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In the past three and a half years, I decided to improve at the game of chess. In the following post, I will break-down the lessons learned and steps taken in each year of my journey that brought me from 900 ELO to 1423 ELO in Blitz and 1100 ELO to 1657 ELO in Rapid on Chess.com.
2021: Beginning
In December of 2020, I finally listened to recommendations to watch Netflix's The Queen's Gambit. I had forgone watching the show for a couple months as I had always been disappointed in chess depictions in media in the past, with the exception of Searching for Bobby Fischer. However, I succumbed to the peer pressure after a couple of months and binged the whole series. Shortly after, I created a Chess.com account on the day before New Year's Day 2021 and began playing games.
In high school, I played two chess tournaments and got 4th place without putting much effort into preparation. I remember thinking that I would be vastly better than most people online. I was wrong.
I was thoroughly being outmatched for my initial ranking and quickly began to hemorrhage ELO points. I expected to at least be ranked at least 1200 ELO; however, after a month or two I had dropped to around 900. This made me mad and thus motivated.
I began watching professional chess streamers in my free time such as: Hikaru Nakamura, ChessBrah, and BotezLive. I finally got to see the terminology, positions, and puzzles worked out at the highest level by watching these professionals. I began remembering old tactics that I had forgotten in high school and learned a few different mating methods. These allowed me to jump up to 1100 in the coming months quickly.
During 2021, I was also starting a new job and training in martial arts around 5 times a week, and most of my time was diverted to these pursuits. When I had a Muay Thai fight potentially at the end of the year, I found my chess rating plummeted down to the 900s as my body become more deprived of calories and sleep. Chess was not the main priority so I didn't care what my rating was doing; however, I daily made time to complete the Puzzle of the Day on Chess.com. This kept me somewhat sharp and constantly learning.
End of 2021 Chess.com Rating: BLITZ: 964 RAPID: 1214
My journey in chess in 2021 reinforced three lessons:
- Playing games helps you gauge competitive standing.
- Watching chess content helps you grasp key concepts and culture.
- Solving puzzles helps you enhance tactical skills.
2022: Consistency
2022 began by being a very difficult year in many different ways. I had gone through 2 training camps for Muay Thai fights at 185lbs and 205lbs. This physically drained me, and I found myself being consistently tired; however, there was a shining light during this time. I had what I believed to be the start of a great relationship. While dating, I remember being excited about the future and my chess ranking reflected this jumping back up to 1100s. However, this ended abruptly...and that hurt.
I found myself questioning myself and my life decisions. I then entered a third training camp for a fight at 170 lbs., and I was wrecked physically, mentally, and emotionally. My ranking plummeted from the 1100 ELO back down to 900 ELO.
The coming months would continue to get worse with a hip injury and personal conflicts that continued to trouble me. My chess ranking dropped significantly during this time. It was almost as if my mental state was reflected in how I played chess. When I was confident, I moved boldly and with purpose and when I was unsure my moves became timid and I overthought consistently.
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| Injury in Question |
I remember being so angry and striving to get better at chess. Because my body was injured, I wanted to strengthen my mind; however, it seemed the more effort I put into chess the worse my chess got. Dropping into the 800s for ELO, was a low point, and I remember taking a break for a week and then coming back with a strategy.
The strategy I adopted was the following: I would play 3 games a day and complete the total allowed free puzzles for each day. From July to the end of the year using this strategy for the most part, I went from the 800s to a new high of just under 1200. I attribute the growth to chess becoming part of my routine and limiting the amount of stress. This allowed me to acclimate and build momentum. This was especially necessary given my body was healing during this time.
In addition to limiting the amount of games I would play, I also forced myself to experiment with different openings and patterns often taking riskier moves in order to force myself to calculate deeper. This caused me to be unorthodox which sometimes worked and sometimes failed miserably. I ended the year with a ranking that hovered just below the 1200 ELO range; therefore, giving some improvement from my previous all-time high of 1100 ELO.
End of 2022 Chess.com Rating: BLITZ: 1114 RAPID: 1313
My journey in chess in 2022 reinforced three lessons:
- Your physical and emotional state have a direct effect on your mental state.
- Consistency helps you to incrementally grow and build momentum.
- Breaking your habits and tendencies is necessary to grow your game.
2023: Evolution
At the start of 2023, I found myself hitting a plateau hovering around the 1200s in Blitz. I would play games based on very similar French and Italian game openings and they would all play very similarly with me winning and losing around 50% of games. Something needed to change.
I decided to play multiple opening variations until I found something that worked. I started playing what I later learned was the English opening, C4. I began to find my opponents from the 1100-1200 ELO rating didn't know how to play against this. This lead to a wide variety in how games would play out, and I began winning games due to a better understanding of tactics from my puzzles than my opponents. I quickly rose to the 1300s for the first time.
The sudden jump in rating increased my confidence in my skills and I looked into chess meetups near me. I found a chess meetup on Saturdays at a bar near me, and I began to attend every Saturday. Once again my hubris bit me. I thought I would be one of the better players, and I found out yet again I was not as good as I thought losing about two thirds of the games I played. There was a considerable difference between chess players online and people who actually played tournaments seriously.
Playing chess in real time is a lot of fun. As someone who thoroughly enjoys banter, being able to trash talk and joke with other players makes the game far more enjoyable. This became a weekend ritual of going to the pub, buying one drink, and playing chess for several hours with the same people. Shout out to Jeff, Alex, Geoff, and all the others!
1 minute game at Handlebar chess
By surrounding myself with players that were considerably better than me and attaching importance to chess with the community, I found my rating to rise considerably. This was in part because the community attached more importance to chess in my mind, and I would ask considerably better players where they thought I messed up. This caused me to focus on weak areas and learn a concept about applying martial arts concepts to chess.
“If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior strength, evade him. If your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them. If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected .”-Sun Tzu
In Sun Tzu's the Art of War, exploiting the enemy's weaknesses and playing to your strengths is necessary for employing effective strategy. I found this also plays well in chess. If I was playing a traditionally stronger player, I would do my best to play unconventionally with wild and risky moves. I would introduce as much chaos as possible on the board to cause them to think. This ran down the clock and played well to my strength of tactics which were strong from completing chess puzzles for the past couple years. Occasionally, I would beat a significantly better player with a little bit of luck and strategically taking the stronger player out of their comfort zone.
Near the end of 2023, I decided to write my 2024 goals. I added a rating of 1500 in Rapid on Chess.com. I found in the final months of 2023 my rating soared with the added incentive of reaching and established goal. I also tailored when I would play Rapid. If I was on a roll in Blitz games, I would switch to Rapid and win the majority of the time as I was on a roll. I essentially used Blitz as a testing ground for the Rapid games which I took far more seriously. The goal of hitting 1500 coupled with Blitz game testing caused my Rapid rating to climb well past 1500 to 1619.
End of 2023 Chess.com Rating: BLITZ: 1212 RAPID: 1619
My journey in chess in 2023 reinforced two lessons:
- Ecosystem Helps, Surround Yourself with People You Aspire to Learn from or Be Like
- Goals Help Incentivize Growth
2024(current): Experimentation
I had talked about playing a tournament in 2024, and at the behest of Jeff from weekend chess, I signed up last minute for the Idaho Closed 2024 Tournament. I didn't look at any of the rules or practice. I knew I would be too nervous and not play if I did. I just leapt before looking.
I played the Blitz tournament February 19, 2024 at night. I dropped some profanity early on and quickly realized I wasn't at pub chess when I looked across the board at an astonished high schooler. I apologized and continued to play a series of crazy games winning 3 out of 8 games and ending up 12th in Idaho for Blitz out of 18 players. This was fun and enjoyable with pretty much everyone being friendly and upbeat.
The next morning I joined the about 50 some people for the classic-open tournament, and I was casually conversing with everyone who seemed stressed for some reason. I thought the games were going to be super long games like 3 hours...they were 3 hours per person...I was not prepared for this.
The next 3 days were incredibly stressful. Thankfully, I was able to get a bye which cut down on the stress and gave me much needed points, but I still ended up playing two games over 5 hours, another around 4 and a half, and my final game was about 3 and a half hours. I remember thinking at one point, "What the hell am I doing? I'm not getting paid to be here!" But I made it through the 4 days of chess and ended as 37th in Idaho out of 51 players.
All in all, it was a good learning experience. Just like all the times before I realized I am woefully low on the totem pole with regards to good chess players, and it was great to see how talented others are to give me something to aspire to. In the future, I plan on play more competitive chess; however, I had to take a month break after this tournament as I became sick from playing and was a bit burned out. Next year will be different. I will work out my cardio and my preparation will be far better.
My journey in chess in 2024 has reinforced two lessons:
- There is no substitute for experience. Tournament experience is vastly different from what you think it is.
- Optimizing training for your lifestyle and goals is key to sticking with chess.
Future Improvements
In the future, there are 2 large areas for improvement that I currently see missing from my game.
- Openings (I have not studied any openings in depth, and I believe this would allow me to dictate the games and not fall for traps early in my games.)
- Coaching (I believe a good coach would be able to help me pinpoint my weaknesses and strengths in order to improve at a faster rate.)
Conclusion
In conclusion, my chess journey has been fairly long with plenty of ups and downs. The lessons of immersing myself in chess culture, consistency, and experimentation with different approaches have been the biggest takeaways in looking back at the chess learning curve. By no means am I done learning, and I may look back at this post and cringe; however, at this point in time, this seems to be useful advice and lessons learned. I hope the reader was able to glean some insights, and I will update with more lessons learned when I can. Until then see you online and over the board! Thank you!
TLDR: Here is a general breakdown what I learned along with my Chess.com ELO rating over the years.
2021
- Play to Find Out Where You Stand Amongst the Competition
- Watching Chess Entertainment helps with Terminology, Concepts, and Culture
- Puzzles Help Develop Tactics
2022
- The Physical and Emotional Effect the Mental
- Consistency Is King
- Break Patterns to Evolve
2023
- Ecosystem Fosters Growth
- Goals Help Incentivize Growth
2024
- Tournament Experience Is Vastly Different from What You Think
- Optimizing Training for Your Lifestyle and Goals Is Key
Feel free to play me online!
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