Corus in retrospect.

The Corus tournament is always the main event we look forward to.
Every year we go with 10-15 men from our club to Wijk aan Zee.
The whole village breathes chess. The last few hundred meters you have to drive careful because chessplayers jump before your car, deep in thoughts.
Playing with 700 persons in one hall is a hard to describe experience.
The athmosphere seems to exhale chess vibes and the smell of pea soup.
If you go to the bathroom you fall in a discussion about the advantages of bishop a6.
Before the first game there is a lot of handshaking to all those old opponents you played in previous years. You play with 10 persons of the same level in a 9 round robin. Playing nine days in the same group develops chess bonds between persons that last ever since.
After the game there is the "straffe Hendrik" and other strong beers and a lot of laughter. You are in a different world. It is really vacation.

I was with 1712 the lowest rated player in my group (1712-1795). Except for a lad who had 1626 and who was promoted last year. He managed to lose ALL his 9 games (!).
With 5 out of 9 and a TPR of 1770 (Tournament Performance Rating) I did a good job.
I will gain about 20 ratingpoints, and I'm rather satisfied.

About the games.
I was very keen this year to know what costed me points. So I have allready a clear picture of what happened.
3 wins
4 draws
2 losses

The wins.
The wins are very clear. I overplayed the opponents tactically.

The losses.
The losses are also clear. In one game I had 3 tactical oversights in a row and my position collapsed. In the other game I first blundered a knight away. Allthough I was still better (!) I oversaw a mate in one against my king a few minutes later.
Blunders come in waves.

The draws.
So what about the draws?
I have never been in real time trouble.
This is the list of sacrifes in my games:
Pawns: 6
Exchange: 1
Bishop: 3
Knight: 3
Rook: 1
I didn't lose a single point due to a sacrifice.
So I would say that I'm able to enhance my play with sacrifices without bad repercussions. Have a look at the article of GM Aviv Friedman about amateurs who should make more sacrifices as common practice.
The sacrifices gave me the initiative and an attack. No matter if I have black or white.
During plan A all chances are for me.
Plan A is "hunt down the king".
But in 4 cases I didn't manage to bring plan A to a good end.
In these cases I had to step over to plan B.
The moment an attack dries out, there is almost always the possibility to convert the initiative and get back the invested pawns and such.
But I have no plan B!
Plan B should be the liquidation to a favourable endgame.
Since I have no idea which endgames are favourable I liquidate to a drawish (or any. . .) endgame. Hence the 4 draws. Ok, of course I know the common rules of isolated pawns, pawn islands etc., but I have no idea in what direction to steer. Should I keep a knight or a bishop? Do I have to trade rooks or should I avoid it?
So I try to steer towards a draw, being in fright and awe when my opponent still tries to win.

My conclusion for now is:
With endgame knowledge and skills I could have tried to get the 2 points I didn't get due to the 4 draws.
With more simple tactical skills I could avoid the oversights and blunders which costed me 2 points.
So I have to divide my time between 50% tactics and 50% endgame.
The method I use for tactical training (with flashcards, spaced repetition and visualisation) is equally suited for endgame training. And that is what I'm going to do.
I allready started this in the past, but my analysis of my bad performance at Whitsuntide put this in the fridge. Now it's time to pick it up again.

Most of my games were exciting. In this game I punish a materialistic Pirc player with a home made attack. A few sacrifices sealed the deal. I'm proud of it.

The Corus Tournament

Margriet and I are playing in the Corus tournament.
We play 9 games G/120+60 round robin.
Total amount of players is about 650 for the 9 round event.
Here you can find the results every day.
I'm in groep 5F and Margriet is in groep 8B
Please respect privacy.

Continuous update.
Day 9.
I had a beautiful win with white against 1738. The whole week he had played 1. ... e5, but since he knew I'm a king's gambit player he decided to play the Pirc. He had better not!! I played my home-made attack which I developed years ago. I invested an exchange and a knight in a crushing attack. He had to give a bishop and a rook back to prevent mate, but at a certain moment he was two pieces behind. For some reason he didn't resign and I lured him in two other tricks, which handed me his last pieces. So I was a rook, two knights, a bishop and a few pawns up, but he kept playing. Some people really have difficulty to say farewell to a point. Maybe he waited for my cellphone to beep?
Anyway, we had a wild game with castling and attacking on opposite wings.
I'm too tired now, but I will post the game tomorrow.
These are the games where all my efforts reap fruits. Razor sharp crushing of opponents who hadn't estimated my attack so dangerous. That's what I'm doing it for! I suggest that all you Pirc players out there have a close look at the game when I post it to see what NOT to do in the Pirc!!
Margriet drew her game.

Day 8.
I played the Portugese gambit against 1772. My opponent declined and managed to make the game very dull. Draw.
Margriet lost with a king's gambit.

Day 7.
The first 6 days of a tournament you exchange viruses with the group, so after the restday an amazing amount of people had caught a cold or the sniffles:)
Margriet and I weren't 100% either, but we felt luckily not too bad.
My opponent of today (1627) was promoted to this group last year. So far he had lost all his six games. He played 1.Nc3. It costed me 19 moves to deliver his 7th zero. That guy has a looong tournament!
Margriet tried the dutch defense for the first time but got so entangled that she lost a rook.

Day 6.
I played the Alapin against 1717. Since I don't feel comfortable with too much pawns on the board I sac'd one (DIY-gambit). I thought my opponent would give it back at a certain moment, but he decided to keep it. He was very surprised by the following crushing attack. In the end I had two connected pawns more, ready to run for promotion. So I declined his draw offer.
I had a little time trouble, but not so much as my opponent.
I got greedy and took a pawn to much. That was a tactical error, so my knight disappeared from the board. Even with one knight behind, I stood still better. But the psychological blow of the blunder made that I didn't see the mate in one delivered to me. A silly way to lose a point!
Margriet was one pawn behind the whole game, but managed to keep the balance after six(!) hours of play.

Temposchlucker: 5/9
Sacrificed by Tempo:
Pawns: 6
Exchange: 1
Bishop: 3
Knight: 3
Rook: 1
By opp:
Knight: 1
Bishop: 2



Margriet: 3.5/9
Sacrificed by Margriet:
Pawns: 4
Exchange: 2
Knight: 1
Queen: 1
By opp: -

Who said tactics and sacrifices don't occur in a game?

Day 5.
I played with black the Fajarowicz against 1729. It was again a very wild game. He hadn't the courage to take my two times sacrificed bishop. The sacrifices helped me to trade off pieces on my own terms, so he got a double isolani. That was enough compensation for my gambit pawn. So I could easely hold the balance in the following endgame with knight vs bishop: draw.
Margriet lost her Kings gambit. No comments, no flowers, no visiting.

Day 4.
I had an extremely wild game playing the King's gambit against 1759, an expert of the Falkbeer countergambit. After we mutually sacrificed two pieces each, all pieces were traded off, leaving us with an endgame with bishops of opposite colors: draw.
Margriet withstanded an heavy attack, losing one pawn.
But she got tired and blundered at her endgame with bishops of opposite colors: lost.

See here a video of Yasser Seirawan from behind the scenes at Corus.

Day 3.
I played with black the Dutch defense against 1743.
It was hefty manoeuvring but I got the bishop pair plus the possibility to open up the closed position. We were both in time trouble. I managed to lure him in a hard to see trick and he lost his queen for a knight. The moment I made the 40th move within the time limit, he resigned.
Margriet played the Alapin against 1464 and won the exchange with a good combination. After the first time control she got tired and blundered her rook away. Her opponent thought she would queen first and offered a draw.
She accepted immediately since she eveluated her position as lost. Once she showed him how he could have won he was assured of a bad evening.:)

Day 2.
I was tactically outplayed by 1795. I played the Alapin. Later he told me he was 100 points underrated. I'm more than happy to believe him. . .
Margriet played with black an Icelandic gambit against 1485 and won a rook, lost a knight, sacrificed the exchange and won the queen.

Day 1.
Today january 20th we played our first game.
The main playing hall is rather psychedelic this year.
Margriet played with white against 1402 and had a walkover with a King's gambit.
I played with black an Icelandic gambit with a lot of pressure.
I sacrificed a rook which gave me my pawn back in the end with equal position.
He didn't see it coming.

Time for a prognosis.

To a hypothesis belongs a prognosis.
In a few days I will start at Corus.
What will my TPR (= tournament performance rating) be?
Today my dutch rating is 1712.
This reflects my performance in the summer tournaments.
My average rating at CTS was 1470 in the summer.
My rating gain at CTS is 60 points since then.
I formulate the hypothesis that an increase of 60 points at CTS will result in a 30 points gain OTB.
To gain 30 points in 9 games I have to score a TPR of 1802.
Let's see what will happen.

Some cheap points.

Since I have a rather relaxed schedule at CTS at the moment (120 new+240 repeated problems a day), I deciced to score some cheap patterns by repetition of problems I have already done 7 times.
Today I did for the second time step 3 of TCT (which I have done 7 times in the past 8 months ago). When I repeated step 3 for the first time a few days ago, it was rather disappointing. But today I seemed to remember a lot more. My results a few days ago I compared with doing step 3 for the first time. But my results today were comparable with doing it for the 5th time. So all these circles in the past have their value, only you have to repeat them sometimes.

I intend to use during the next 9 days before the Corus tournament all the free time generated by the lazy schedule at CTS for repetition of problems I did allready 7 times in the past (I hope this is still English). I.c step 3,4,5 from TCT and 1359 problems from George Renko's intensive course tactics part I.

40,000 done, only 30,000 to go !!

Circle 4 is done: 40,000 problems of 70,000
My rating at CTS is min. 1500 avg. 1520 max. 1540
I started the new system at januari 1st, 2006

To a new system belongs a new prediction: I estimate that at march 1st my rating at CTS will be min. 1550 avg. 1570 max 1590. I.c. an improvement of 50 points in 2 months.

The daily workout:
Solve 120 problems at CTS
Select the 30 worst problems of those 120 for spaced repetition.
Daily # for spaced repetition is 240 (= total of 8 days)

Let's see what happens.

Pump up the volume.

To prevent people from thinking I'm on vacation I beefed up my efforts.
Well, actually because the Corus tournament comes nearer:)

My new method is working extremely well. The last days I do 240 problems a day at CTS, to select 60 problematic problems which I use for spaced repetition. So that's 8 times as effective as my previous method (see previous post). In 3 days I have collected 3 x 60 = 180 problems for repetition.

Today I did 400 problems of TCT step 3.
I did the 7 circles with TCT about 8 months ago.
I wanted to find out how much I picked up from it.
That was rather disappointing. I remembered only 5% of the problems.
It took me 3.5 hours to solve the problems with a succesrate of 96%.
Which is the same as I started with at TCT.
Conclusion: my 7 circles with TCT have given me very little.
I allready suspected that because of my meagre results at the summer tournaments.
The 5 % I did remember were the more difficult problems, which I had given more attention.

From all my efforts in the past I have learned that these two things are crucial:

• The AMOUNT of patterns you learn per day have to be in relation with the total amount you have to learn. Otherwise it will cost you 20 years before you get results.
• Make sure you REMEMBER the patterns you learn. A forgotten pattern is useless.
  

So these two rules give good direction. If one of them is not met, your efforts will yield no results. It are simple rules and it are logical rules, still I haven't followed them most of the time the past 3 years. I'm very glad I understand why my efforts didn't work well untill now.

To improve my rememberance of the patterns I take some time to visualise the crucial elements in my mind. Then I play thru the solution in my head, with my eyes closed.
Further I make use of spaced repetition. After only 3 days I feel allready that it makes a difference.

Four times faster in half the time

Blue Devil inspired me to have a close look at my working method at CTS.
That revealed that I had learned 1,300 problems by heart.
At first that didn't look too bad. After all, with CT-Art you only have a look at 1,000 problems or so.
But when I realized that it is going to take me 19 years at that pace to learn 50,000 patterns, it was clear I had to improve my method.

What I do now is the following:
I solve ca. 120 problems at CTS.
About 30 problems are failures or consume >30 seconds.
I make a list of these 30 problems.
I repeat these problems via a spaced repetition system (spread over several days - weeks), until I know them by heart.
So I learn 30 patterns a day.
Since my old method provided me 1,300 patterns in 6 months = 7 patterns per day, my new system is more than 4 times faster.
50,000 patterns can be learned this way in 4.6 year.
This starts to look more like what DLM was talking about with his 400 points per year!

Another good point is that this new method takes me only half the time I used to spend.
Which doesn't hurt.

Happy New Year to all

Blue Devil put up interesting questions in his comment on my last post:
The main question is, what is the best way to learn pattern recognition? Via learning a zillion patterns (Tempo), or via learning a relatively small alphabet of patterns (Heisman) around which your skills accrue?

Until now I haven't given these items much attention because I thought I had not the time to develop something my self. So I accepted a less than optimal method as CTS. But let's have a close look on this issue, maybe some good idea's arise.
First I would like to reformulate the second question as follows:

What is a better methaphore, to compare pattern recognition with learning the tables of multiplication or with learning the vocabulaire of a new language?
The tables are limited to 120 items, a vocabulaire of a new language is 20,000+
Prof. Adriaan de Groot mentions somewhere that a (grand-?)master knows 50,000 positions by heart. Other sources speak of 100,000 positions.
An article that especially inspired me was about the five stages of skill acquisition. They talk about 50,000 positions for a chess master.
So the comparison with learning a new language seems to be the most appropriate.
Accrueing skills around a few basic patterns has never worked with me.
Back to the main question:

What is the best way to learn 50,000-100,000 patterns?
I'm not too far from finishing circle 4 at CTS.
This means that at average I have seen every problem of the window (=10,000 problems) 4 times by now.
My average rating at CTS is increased with 50 points.
What does this mean?
If you look at the bell curve of the rating distrubution of the problems you can see that my problem window has shifted 1,300 upwards.
This means that I ingrained 1,300 patterns at the downside of the problem window in my system and that I got 1,300 new problems at the upside of the window.

Summarizing: it took me 6 months to gain 1,300 patterns.
That means 50,000 patterns will cost me another 19 years.
The price of being objective bears heavily on me, thanks, Blue Devil:)
There are three marginal notes:

• I took a break of 3 weeks what costed me 2 months to recover.
• I am almost finished with circle 4 now so I'm expecting an accumulated effect the next circles.
• Since a few weeks I altered my method. This seems to work well.

So I have to find a faster method. Idea's anyone?