Chessable is always improving and evolving. Building it has always been a product of passion and love for chess and chess education. Moreover, listening to our users is one of our top priorities, and as a result, we have a product that might change all the time!
Therefore if we were to release an update every time there was something new, you might just get tired of hearing from us! However, this summer many awesome things have happened so I thought I’d write a quick post showcasing the latest features. Let’s start with the newest.
The new opening explorer will show you winning and drawing percentages based on a database of millions of quality chess games (thanks to TWIC for building up such a collection of valuable PGNs). You can see this information for the first five moves, beyond that its fully unlocked if you are a PRO member. The opening explorer is in v1, and we already have planned improvements for v2 which will allow you to sort by variations in Chessable or Games in Database, whichever you want. As a bonus, the performance and speed of the explorer have been improved for everyone, and you will notice it is now much faster and better than before.
E-mail notifications
We have improved our e-mail notification system so that now you will also receive an e-mail if you people respond to a comment of yours (including book authors). To make it even better, we allow authors to opt-in to notifications on comments on variations or books they have published, so that it is easier for them to respond to your comments or queries. Of course, you can disable these notifications any time via the subscription settings page here.
After the release of 100 Endgames You Must Know we had multiple requests for an analysis board where you could check out various moves and analyse them. We listened to your feedback and released a first version of our analysis board a couple of weeks ago. As a slightly technical note, this allowed us to start using Vue.js as a technology on Chessable. Vue allows for a better user experience and we hope to soon implement it in other key areas of the site.
We’ve also had a chance to improve the import a PGN page which desperately needed a face lift, together with some functionality improvements. You can now copy and paste your PGN text, or drag and drop a file to the field selector.
We try and keep a list of updates in our FAQ, you can find it here, however, not everything we do makes it on to it. One thing is for sure though, you can expect more and more updates and Chessable should get better and better as time goes by. Stay tuned and thanks for using Chessable!
I was doing market research when some data jumped out at me, and an awesome idea was born. What if the biggest chess sites were part of an epic game of Risk? Oh, what a mighty battle that would be. I went down the rabbit hole.
This map shows that the chess playing market is dominated by two behemoths, Chess.com and Lichess.org. Chess24 has bravely held some territories but looks set to lose out should some key contested areas not go their way.
Like in a true game of Risk, both Chess.com and Lichess.org hold strongholds in their capital countries. The game of Risk is said to have been originally invented by a French filmmaker in 1957. Similarly, Lichess.org was too born in the country of love, started by a passionate French developer. Therefore, France remains the stronghold of Lichess.org with a commanding presence, outranking Chess.com by over 25%.
Chess.com, which was started by two high-energy American entrepreneurs, has made the most of their capital country. They out-rank Lichess.org in the United States by almost 65%! This advantage has led to their domination of the entire North American continent. They must be getting a seriously awesome army bonus for controlling a whole continent!
Finally, Chess24’s capital is Germany, and despite a strong presence, it is just not enough to tip the scales. They are the first player in this awesome game of Risk (or Risiko) to lose their capital.
If this were a true game of Risk, which side would you pick? Where would you send more troops? What key territories would you be aiming for? Let us know via Twitter @chessable and join in the fun!
Methodology
The top three most popular chess sites according to Alexa.com were picked.
Countries were awarded to players if their Alexa.com rank in that country was at least 10% better than the others.
Alexa ranks were accessed on June 7th, 2017
Some countries had no data available, even with our premium albeit still rubbish access to Alexa.
Disclaimer
This is just for fun. We endorse no one and love all these sites equally as much; we think they are all awesome in their own way. If you haven’t yet, claim your free Chessable account today!
At the end of last year, I admitted that to improve my own game I needed to learn things beyond the opening. I promised all of you that Chessable would release something to make this possible. However, chess is such a complex game that there will always be many things to learn. We had to narrow it down. We wanted something not yet out there and that would be really useful to chess players of all ratings.
In one of my favourite books, Think Like a Grandmaster, Alexander Kotov writes that “playing the ending well is a mark of the good player, and it is no accident that all the world champions have been noted for this ability”. While this classic book is now perhaps a bit dated, things haven’t changed all that much. The current world champion Magnus Carlsen is well known to outclass most of his opponents during the endgame. Despite this, as De la Villa noted in 2008, there is a tendency for players to neglect this important part of chess. I’ve been guilty of that and lost many half and full-points both online and over the board. Therefore, it seemed logical that we needed to change how improving chess players go about their endgame training. Enter Jesus de la Villa, New in Chess, and their wonderful book 100 Endgames You Must Know.
So what’s new? Why is learning endgames with Chessable better than with a print book and a chess board? Well, De la Villa listed many excuses on why players neglect endgames. It seems appropriate to start with these concerns, and how Chessable changes the picture:
Excuse #1: ‘Studying the endgame is boring.’
No longer does this have to be the case. Endgames are perfectly suited to the Chessable learning method. You can compete in the leaderboards, gain awesome badges, and build up your streak. By making learning fun, we hope to help you gain the motivation necessary to “pay your dues to the endgame as all the greats have done” (De la Villa).
Excuse #2: ‘Half (if not 90%) of the endings I look at are quickly forgotten.’
Chessable’s spaced repetition algorithm will make sure you review at optimal points backed by learning science. Once you’ve started to retain the material, our system will quiz you less and less. Once you know them, you won’t have to review more than once every few months, if at all. Quickly forgotten? More like forever remembered!
Excuse #3: ‘I can’t find a book with good explanations’
De la Villa’s book is one of the most recognised endgame books out there. It’s extremely well written and organised content resonates with many. The author just has a knack for explaining endgames. All the original explanations have been imported with the Chessable digital format. Of course, you can also use our new version alongside the print book. If you choose to do so, for the first time be able to keep track of your progress other than via bookmarks!
Other than addressing these typical excuses, we’ve also made sure to go above and beyond that. Now, there really should be no reasons why someone doesn’t study the endgame:
The Book is Supported by 6-men Endgame Tablebases
This allows Chessable to know all possible solutions to the endgames presented by De la Villa. We’ve taken certain alternative variations and common blunders and added them as their own endgames. In this manner, you can commit everything that’s important to memory.
Alternative Moves Feature Released
We made and released a special feature. Alternative moves allow you to play a different move to the text move without penalising you. This means that if Re2 and Re8 achieve the same thing, and you play the alternative, the system will recognise this and refresh your timer so that you have enough time to recall the text move.
Aside from everything we have already done, as always, we will be listening to your feedback and improving things to make it all even better. Enjoy!
PS.- To celebrate International Chess Day, tomorrow, New in Chess have been very kind to run a one-week sale for $14.99 instead of the retail price of $19.99. Don’t miss out. Check out this awesome book now.
While this may not be the most exciting of updates we have had, we are nonetheless quite happy to announce it! We have new and shiny: terms of service, privacy policy and a checkout/payment gateway. Now that they are finally here, they will facilitate the growth of Chessable to achieve our next set of milestones. Spoiler alert: we want to treat you with great chess content made easy to learn by using the Chessable learning system!
For the terms and privacy, we kept our users in mind at every step of the way. We also followed the best practices listed at https://tosdr.org/ to make sure we were doing the best we can for you. Our lawyers understood our concerns, and we think our new terms reflect that we care about our users first and foremost. What’s more, we’ve provided a running summary in plain English! We know some of us may feel a tad overwhelmed by the language of the law. Please do review these documents as they apply every time you access the site. If you have any questions or concerns, please e-mail us at hello@chessable.com
Today we’ve also released a new payment gateway. We partnered up with Stripe as our new primary payment partner. This allows us to give you the best customer service possible, even better than with our previous partners. For some of you, it may be that some payment methods you have gotten used to (e.g. bank transfer) may temporarily be unavailable. We are sorry about that, and we do plan to increase our payments accepted in the future. Initially, we are launching with Visa, Mastercard, American Express and Paypal. Another big plus of this update is that we can now accept payments in British Pound Sterling (GBP) and Euros (EUR). Shortly, we may support more local currencies. In the shopping cart, simply use the currency converter at the top right of the page. US dollars remain our primary currency. For all other currencies, there may be a slight mark up due to exchange fees. You are free to switch back to USD if it works out cheaper/better. Our system will remember your preferences. We wanted to give you more choice, more flexibility.
Now that these important updates are out of the way, we are going to crack on working on something more exciting. We promise you’ll love some of the stuff we’ve got coming up!
Congratulations are in order for user Bumblebee! Over the weekend, he became the very first Chessable member to get the awesome “Legend” badge. The badge is awarded to members who reach 10,000,000 points (whew!).
This is quite the achievement. To put it in perspective, I am the very first Chessable member and had a couple of years head start. I am still about 5,000,000 points behind Bumblebee! Incredible.
To celebrate the occasion, we made a very special one of a kind badge. We called it “The One and Only” and Bumblebee is the proud owner of it. Since we truly love all of our members, there might be another badge or two, but they won’t be quite what this one is.
I briefly caught up with Bumblebee, and I can share with you that he is a casual chess player who purely plays unrated games. He loves studying chess openings on Chessable as he enjoys outplaying his opponents from the get-go. It was a bit surprising to me that he doesn’t play chess competitively. Instead he just enjoys learning what Chessable’s masters have to teach in their books. Presumably, he then plays an unrated game or two like a PRO! Therefore, while we don’t have a rating to share with you, this is what Bumblebee had to say about his progress:
“My inaccuracies, mistakes, blunders, and centipoint loss have fallen. I do think I have improved my feel of the game with a better understanding of undermining, pawn breaks, and weak squares.”
Bumblebee is indeed thinking of joining a chess club soon and getting a rating. We look forward to that day (please do write to us with an update Bumblebee!). We think you’ll absolutely rock your local chess club. Keep going!
What are the best chess books ever written? We asked ten titled players this question and this article will share their answers. Because of the open-ended nature of the question, we received an interesting variety of responses.
Let’s jump right into the books and see what the masters had to say about them.
Timeless Classics
Chess books have been around for a long time. Although the quality of the books vary as they do in any genre, there have been a few that have endured through the years and prove to be both educational and entertaining for those who study them. The books in this section fit into this category.
The books are listed in alphabetical order. I have put the player who nominated each book in parentheses after each title.
Chess Fundamentals by Jose Raul Capablanca (GM Nigel Davies)
How to Think like a Grandmaster and Play Like a Grandmaster by Alexander Kotov (IM Levon Altounian)
Ideas Behind the Chess Openings by Reuben Fine (GM Nigel Davies)
Lasker’s Manual of Chess by Emanual Lasker (GM Nigel Davies)
My System by Aaron Nimzowitsch (FM Daniel Barrish)
These books illustrated many concepts devoid of some of the complexity of modern chess brought about by decades of theory and computer analysis. This makes them ideal material for instructive purposes.
GM Nigel Davies
For example, commenting on Chess Fundamentals:
“One of the most lucid explanations of certain aspects of chess strategy.”
~GM Nigel Davies
Besides the clarity of instruction in these books, these were the pioneers of chess strategy as we know it. Books like My System by Nimzowitsch explained and built upon strategic concepts that were in their early stages of development and refinement. The fact that these concepts are still valid today are proof of the value of these books.
FM Daniel Barrish was influenced greatly by Nimzowitsch. In his recommendation of My System, Mr. Barrish writes: “A common choice – one of the first books I read and probably the most influential. It’s a classic that was revolutionary at the time and which defines and explains basic positional principles in a lucid manner.”
Similarly, IM Levon Altounian had high praise for the works of Alexander Kotov: “Likely the first book ever written that deals with finding candidate moves, dealing with psychological mistakes, time management and multi-level plan creation. All written in a very easy to understand way thanks to Kotov being a part time reporter at his time.”
These chess books have been the foundation for generations of chess players and I suspect will continue to be so for those wise enough to mine the treasures within these works.
Quests for Improvement
Our next selection of books features books that are reflections from players’ attempts to improve their play. I think these books hold a special place in the hearts of players because they often relate to our own attempts to get better at the royal game.
Amateur to IM by Jonathon Hawkins (IM John Bartholomew)
Lessons with a Grandmaster by Boris Gulko and Joel Sneed (GM Rafael Leitão)
The Seven Deadly Chess Sins by Jonathon Rowson (GM Alex Colovic and IM John Bartholomew)
With The Seven Deadly Chess Sins, Rowson investigates in a fascinating way why players lose games. As IM John Bartholomew notes, “GM Jonathan Rowson delves in to the psychological side of chess. Fascinating.”
IM John Bartholomew
Moments of empathy and understanding between author and reader occur often, as these players share their own struggles along with their triumphs as they ascend the chess ladder. For example, referring to Amateur to IM:
“Engrossing, honest read. IM Hawkins describes his path to becoming a strong player. Interestingly, the vast majority of the book is on endgames.”
~IM John Bartholemew
In Lessons with a Grandmaster, the co-authors share the relationship of teacher and student, as the grandmaster, Boris Gulko, instructs his student, Dr. Sneed, through deeply annotated games where student questions master. The effectiveness of this approach is the reason for its appeal to GM Rafael Leitão: “Brilliant idea for a book. Extremely helpful to understand chess better.”
Biographical Game Collections
Chess is about the personalities of its great players as well as about the positions and moves on the board. The following books were chosen I think not only because of the great games and commentary from some of the greatest players ever, but also because of the fascinating (and in one case tragic) lives that these players led. The fact that chess has produced so many interesting figures explains in part the size of this particular list.
Baloven Kaissi (in Russian) by Max Euwe and Lodewijk Prins (GM Alex Colovic)
Chess Duels by Yasser Seirawan (IM Christof Sielecki)
My 60 Memorable Games by Bobby Fischer (GM Alex Colovic)
My Best Games by Anatoly Karpov (IM Levon Altounian)
My Great Predecessors (series) by Garry Kasparov (GM Rafael Leitão and IM Christof Sielecki)
My Life and Games by Mikhail Tal (IM Levon Altounian, IM John Bartholemew, and IM Christof Sielecki)
My Life, Games, and Compositions by Pal Benko and Jeremy Silman (WGM Jennifer Shahade)
GM Alex Colovic
Being able to grasp the inner workings and mind of one of the greatest players ever is something we as mere chess mortals would love to do. Several of these books, such as Baloven Kaissi do just that.
“An incredible outlook on Capablanca’s games and career with psychological insights from the authors who knew the man personally.”
~GM Alex Colovic
Some of these insights come from the minds of the players themselves, such as Tal’s beloved classic My Life and Games, Yasser Seirawan’s Chess Duals,and Pal Benko’s My Life, Games, and Compositions. Besides some brilliant chess, our panel noted how interesting and entertaining these books were.
IM Christof Sielecki
“Great games, wonderfully written, just a joy to read and browse through.”
~IM Christof Sielecki
Others, such as Kasparov’s epic series My Great Predecessors, share the knowledge and insights of legendary players from a unique perspective. GM Rafael Leitão describes it well: “The best player ever analyzing games by former world champions. Can’t get much better than that.”
We are very fortunate as chess players and fans to have these works by some of the greatest to play the game.
Advanced Training
Our final section of this survey contain books that are written for strong players.
Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual by Mark Dvoretsky (WGM Jennifer Shahade)
Endgame Strategy by Mikhail Shereshevsky (FM Daniel Barrish)
Grandmaster Preparation series by Jacob Aagaard (FM Daniel Barrish and FM Nate Solon)
School of Future Champions series by Mark Dvoretsky (IM Greg Shahade)
School of Chess Excellence series by Mark Dvoretsky (GM Rafael Leitão)
Secrets of Chess Tactics by Mark Dvoretsky (WGM Jennifer Shahade)
From the feedback from my respondents, there are two aspects that make these books great. First, the authors carefully selected appropriate material to challenge their readers. The second is the ability to communicate the most important points to be understood and applied. The books on this list embody these qualities.
An observant reader might notice that one author dominates this list. International Master Mark Dvoretsky (who passed away in 2016) was regarded as one of the best chess trainers by many high level players. His selection of training material was one of the strengths of his works. For example, IM Greg Shahade (referring to volume one of the School of Future Champions): “I just love this book, lots of great examples and awesome chapters.”
For WGM Jennifer Shahade, there is an emotional connection to Mr. Dvoretsky’s work, as she shared that she had “fond memories” of Dvoretsky’s Secrets of Chess Tactics. Part of this connection arises from the feelings of confidence and joy from correctly solving the exercises of the author’s solutions.
For some, Dvoretsky’s books were extremely influential:
GM Rafael Leitão
“I studied the early versions of these books (they were published in the beginning of the nineties). They changed the way I saw chess.”
~GM Rafael Leitão
In addition to Mr. Dvoretsky’s books, a couple of our respondents spoke highly of GM Jacob Aagaard’s Grandmaster Preparation series. Aagaard’s books are newer and combine the two key characteristics of selection of material and eloquent communication.
For example, FM Nathan Solon commented on Grandmaster Preparation: Positional Play: “The biggest thing that’s impressed me about the Aagaard book is the number of good examples he’s assembled. One thing I’ve noticed doing lessons is, in general, the less I’m talking, the better. It’s all about the student getting experience. So I think Aagaard’s approach of short but helpful explanations, followed by a lot of exercises, is a good way to go. When I do the exercises I really feel like my chess brain is growing.”
Although many of the other books on our lists above were meant for chess players of all levels, there is a need for training material and instruction for players who have at some level mastered the game. Fortunately, we have both the legacy of the legendary Mark Dvoretsky and newer training works from Jacob Aagaard and others.
Our Panel
Before concluding this article, I wanted to extend my gratitude for the generous participation of the following chess masters:
Chess players love chess books. It’s part of the culture of chess to read books. Fortunately, there is no shortage of chess books for us to read!
What makes a great chess book? I think from our lists of the best chess books (in our opinion) there are several conclusions we can make.
First, the books contain some great chess! Whether it be the games of world champions or instructive positions in a specific phase of the game, the beauty and truth of chess is on display first and foremost.
Second, some of the best books tell a story. It could be the story of a player’s journey as in Tal’s My Life and Games. It could be the story of the evolution of chess as in Kasparov’s My Great Predecessors series.
Finally, many of the books inspire and teach. You could be a beginner studying the early champions such as Lasker or Capablanca or a master delving into one of Dvoretsky’s training manuals. Either way, the games, positions, and words within these works both evoke your own desire to improve as well as showing you the method by which you can.
Indeed, reading the books are often as enjoyable as playing the game itself!
Your Turn
What do you think is the best chess book ever written?
Has our panel of chess masters missed any of your favorite books?
Thinking of your next chess move? Ask a Chess Master for free!
When thinking of your next chess move, like when choosing chess openings, often the only feedback we get is from a computer. Perhaps you are doing one better over the majority of us and also looking at a master’s database. However, is this truly enough to learn chess and improve?
We think that when learning anything in life, the importance of feedback cannot be ignored. Chess Grandmaster Georg Meier says one of the most important things in chess is to “be receptive to feedback”. Olympic medallist Matthew Syed says his coach used to say, “if you don’t know what you are doing wrong, you can never know what you are doing right”. The way to know? Feedback.
Can a computer give you this kind of feedback for your next chess moves? Can a master’s database answer your questions? These tools, while great, aren’t quite able to offer us specific feedback. Are we all missing something by not being able to chat with a stronger player about our chess moves? Might they recommend something less “computery” and more suitable to humans? We think so.
At Chessable, we are passionate about learning chess in the most efficient and awesome manner possible. This is why from today on Chessable students can access our new “Ask a Master” feature (BETA). The best part? You can ask questions for free. Don’t have a Chessable account? You can also make one for free.
It’s simple, to get your question answered, you need one master token. To get a master token, you need to spend some rubies in the store. How do you get rubies? Well, you can earn those by simply logging on to Chessable and studying for a few minutes! We promise you a chess master, above 2,250 FIDE rating, will answer your question – or you get your rubies back.
Aha, you say! You need to spend something after all, so it’s not free! Well, so far we’ve given away 365,000 free rubies to our dedicated Chessable students. This is over 3,000 free questions that we promise our chess master will answer (he’ll have plenty of coffee to hand)… and for having read on, here are some rubies to get you started (you must be logged in), pick your next chess move wisely!
Notes
1. You can also buy more rubies for cash if you need a question answered urgently.
2. Here is the FAQ explaining a little bit more about this feature.
3. Our top ruby holder has over 1,000 rubies. Impressive.
4. This feature in BETA, we are pretty happy with version 1, but please bear with us, we are treading new ground here.
5. If the feature is popular, we hope to bring more chess masters on board.
6. Don’t have enough rubies? Don’t worry, you can still ask a question as our chess book authors often answer anyway, no rubies needed!
7. No rubies but still want to upgrade to Ask A Master? Post your question anyway, some kind member might upgrade your question for free! 😉
Fide’s big event, the Grand Prix, is back for another round starting today in Moscow. Here are all the details and main talking points.
What is it?
The Grand Prix is a series of four elite-level tournaments taking place from February to November. It is organised by Fide, or more specifically Fide’s commercial arm Agon/World Chess.
The first round took place at the impressive 4000 sq ft Sharjah Chess & Culture Club, which claims to be the biggest chess club in the world.
It was won by Alexander Grischuk on tiebreaks after a three-way tie with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov.
French number one MVL in action at Sharjah
The second will be between May 12 and 24 in Moscow’s Telegraph building, which is just a few hundred meters from the Kremlin.
Dates or venues have not been announced yet for the next two rounds scheduled for Geneva in July and Palma de Mallorca in November.
Why is it important?
Put simply, Fide has made the Grand Prix an essential part of the World Chess Championship cycle.
Win one of the two spots available, and you secure a place in the Candidates tournament scheduled for March 2018.
Win that and you will get a crack at Magnus Carlsen. However, that is a long and arduous journey.
Who’s in it?
There’s an 18-player line-up of elite grandmasters taking part, with each playing three of the four events which are run as a nine round Swiss contest.
The field at Moscow is headed by MVL and Hikaru Nakamura while Mamedyarov, Grischuk and Michael Adams, the English number one, return.
Grischuk picking up his prize
Anish Giri has been back in form recently and takes his place while the cricket-loving Russian Peter Svidler and Boris Gelfand, the oldest in the field at 48, also make up the numbers.
Hou Yifan, the world’s leading female player, is also competing.
Players qualify to the Grand Prix series by rating or by being nominated by World Chess by Agon Ltd, with one addition coming from the Association of Chess Professionals (ACP) or Fide.
Who’s going to win it?
That is absolutely impossible to say. However, for players like Nakamura, MVL and Mamedyarov the Grand Prix may offer the best chance they have to get to the Candidates next March so they might have that extra push.
Grischuk eventually came out top in Sharjah and will be dangerous.
What is the prize money?
This is a touchy subject.
World Chess have offered up prizes purses of 130,000 euros per Grand Prix, or 520,000 euros for the total Grand Prix series.
Sergey Karjakin at the launch of the Moscow Grand Prix, with Fide president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov
However, the prize for first place is “only” 20,000 euros and given the long, drawn-out nature of the event that has put off some of the top players.
As a result the Super GMs weren’t exactly falling over themselves to enter.
So, who’s missing?
Well, Magnus Carlsen obviously. He has no reason to enter given the main motivation for most grandmasters is the chance to enter the Candidates tournament which is the final play-off before the World Championship match.
But apart from that there’s a whole host of stars who aren’t there for various reasons.
Hikaru Nakamura will be gunning for glory at the Grand Prix
Out of the top 10 Carlsen, Vladimir Kramnik, Fabiano Caruana, Vishy Anand and Sergey Karjakin won’t be at Moscow.
More noticeably there will be no Wesley So, the current world number two. He is focusing his energies on the rival Grand Chess Tour.
Also missing is the combustible Bulgarian Veselin Topalov.
The former world champion, who dropped out of the world’s top 20 at the end of last year, wrote a piece on his website saying he was refusing his invitation because of the “unfavourable conditions” offered to grandmasters.
By that we can assume he meant the prize money.
World Chess responded by saying it was “a shame that Mr Topalov chose not to take part”.
What do Fide say about it?
They say it’s incredibly important, as you would expect.
At the launch of the Moscow event Ilya Merenzon, the chief executive of World Chess, made some pretty big claims.
Ilya Merenzon, the chief executive of World Chess
He said: “The eyes of the chess world will be on Moscow once more. We are expecting thousands of spectators at the venue and millions more will watch every move at www.worldchess.com.”
In the build up to the Moscow event, Georgious Makropoulos, acting president of FIDE, said: “With so many top players in the line-up, the Moscow Grand Prix will undoubtedly feature some classic match-ups for chess fans around the world.”
What does everyone else say about it?
They say the prize fund is paltry, and doesn’t provide enough motivation for the top GMs.
The high number of bore draws has also led to criticism.
Malcolm Pein, for example, said in his Telegraph column that Sharjah was “one of the dullest events in recent memory”.
Topalov, who never wastes an opportunity to criticise Fide, said the game’s governing body is “failing to summon top players”.
Another ageing legend not shy of sticking the knife into Fide is English GM Nigel Short.
After claiming Fide was selling places on the Grand Prix for $100,000 a spot, Short said the process has been “utterly prostituted”.
It is fair to say the Fide Grand Prix is splitting opinion at the moment.
This is a question we all ask ourselves at one point or another. It’s the reason why I read all the science there is on Chess and started Chessable! Recently, I got news that one of our users made some remarkable improvement, 300 over the board points in one single year. I got in touch with him to find out a bit more about it. GermanMC is not only one of our power users, but he has also made his opening repertoires available on Chessable for anyone to use. Some are free, and some, cost a few dollars. His top book is on the Ruy Lopez, it’s free and has been studied by an impressive 1,238 people! He has learned 764 variations with a modest maximum daily streak of 9 (there are some who have kept a streak for over a year).
I’ve tried to keep the questions similar to previous chess improvement interviews so as to stick to a familiar theme. Now, let’s find out a few more insights on how to improve at chess, here we go!
1) You have improved around 300 USCF points in a year of tournament chess since joining Chessable, that’s impressive, how do you feel?
Improvement is very satisfying of course, but it also makes me feel hungry for more knowledge and improvement. It’s really nice to live in an age abundant with brilliant resources like Chessable; all I have to do is open up my laptop and get to work.
2) A lot of work must have gone into this, and your game must have improved all around for such a brilliant change. Let’s break it down, how have you improved your chess openings? Over this past year, I have become much more familiar with the typical plans in my openings as well as the “theory” moves. I often understand how to handle the positions that I get out of the opening better than my opponents, which has allowed me to win many easy games against strong players. Chessable has been a key contributor to this aspect of my game because so many of the available repertoire books contain very high-quality instruction and allow me to easily review lines
3) Which openings do you play (if you don’t mind sharing!)?
My style has changed a lot over this past year as I have become a stronger player. As Black, I like to play the Najdorf against 1.e4 and the Benko Gambit against 1.d4 because I always seem to get fighting positions that are interesting to play. As White, I enjoy playing 1.d4 and going for Catalan-type structures with a later Kingside-fianchetto (spoiler alert – this will be the topic of my next Chessable book).
4) How have you improved your middle game?
The middlegame is probably the most critical stage of the game because it is where most games are decided at the amateur level. I personally have improved my middlegame significantly by obtaining a better understanding of the plans out of my favorite openings, as I mentioned earlier. Working daily with an online tactics trainer has also improved my middlegame play a lot. Other than that, I recently got started with Jeremy Silman’s How to Reassess Your Chess, which I find to be a very enjoyable read.
5) What about your endgame, have you worked on that at all?
I have to admit that I have slacked off a bit in my endgame study, but I have taken the time to learn a few basic king and pawn endgames as well as some rook endgames. John Bartholomew has some great videos on his Youtube channel about various essential endgames that I find very instructive!
6) You gained over 1,000,000 points on Chessable, that’s pretty impressive. What would be your tips to new Chessable users about how to get the most out of the platform?
My biggest tip to new users would be to develop a “Chessable routine.” To get the most out of the platform, it is important to do smaller (but daily!) review sessions rather than reviewing a very large quantity of lines every few weeks.
7) What would you personally like to see improved on Chessable?
I think the user interface could be improved a bit, but it seems to be getting better almost every time I log on!
8) What’s next for you? Any new goals? I have my eyes set on 2200, which is when the National Master title is given here in the United States. It would be great to reach that goal sometime in 2018. I would also love to play in some international tournaments when I happen to be in Europe so that I can increase my FIDE rating, but that’s more of a long-term goal.
Thanks GermanMC! It’s very inspiring and motivating to hear of your chess improvement. I am sure many of our readers, including myself, will take a tip or two away from your experience and apply it to our own game. Best of luck on the road to 2,200 and see you on the leaderboards! Personally, I am aiming for 2,000 FIDE this year, which right now, seems a long way away, a long way away!
So, how to improve your chess? In summary, it involves a lot work (1,000,000 points don’t come easy!), habitual study, and a balance between knowing chess openings and understanding the middle game concepts that are relevant to that chess theory.
A bit more about GermanMC: GermanMC is a chess player who is also a student in Austin, Texas. His nickname stems from the fact that he grew up in Munich, Germany. His passion for chess has been highlighted in recent months as he reached his age-groups Top 100 List for the USCF after improving 300 rating points in one year. He spends his free time playing chess tournaments, solving tactics, reading chess books, and of course, creating Chessable chess books.
Last year John and I took the decision to fundraise to accelerate the growth and development of Chessable. A whole year and two crowdfunding campaigns later, I am very happy to announce that we have finally done it! We’ve raised nearly £100,000 from private investors. These funds will immediately be put to good use, supporting our mission of making Chessable the go-to source for chess improvement and education.
Paradoxically, investing time in fundraising would always delay many of the things we want to achieve. Our roadmap and backlog have always been overflowing with things we need to do. I often had doubts, should I be working instead of trying to raise funds? However, I think the following story told by Stephen Covey in his famous book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, describes why fundraising was always the right choice:
Suppose you were to come upon someone in the woods working feverishly to saw down a tree.
“What are you doing?” you ask.
“Can’t you see?” comes the impatient reply. “I’m sawing down this tree.”
“You look exhausted!” you exclaim. “How long have you been at it?”
“Over five hours,” he returns, “and I’m beat! This is hard work.”
“Well why don’t you take a break for a few minutes and sharpen that saw?” you inquire. “I’m sure it would go a lot faster.”
“I don’t have time to sharpen the saw,” the man says emphatically. “I’m too busy sawing!”
We didn’t want to be too busy sawing. We wanted to make sure we deliver an awesome service as quickly as possible without compromising on quality. While we have been consistently improving the site, which is now unmistakably better than during our humble beginnings in February last year, there are still a lot of things we want to do! With a two-man team this has been a slow process and while we’ve had a helping hand from some awesome volunteers it just hasn’t been enough to work on everything we’d like to deliver. This is why we chose to fundraise and sharpen the saw.
Now that the process is complete (hurray!), we will immediately start growing our team and bring you more great features and content. We’ve already recruited one of our volunteers to be our first full-time hire (welcome Simon!) and have concrete next steps to bring you more great things that we know you will love. Stay tuned.
