Study plan for a ~1200 rated player - comments welcome

I've been thinking about the same problem (coming back to chess after > 20 years away.) I played for my school, but I've never been stronger than 1600 (optimistically) and my Rapid score on chess.com is 1230 today.

This is what I've come up with (and would welcome comments).

Generically, I have identified 7 areas in which I could invest in concentrated study.

1. Tactics - Woodpecker Method - solve 1200 problems from games of world champions, multiple times with focus on increased speed of solution.  I'm really liking this because I am finding myself recognising some of the combinations in my own games.
   
   I'm also leaving a phase of doing a ridiculous number of tactics on chess.com.  Disappointingly, over multiple runs, I have capped out my puzzle rating at 2400ish (highest ever was 2512) .  For tactics, I try to maintain a success rate of over 60% (and I reset if my success rate drops below that.)
   
   Instead, I'm going to focus more on two things:
   * learning the solutions for problems I missed
   * (long-term goal): trying to get puzzle rush survival score to 50.  Current best is 40.
   
   As an aside, I did an enormous amount of puzzle rush 5min last year and have realised that this should be avoided like the plague.  It teached me to guess when I don't have the right answer.
   
   
2. Positional play - I'm using Mastering Chess Strategy by Hellsten on Chessable.  The book has ~1100 game fragments covering improving piece placement, exchanges, pawn play, dynamics and prophylaxis/restriction. 
   
   Chessable retests me so the optimistic endpoint is I'll have memorised 1100 positional "tesuji" at the end of this.
   
   
3. Endings - I'm doing the 100 endgames you should know book on Chessable.  Again, Chessable retests me each day, so it's possible that I'll actually be perfect on 90+ of these at the end.
   
   It also feels like this will be the first thing to be finished, and I'll need to decide what to work on next.  Either Shereshevsky or Hellsten have books with "Endgame" and "Strategy" in the titles.  I'll probably pick whatever is available on an Elearning platform.
   
   
4. Openings - IMO, like a sugar rush which is actively bad for me because it's wasting time that could make a difference in a wider variety of positions. 
   
   In spite of this, I'm learning the Pirc as a social thing with a friend who is slightly weaker than me.  I also  use the same openings a lot and slowly learn from the engine in game review.
   
   My repertoire atm is 
   * Kings Gambit as white
   * Try to get a Najdorf as black
   * Not sure with black against 1. d4
   
   My long-term plan here is to cycle through several openings.  My list includes:
   * Nimzo-indian
   * Slav
   * Caro-kann
   * French
   
   
5. Thinking process - how to choose candidate moves, how to assess moves.  I am interested in suggestions.  I've moved from 5min games to 10min games since maybe August 2021.
   
   
6. How to study your own games - I'm currently just playing on Chess.com and using the engine to point out missed opportunities.  Looking for suggestions about better processes.
   
   
7. Actually studying your own games.  Strong players seem to recommend this an enormous amount.  It might just be what they did and they were more talented than average.

What is also suggested in the reading I've done it to find smarter friends.  I've not done that (yet).  I have one friend of roughly the same strength that I chat with occasionally.

I have added you as a friend.

It is a lot of work and may take a long time.

My work with Woodpecker has already been quite useful.  I have gone from starting with getting less than 25% of the easy problems to over 95% now and close to 0% of the intermediates maybe 50%.

Re: positional play, I have 3 reasons:

1. want to get to 2000.  That will require positional play skills. 
2. Also, there are certain games I am losing positionally - black vs grand prix, black vs 1. d4.  I think pp may be what I am lacking
3. More generally, the woodpecker work means I am seeing attacking ideas in good positions.  But it is also pointing out games where I have no tactical ideas.  I expect pp might impove that.

I quickly glanced over your last four or five lost games. My advise would be to do the same. I could be mistaken (it was really a quick glance) but it seems to me that you resigned two games where you were only slightly behind. And in the third game you moved you king very quickly (3 seconds) into trouble instead of out of trouble in a winning position.

What happens there? Can you recall your decision making?

Atachess:First, thank you for doing the work to review my games.

I think the last arena I played was after a couple of beers, so not my best work.

I have a policy of not fighting positions where I don't have a plan that feels promising.  Mostly because I play arenas, and I feel that fighting a weak position is a waste of arena time.  Secondly, fighting hard and getting crushed is much less fun than saying "don't care.  Next!"

Do you have a link to the game with the king move?  I've looked at several games and not spotted it.

This is the king move game: [Site "Chess.com iPhone"]
[Date "12/08/2021 11:57PM"]
[FEN rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1]
[White "realraptor"]
[Black "ShirlockCones"]
[Result "ShirlockCones won door schaakmat"]
[WhiteElo "1232"]
[BlackElo "666"]
[Termination "ShirlockCones won door schaakmat"]

1.e4 {9:57} e5 {9:58} 2.f4 {9:53} Nc6 {9:54} 3.Nf3 {9:52} exf4 {9:51} 4.d4 {9:50} Nf6 {9:49} 5.Nc3 {9:47} Bb4 {9:41} 6.Qd3 {9:27} d5 {9:32} 7.a3 {9:22} Ba5 {9:27} 8.b4 {9:16} Bb6 {9:24} 9.e5 {9:15} Ne4 {9:21} 10.Nxe4 {9:12} dxe4 {9:19} 11.Qxe4 {9:10} g5 {9:04} 12.d5 {8:25} Nd4 {9:01} 13.Nxd4 {8:21} f5 {8:57} 14.Qd3 {7:48} Qxd5 {8:47} 15.c3 {7:40} Be6 {8:41} 16.Nxe6 {7:32} Qxe6 {8:34} 17.Bb2 {7:18} Rd8 {8:17} 18.Qc4 {7:13} Qxe5+ {8:10} 19.Be2 {7:10} g4 {8:05} 20.Rd1 {7:02} f3 {7:54} 21.Rxd8+ {6:58} Kxd8 {7:52} 22.Qd3+ {6:54} Ke7 {7:48} 23.gxf3 {6:51} g3 {7:37} 24.hxg3 {6:36} Qxg3+ {7:37} 25.Kf1 {6:33} Rg8 {7:32} 26.Rg1 {6:19} Qf2# {7:29} {ShirlockCones won door schaakmat}

If you don’t fight in a game were you are -0.50 and don’t have a plan… I know how you can improve!

I'd suggest limit openings until you definitely do know what your plan is against most things. I'm about the same rating and really only play one opening as white, one as black, and try to study the transpositions that can eventuate from opponent's choices. And fight! The things you notice when you're trying to find resources in cramped or collapsing positions end up helping your attacking play too. I'm in a similar position, returning to chess after many years out, and that's the advice I'm following. Doing lots of puzzles was also part of that advice.

That's a way to improve my rating, rather than to improve my chess, don't you agree?

The goal of my study is to improve my chess.  If I can handle that, I'll be happier and I would expect my rating to reflect that.

Agreed.  Opening are like sugar food.  The "long term" above is carrying the weight of reflecting this.

How do you get access to move times?  I hadn't considered that they might be available.

well if you improve your rating then you'll often encounter stronger players and playing against those stronger players will help you improve as they are more likely to be able to spot your mistakes and take advantage of them

 

It think 6 and 7 should become the heart of your process if you really want to get to 2000. Learn how to study your games and start finding mistakes you repeat.

That could be missing pinned pawns (me), or resigning instead of fighting for a draw (you?). Or even still hanging pieces or not taking hung pieces (me). By studying our games we learn what we have to work on. 

 

Effort tracking is an interesting idea, but I'm not ready to do it (yet).  How do you track it?  (I could start doing pomodoro intervals as a starting point.)

I'm studying in bed in the morning and evening, so time tracking is a little rough.

Re: just focusing on tactics - I started reading the Woodpecker Method on the Forward Chess app in August after a year of doing the chess.com tactics training (rated and 5 min puzzle rush) heavily.  My puzzle rating capped out at between 2200 and 2400.

After using the Forward Chess app, I've also bought it on Chessable at the weekend, and I'm working through 50 problems a day there.  Today I just finished the easy section and I'm working my way up to 250 at the start of the intermediate section.

But after thinking about my games, I think there is a need for better planning as soon at the opponent is over 1200.  That motivated the addition of the strategy book.  Using that with Chessable for memorization is interesting - I'm wondering if it will translate into being able to see plans in my own games.  Anyway, I'm 120/1101 variations into that.  It would be really cool if I can finish that by New Year's Day.

On 100 Endgames, I'm 130/360 variations into that.  I've done the R+P v R section out of turn, and I started the Opposite Bishops section this morning.

NACK on 7.  I'm minimising the playing games piece for the moment.

6 is there to start a discussion.  My game-review-game needs work.  (For me currently, it's scrolling through the engine analysis for best moves and mistakes when I do them at all.)  What does a good game review look like?  Do people do different game reviews for OTB vs server games?

Here you go, you´ve just defined your problem.

You're resigning down a pawn. Don't do that.

Play some daily games and analyze them afterwards. When playing, start to look up the opening that you are playing, try out the variants on the explorer (or, better, on the board), look for easy tactics...

For me, the daily games are the best lessons (although I tend to have an untidy thinking process because it is so easy to click through variations.

Try to replay some annotated games - Tarrsch '300 chess games' is an 'oldie but goldie' here, the games fit better for a beginner than many of the ultra-theoretic modern games (although I don't know if the English translation is as good as the German original).

 

Have Fun!

You mind letting us know what happened to your training? We're 3 years later and you're at the same rating when this post was made. Did you just not actually practice?