“I’ll start with the classic one - how and when did you start playing chess? What are your long-term chess goals? Might be a boring question to ask, but I am always curious!”
I guess like a lot of people, I first learned chess at a young age — maybe seven or eight. But I didn’t start playing in earnest until late 2016, after I found a random video of some old guys playing what must have been bullet chess. I can no longer find the video because it’s buried under the youtube algorithm and chess has had a monumental explosion in popularity and content since then. I picked up my phone, downloaded chess.com’s app, started playing blitz (including bottoming out at below a 500 rating), and the rest is history.
I like to divide my chess goals into process-oriented and outcome-oriented categories. My main process-oriented goals are:
Study the games of the most important chess players, which to me are the World Champions and their strongest competitors.
Study and improve at tactics, calculation, visualization, and evaluation
Play a lot of blitz chess games and a lot of classical OTB games, and fill in the lulls between tournaments with rapid games.
Analyze these games: Blitz mostly for openings and basic tactics, but deeper things in Rapid and Classical.
Study the openings, middlegames, and endgames that I need to learn in order to improve.
Work on positional chess too, with the aforementioned game collections, and the occasional book on strategy + analyzing my own games.
This is the meat and potatoes of my training regimen. Everything is about studying and learning and putting all of that into practical experience.
The ultimate outcome-oriented goal I have is:
Become a USCF National Master (e.g. achieve a post-tournament rating of 2200)
‘s Ben Johnson asks: “it seems like you work really hard on your game, do you have periods where you lose your chess motivation?”
I do have periods where my motivation is a bit deflated, but I’ve never lost motivation entirely. In general, I tend to switch to something else I enjoy, like playing a video game or watching a TV series. I don’t really quit chess during this time, I just give myself a break from studying it in the evenings. I’ll still play games here or there or study during the pockets of time I have during the day. Usually within a week or so I’m back to my “normal” motivation level and want to jump back into chess headfirst again.
Andy Green on Twitter asks
What are your thoughts on online chess courses? (such as Chessable, Chessly)
I’m a long-time fan of the Chessable platform. I have a 1200-day streak, own many courses encompassing openings, middlegames, endgames, strategy, and tactics. I tend to believe in the product, but I’m not the biggest fan of their marketing which I think can be rather misleading especially for newer players. Sometimes they promise rapid chess improvement and I simply don’t think this is possible for most players, especially from opening courses, which is their main kind of product.
I’ve never used Chessly so I can’t say much about it. But in general, I think online platforms are very useful for certain subjects, but not all; or at least, I think that my experience shows that these platforms must be used carefully in order not to waste time or brain space. Gamification can help or harm the learning process — and online chess platforms tend to reward speed rather than accuracy or comprehension. If you have an impulse to worry about getting your reviews down to zero, or have a completionist attitude toward the process, you can easily become so bogged down in material to review that you lose track of your goals or what you actually need to learn. So, use carefully. But in general, I have a positive disposition towards online platforms like Chessable.
How do chess books fit into chess improvement/education in 2023 now that there are so many online tools?
I can’t speak for everyone, but I rather enjoy chess books because for all the advances in computer chess and its impact on the theory of the overall game, the didactic potential of a good chess book still outshines new technology. Some classics are clearly outdated based on modern chess ideas, but they still contain the foundation for how to play the game, and over time, we learn what needs to be unlearned and learned anew. That’s why I think a book like Simple Chess (click for review) is still relevant today. The other thing is, especially if you’re a tournament player, the tactile experience of reading a book and moving the pieces on a board and turning pages is still inimitable and tends to increase the amount of knowledge and information you retain after a given learning session. It’s still worth keeping books around for that. Plus, game collections can be timeless, and a book is still the best way to read through those at the moment.
Lichess or Chesscom?
I like both sites and tend to go back and forth. Here’s where I think each of them outshines the other:
Lichess:
No paywalls. Everything is free. Chess.com’s kinda shamelessly onerous in how many features they hide behind their freemium model. That’s fine, they’re a business. But I much prefer Lichess’s ethos: Chess is for everyone.
Studies feature is still unmatched.
Analysis is free, and you can get an automated game analysis too (also free, like everything else). The Analysis UI and experience is also much better.
Puzzles are better: Sort by theme, opening, etc. No limits on solving.
Puzzle ratings are more cutthroat: There is one solution, and you don’t get pity points for getting it almost correct — this is a much better way to train for candidate moves in my opinion. chess.com’s system (puzzle ratings are divorced from reality, and your rating change is based partly on time, which encourages bad habits) doesn’t make sense to me.
No ads. Did I mention it’s all free?
Chesscom:
I really like the UI and feel of the site.
Bigger pool of players (attracts more casuals, but also many strong players too). Most people play on this site.
Game Review feature is very pleasant to use, even if it’s a bit fluffy. The dopamine hit when you see that blue-green “!!” icon hovering over one of your moves is addictive.
Better cheat detection.
Ratings are closer to USCF/FIDE numbers compared to Lichess and this tends to lead to less confusion about how one’s online rating may compare.
Cool online events — including the #Chesspunks Champs tournament.
Integral contributions to the capacity of professional chess players and streamers to support themselves by playing chess.
Right now I’m maining on chess.com for reasons mostly relating to the upcoming ChessPunks Champs event, to which I was invited as a finalist in one of the sections. But in general, I think I prefer Lichess. Both sites are great! But if I had to choose one, it’s the one that’s 100% free.
Thank you all for submitting your questions here and on Twitter! I’d love to make these a regular occurrence, so if you have more questions, please send them my way and eventually I’ll answer them!
Nick