GM Grigoryan on the "Myth" of Solving Puzzles

This is on point. Good chess training has a way of making what was once a discovery of calculation become merely the exercise aftermath of the intuitive "aha" moment when you spot the position.

its not just how much you can calculate, its knowing exactly when to spot those critical moments in the game and spending your time wisely in those.  This is honed with lots of experience. There is a reason all these highly talented kids (as in 13 and lower!) are virtually all monster calculators in terms of playing style.  

in fact my suspicion is that the reason its easier to go back to your previous playing strength is easier than breaking through a rating plateau is that your spider senses in this sense is a lot of like muscle mass whereas calculating and tactics is more like cardio, the latter deteriorates pretty quickly but the former does not. Even if you havent played for years, you rarely drop more than like 300 points in playing strength or so because your "muscle memory" is still there.

endgame training ironically improves your tactical analysis... knowing which endgames are won, drawn or lost allows you to evaluate the viability of certain tactical sequences, circumventing the need for further calculation.

Oh yes, I found it. Why, thank you! But he blundered a pawn with the queens already off the board and he was quite happy to trade pieces afterward. So, not one of his best games I think, lucky me!

when ahead, trade pieces.

when behind, trade pawns.

🙂

Did magnus say those "interplay between strategy and tactics" line? i think you just took his words and included that to imply that he meant strategy.

Strategy is completely useless for anyone below 2000 because strategy is not the reason we lose games, it's as simple as that

“Strategy is completely useless for anyone below 2000 because strategy is not the reason we lose games, it's as simple as that”

Incredible .. the nonsense that spews forth into the forums. Strategy can be simplified to mean having a plan. Players below 2000 are not capable of formulating a plan and lose because of a plan gone wrong???  Moves lose games at any level, but it’s always good advice to formulate a strategy at all levels of play.

It's just common sense. A 1900 isn't going to beat a fellow 1900 in rapid/slow chess because of some brilliant middlegame plan or some nice opening prep. He is going to beat the other guy as the other guy "missed" some move.

Players below masters have not yet reached a point where they need strategy to win. GMs and super GMs need strategy since their opponents rarely miss moves in their games so the only way to beat them is to play a strong positional idea. For intermediate players all you need to do is to make "ok" moves aka not blunder something and chances are your opponent will most definitely blunder.

This is true for any sport. Also just like how magnus said , players below 2000 should mainly study tactics. Nakamura also said once that up untill 2200 the game is 95% tactics. Ben finegold the chess coach and a GM also says this very often.

I like this distinction...

Also I started doing a bit of the Woodpecker Method recently, not grinding it like crazy just trying it out... And besides studying strategy, I found there is something about actually analyzing a tactic deeply and looking at it over and over that you start seeing it in different ways and how beautiful it is...

So in that sense I agree, solving puzzles is almost like the "playing a game" of the wider "studying tactics", which can mean alot of things from analyzing the puzzle and many different lines that could result from a puzzle, to observing the beauty through repetition.. and of course strategy, like you say... 

Magnus and Hikaru both had master-level coaches, when they were under 2000.

Almost certainly, their coaches taught them much more than tactics alone.

They would've looked at countless games (both classic games, and games of their own), and would've discussed the ideas behind each move.

They would've talked, with their coaches, about whether or not these ideas made sense, based on the needs of each position, and they would've learned about practical alternatives.

Quite often, the moves discussed with coaches are positional in nature. Even at lower levels.

Players will say things like, "I thought the queenside would open up, so that's why I started moving my pieces toward that side of the board". Or, "I didn't want to exchange my strong bishop for their knight, because their knight didn't seem to be doing much at all ..." Or, "I wanted to lock the center, so I could start advancing on the kingside, without worrying about them having counterplay in the middle."

These aren't tactical conversations - they're strategic. And it's almost certainly it's the kind of stuff that both Magnus and Hikaru went over a lot, with their own coaches, when they were U-2000 players.

Of course tactics are vital, too. We definitely don't want to miss tactical opportunities, when they arise. But ... tactics aren't everything.

He hasn't been rated under 2000 since the age of 10, so first of all, he doesn't even know what under 2000 is.

Second of all he doesn't have any students. If you don't have students then you don't know what works.

Third, I doubt this is actually a quote from him... but even if it were, sure, tactics are very important, no one is going to argue that.

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Anyway, you want to know the REAL advice almost every GM will give you? Play tons of long OTB tournament games, read books, and study GM games. The idea that all you need is tactics, or all you need is openings, or all you need is [fill in the blank] is mostly talk from new players looking for shortcuts.

If you've ever been to a chess tournament though, minor sections are full of tactics. Intermediate less so. Open sections, where most of the players are over 2000 FIDE, can be very tactical. But majors? Solid, solid, solid, so Carlsen does have a point.

First of all, show me the source. Show me where Carlsen said to "mostly study tactics which is different from solving puzzles."

Secondly, it's not true that GM games are solid solid solid. There are plenty of creative and sharp players. Even at the very top, you had players like Nakamura playing KID and Dutch.

To repeat, <<<If you've ever been to a chess tournament though, minor sections are full of tactics. Intermediate less so. Open sections, where most of the players are over 2000 FIDE, can be very tactical. But majors? Solid, solid, solid, so Carlsen does have a point.>>>

Major sections are about < 2000.

I already addressed that.

But anyway, I dislike arguing on the forums. I'll leave you guys to have at it.

No....Ive heard Nak  say "the game is decided", not the entire list of moves is 95%.. And he mixes up words. If I let my queen get captured and my opponent takes it, is that really a tactic? Maybe...but probably not. Its probably a strategic move. But since you dont know what strategy is, you have only 1 type of move and say 95%. Say its a blunder haha so the question is not answered directly. If you knew strategy 101, you would suspect strategy from the getgo. Like 1 second or less. But maybe you miss it...and doh! Probably thinking tactics! I hate those puzzles....thinking over all these tactics when the answer is strategic or positional.  

Or in simple terms, everything is connected with everything else. Strategy, positional thinking and tactics go hand in hand.

Adolph Anderssen, one of the most brilliant combinative players of the 19th Century (he played the winning side of both "The Immortal Game" and "The Evergreen Game") was asked why he never managed to pull off that type of tactical brilliancy in his games against Paul Morphy. He simply replied "Morphy won't let me."

And a quote from Capablanca:

"Morphy's principal strength does not rest upon his power of combination but in his position play and his general style....Beginning with la Bourdonnais to the present, and including Lasker, we find that the greatest stylist has been Morphy. Whence the reason, although it might not be the only one, why he is generally considered the greatest of all." ~ José Raúl Capablanca

That's where your point is wrong. An intermediate would find it if presented as a puzzle but not in an actual game, big difference.

I am saying what is a fact... that magnus said that till 2000 all u need to do is to study tactics.... and that nakamura said that up until 2200 the game is 95% tactics.

What u are saying is just random, unprovable stuff since we don't know if they had coaches who trained them extensively in strategy... any coach who, instead of increasing their low rated students' visualization and calculation gives him strategical ideas is a bad bad coach.

Well if you let your queen gets captured then u "missed" that he can capture your queen..

My point is, at below master level all one really needs to do is to not make blunders and he will be good to go. You don't need strong grasp of what to do in a position. You just need basic, very basic opening principles and that's it. You can keep on making "ok" moves and as long as u don't blunder, you will win