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Richard posted an update
I’m having trouble progressing from 900 -> 1000. I find two different things happening 60%-70% of the time.
1) My opponents play fast and thwart my threats and I get flagged.
2) My opponents play fast and I find a tactic and they have 20 minutes on the clock to my 5.
Bottom line, I need to play more quickly while still being accurate. This seems to be easier when I have time to play 3-4 games a day. But, when I’m only playing 1/day or perhaps 1 every other day, the above 1 and 2 generally happen when my opponent is 900 rated or above. Practicing with puzzles does help on the off days, but it’s no replacement for actual game play.
I’m considering playing blitz to warm up, instead of puzzles. But, I’m worried it will give me bad habits and I’ll actually play worse.
Another thing I’ve tried to do at levels below 900 is to try to match my opponents clock. I.e. don’t let my time go beyond 2 minutes down, when it’s not a critical position (depending on when I can tell it’s a critical position). I think I need to do more of this at the 900 level.
Does anyone have any advice?
3 Comments-
Congrats on grinding to 900 and playing longer time control games online. For time management I would recommend one or two things. 1) Try to play into openings that you know. If you know the first 8-15 moves of your opening you should have plenty of time in the middlegame. 2) Create an internal process for each turn (Nelson talks about it in his how to avoid blunder section). If you do the same process every move, you can typically get it so you won’t be taking so much time for each individual move. 3) If you know the first 5-10 moves of your opening you shouldn’t be spending too much time looking for tactics. Once you move into the middle game, only allow yourself a specific amount of time to find the tactics (1-3 minutes depending on the time control). As you get better at tactics, you’ll begin identifying patterns. But lets be honest, at 900 level the chances of you finding at tactic after staring at the board longer than 3 minutes isn’t likely. 4) For tactics I typically do 2-3 puzzles and then do timed puzzle rushes on chess.com (2-4) before playing. The main puzzles are good to train the brain, but in your games, the puzzle rush will be closer to what you will find (with a time pressure). I will also run a puzzle rush after every 4th game if I’m playing a long set. 5) Don’t worry about your opponent’s time. Spend your time finding good moves. If you are finding good moves in the middle game, you will get an advantage with an easier end game. 6) Recognize that you are going to lose games on time and just be OK with it. You should win more games by taking your time in the middle game to make the right moves than blitzing out moves. Sorry… a bit longwinded, but hope it helps.
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One thing I do as a drill is to play bots with a 10 minute or 15/10 time control. The bots always finish with like 9:30 on their clock, but It helps me work on time management.
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I try to move a little faster In very familiar territory. Then when I am In the weeds I use that time to think it through. Losing to the clock is a Bummer =)
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