team which means I'll play a much stronger field than on bottom board of the first team. Although this diminishes my chances of winning a medal I'm looking forward to the challenge.

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship

I finally got confirmation that I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley.

July 31st - 10th August 2025: British Championships
These have now been confirmed for Liverpool on these dates, you can find details here. If I get invited to play in the main Championships, I'll probably accept. Otherwise I'm eligible for both the 50+ and 65+ sections, and should have a chance of doing well in either.

There will probably be at least one or two events between April and the end of July, it's important to keep playing in order to maintain good form.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

FRENCH DEFENCE, OPENINGS, PSYCHOLOGY, TRAINING

KEEPING A DIARY

I've seen lots of comment about Arjun Erigaisi's disappointing result in the Tata Steel Masters event. I agree with Magnus Carlsen's comments, that it's probably best not to read too much into it. I might add that having not had much experience of these top level events he might have been a bit disorientated.

This is where keeping a journal can prove its worth, by reflecting upon how you are playing you gain much greater insight than just going from tournament to tournament. Bob Wade advised me to do this back in the 1980s, and had a specific set of protocols for a chess player's tournament diary. I discuss these in A Practical Tournament Guide, which is discounted this week.

I kept a reflective diary, and made notes to my games, in the years leading up to gaining the GM title in 1993. Since then I have downscaled this activity, but I still write down concerns I have during tournaments, and what I might do to address them.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature the French Defence, and the basic positions in the Classical and Tarrasch Variations:

Sunday February 2nd at 5pm UK Time: French Classical with 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6

Sunday February 2nd at 6.15pm UK Time: French Tarrasch with 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 c5

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

February 16-27, 2025: World Senior Team Championship
I've accepted a place in the 50+ second team which means I'll play a much stronger field than on bottom board of the first team. Although this diminishes my chances of winning a medal I'm looking forward to the challenge.

April 4-14 2025: European Senior Team Championship
I finally got confirmation that I'll be in the 50+ 1st team, apparently on board 3 of a team that includes Michael Adams, John Emms, myself, Steve Dishman and Graeme Buckley.

July/August 2025: British Championships
Will these be held in Liverpool next year or maybe Torquay? I've heard rumours about both venues, if they're held in Liverpool I'd probably go for the 50+ event.

Here's one event which I'd have liked to play in if there was time:

February 5-10, 2025: Senta, Hotel Fantastico: Details can be found here.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered), the Webinar on training tournaments and games is up on Fridays and another weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

TIGER CHESS THEMED TRAINING TOURNAMENTS, TOURNAMENTS, TRAINING

Can Shogi Help Your Chess?

I've recently being learning the Japanese game of Shogi, along with my wife. We were given a set as a Christmas present and both found it fascinating. Some of the pieces move similarly to Western chess, but there are also huge differences. I am struggling with fluently recognizing the pieces, but I guess this is a question of time.

One interesting question is whether playing Shogi can help chess players improve? Alexander Nikitin also played Go with the young Garry Kasparov and claimed it played an important role in his understanding of strategy. An interesting analogy is that there are reported benefits to learning a second language, in that it can help improve someone's first language. A second language particularly targets areas such as reading, speaking and expressing ideas, as well as having more general benefits on memory, concentration and problem solving. This would make an interesting case for secondary board games helping your chess, there will be more general benefits as well as some that are specific to board game thinking.

Have I experience any benefit from Shogi as yet? It's too early to say, and learning Shogi has coincided with other measures I've been taking. My concentration seems have improved lately after having had it waver over recent years. It's a work in progress and I'm a self-reporting sample of one, but I think Shogi worth trying.

If you're interested in learning Shogi I suggest joining Lishogi.org, a Shogi version of Lichess.org. I've been diving into the tsume section with unspectacular results, but like everything it's a question of practice.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments feature the Dutch Defence with 3.e3 and then 3...e6 or 3...g6:

Sunday January 26th at 5pm UK Time: Dutch with 1.d4 f5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e3 e6

Sunday January 26th at 6.15pm UK Time: Dutch with 1.d4 f5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.e3 g6

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

January 26th: Stockport Rapidplay
I've played in this event with some regularity, so probably I'll go for it again. You can find details here.

February 16-27, 2025: World Senior Team Championship
I've accepted a place in the 50+ second team which means I'll play a much stronger field than on bottom board of the first team. Although this diminishes my chances of winning a medal I'm looking forward to the challenge.

July/August 2025: British Championships
Will these be held in Liverpool next year or maybe Torquay? I've heard rumours about both venues, if they're held in Liverpool I'd probably go for the 50+ event.

I'm still waiting to get a firm offer to play in the European Senior Team Championships (Poland, April 4-14). I've heard that I'll be offered a place in the 50+ first time, which I'll take if it happens in the next day or two.

Meanwhile I missed out on these two events, both of which I'd have liked to play in if there was time:

January 24-31, 2025: HIT Open in Nova Gorica: Details can be found here.

February 5-10, 2025: Senta, Hotel Fantastico: Details can be found here.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered) and other weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

ENDGAMES, OPENINGS, TACTICS, TRAINING

KNOWING YOUR STRENGTHS

One of the most useful bits of information a chess player can have is to know their strengths. These may not always be what you think they are, for example I used to think that the Modern Defence (1...g6 against either 1.e4 or 1.d4) was my friend until I checked my results with it. They were good against opponents who were lower rated than me but horrible against stronger opposition.

A different breakdown was apparent with more classical openings such as the Nimzo-Indian Defence and meeting 1.e4 with 1...e5. This in turn suggested that using the Modern more sparingly, and choosing to play it against particular opponents, would yield better results.

More recently I have been doing tactics and endgame puzzles with a couple of apps from ChessOK and my discovered that my results with the endgame app are markedly better. There are unanswered questions here, for example in how these apps have been calibrated and whether they compare like with like. Assuming they have been, for example by testing them on different users, then my endgame knowledge appears to be a relative strength.

It is important to get an objective measure such as the two I have outlined. It's tempting, for example, for us to imagine being a great attacking players because of a fond memory of a successful attack or deriving pleasure from aggressive play. An objective measure of having a skill for this kind of play might be far more difficult and should probably start with having superior tactical ability and outperforming in openings which lead to the possession of the initiative, even at the cost of material.

Training Tournaments

This week's training tournaments return to the King's Indian Petrosian, which is a great line for learning more about pawn structures with a closed centre:

Sunday January 19th at 5pm UK Time: Queen's Gambit Accepted, Furman Variation

Sunday January 19th at 6.15pm UK Time: Queen's Gambit Accepted, 4...Bg4

My Upcoming Events

Here's my schedule over the coming months, though it is subject to change. I often don't know until fairly late in the day:

January 17-19: Huddersfield 4NCL Congress
I really enjoy the 4NCL Congresses as they're played under excellent conditions in nice hotels. This is the first one in Huddersfield, you can find details here.

January 27th: Stockport Rapidplay
I've played in this event with some regularity, so probably I'll go for it again. You can find details here.

February 16-27, 2025: World Senior Team Championship
I've accepted a place in the 50+ second team which means I'll play a much stronger field than on bottom board of the first team. Although this diminishes my chances of winning a medal I'm looking forward to the challenge.

July/August 2025: British Championships
Will these be held in Liverpool next year or maybe Torquay? I've heard rumours about both venues, if they're held in Liverpool I'd probably go for the 50+ event.

I'm still waiting to hear about the selections for the European Senior Team Championships (Poland, April 4-14) in which I've said I'll play in any team and on any board. I've been holding these dates open since July last year and have been hoping to hear something definite. Perhaps I will get an offer soon or maybe some other tournaments will come my way.

Meanwhile I missed out on these two events:

January 24-31, 2025: HIT Open in Nova Gorica: Details can be found here.

February 5-10, 2025: Senta, Hotel Fantastico: Details can be found here.

Twitch Channel

My new Twitch channel has new shows every Monday ('Chess Questions Answered) and other weekly coming soon. Please follow it if you'd like to get updates etc, all the shows will be available to Premium members in the Tiger Chess members area, even when they are no longer available on Twitch.

Have a good weekend.

Nigel

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