44 lines
9.3 KiB
HTML
44 lines
9.3 KiB
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> I caught the chess bug as a college student, twenty-one years old, and it’s become my favorite way to unwind since then, as I’m now working at <a href="https://visiostack.com/">VisioStack</a> and starting a master’s in CS at Clemson University. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> Like all hobbies, chess is more fun when you’re making progress. And progress as an adult is certainly more difficult, as for instance recounted in <a href="http://nautil.us/issue/36/aging/learning-chess-at-40">this fine story</a> by Tom Vanderbilt. It’s not so easy to rewire your brain. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> I started out as a below-average-rated player, which was humbling and rather galling. My chess-playing friends IRL beat me easily. Today, I’m still a poor player – I frequently blunder pieces and make other mistakes – yet I’m much stronger; I beat those friends and am now around the 95th percentile at chess.com. My rating progress at blitz looks like this: </p>
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<img data-attachment-id="86" data-permalink="https://jacobbrazeal.wordpress.com/image-1/" data-orig-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png" data-orig-size="2670,890" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="image-1" data-image-description="" data-medium-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=1024" src="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=1024" alt="" srcset="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=1024 1024w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=2046 2046w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=150 150w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=300 300w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image-1.png?w=768 768w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px">
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</figure>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> (I would note that in fall of 2018, I played a great deal of 4-player chess instead of standard chess; this improved my regular game indirectly, fortunately.) </p>
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<h2> How I Study </h2>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> Much of this progress was haphazard: I played lots of games, read the occasional book, learned a few openings. Earlier this year I hit a road block around 1450; the following routine is what’s helped me continue to progress. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> I spend about two hours per day on chess, broken into three periods. In the first period, I drill opening theory and positional concepts. I use the spaced-repetition app <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://apps.ankiweb.net/" target="_blank">Anki</a> for this. My cards are just positions drawn from computer analysis of my own games: I put blunders and mistakes from my games here (front side of the card is the position before my move, reverse shows the correct move.) I also put many positions from the openings that I play here. I add about 25 new cards a day, which means I have 100+ cards to go over on a given day. Reviewing Anki cards takes between 30 minutes and an hour. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> In the second period, I solve puzzles on Chess.com for 30 minutes to an hour. I would note that this requires a chess.com membership, as does unlimited analysis of your games. I pay $99/year for a Diamond membership; there are other, cheaper levels as well. Still, for a serious hobby, it’s pretty cheap. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> In the third period, I play blitz games (usually at the 3+0 time control). I will analyze many of these games – especially ones I lose – and put anything surprising into Anki. I might play for anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 hours. </p>
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<h2> Progress: Not a Straight Line </h2>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> It’s fascinating to me how much chess performance can vary from day to day. Every two months or so, I’ll have an amazing chess day where my rating skyrockets by 150-200 points (and promptly returns to earth in the next few days.) More concretely: The median interval between my personal best ratings is exactly 60 days. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> My rating varies by weekday. I have played over 10,000 blitz games in the last 2+ years. With the exception of a couple of multi-week breaks, I have played essentially every day. If, for each week, I find my median ELO and compare each day to that median (so, for example, that week’s median ELO is 1200, but on Wednesday is 1235, Wednesday gets a +35), and then take the median of all the deltas for each day, we get the following effect: </p>
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<figure>
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<img data-attachment-id="81" data-permalink="https://jacobbrazeal.wordpress.com/image/" data-orig-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png" data-orig-size="3594,1176" data-comments-opened="1" data-image-meta="{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"0"}" data-image-title="image" data-image-description="" data-medium-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=300" data-large-file="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=1024" src="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=1024" alt="" srcset="https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=1024 1024w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=2048 2048w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=150 150w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=300 300w, https://jacobbrazeal.files.wordpress.com/2020/11/image.png?w=768 768w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px">
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</figure>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> So on Thursday I’m about average, on Friday I’m better than average, and on other days I’m <em>much</em> worse. I assume this effect arises from playing fewer games on Monday and Tuesday, and so being a bit rusty, and then playing too many games on the weekend, ending with a lower rating. A win or loss is worth about 8 ELO, so on Tuesdays I lose about 9 more games than I win. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> Time of day and number of games played also certainly affect rating, but I don’t have that data readily at hand. I do believe that it’s possible to determine via the extensive chess.com API (<a href="https://www.npmjs.com/package/chess-web-api">https://www.npmjs.com/package/chess-web-api</a>), though. </p>
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<h2> Goals </h2>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> I’d like to reach 2000 in 2021. My current study strategy seems to net me around 1.5 ELO/day, so this seems achievable. Of course I could hit a wall where I need to reinvent myself again; if I do, I’ll consider getting a chess coach, reading chess books, etc. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true"> Some day, I want to become a titled player. A candidate master needs an ELO of 2200, but this is in over-the-board play, which probably corresponds to around 2300 in online blitz. I don’t have a timeline for this, but I imagine that if I do get there, it will happen with in the next five years. </p>
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<p data-adtags-visited="true">
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<em>Comments on <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25108800">Hacker News</a></em> | <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/jv67l9/on_learning_chess_as_an_adult_from_650_to_1750_in/"><em>Reddit</em></a> | <a href="https://jacobbrazeal.wordpress.com/2020/11/17/the-touching-responses-to-on-learning-chess/"><em>My response</em></a>
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