Hey there,
My classical rating got stuck around 1400. (See profile) I started playing chess a year ago and im 23 now. I tried numerous chess puzzles but that rating got stuck too. Did I learn chess too late? Is there even any hope left for me?
Try to calculate all the moves of the puzzle in your head. Then you are sure you found the best move. Do you want to be a GM?
Thanks for the advice! I dont want to be a GM :p I just want to make some progress. It feels bad if I stay below 1400 all the time. Puzzles seem to kind of demotivate me, since when I make mistakes the computer has no mercy.
buy a chess puzzle book or find one on the internet(and try to solve them)
and learn some openings and plans
then learn some basics endings like R against pawn and Rook and king and pawn against king
@Olesma:
Its of course not too late to become a solid chessplayer. I started at same age (I learned the rules earlier but never played chess seriously before) and gained 700 rating points since then.
But you have to look at your mistakes (means analysing your games) and you have to study tactics as well as strategical issues. I looked at one of your recent games and there are basic things for you to learn (not moving with king into selfpins, not giving up bishop pair for free, not moving pawns if you weaken important squares and so on...) and if you do so you will improve for sure.
I would not play fast games (under 15 minutes) because its pointless if you want to improve.
Good luck!
Nada
For me puzzles are not very usefull since you already know that there exists a very good move and you have to look for it..this is not the case during a regular game..where the problem is to know what to do to defend yourself and when there is a balanced position..
In my case, I improved by watching videos on youtube where chess champions games were commented.
Don't take the computer as an opponent that is crushing you but rather as the trainer showing you where you can improve. Especially in puzzle, when your move is wrong, open the board in analysis mode and look up why this is the case, what the opponent could gain.
This actually teaches you two things: Patterns you need to avoid and patterns you can exploit against your opponents. If you do not understand why one move is better than another one, play the line against the machine and see if some noticeable advantage shows up. If it is still not clear to you after that, you may want to reconsider your evaluation skills, meaning that you should try to see when you disagree with the computer and more importantly, why you do.
I was extremely bad....you can always improve....you will improve.
Focus on one or two openings and study these lines, do some puzzles and more importantly run a computer analysis once you played your game. It is pointless to play 10 games in a row if you do not know what you did wrong. Check your blunders and see what would have been the best move. If it is too painful to look at your blunders then analysis your victory and your opponent blunders. It might be better for your ego to keep analysing one of your victory :)
With all due respect, I will never play classical online. I simply don't trust people. It's too easy for someone to flip on an engine and check a move. Even if they don't cheat the whole game, just cheating for one move is too easy with the slower time control. I honestly think the best way to play classical, is to play live tourneys. And stick to faster time controls online (which btw, aren't safe either but its a lower likelyhood)
If you want to improve and you are stuck at 1400 don't buy chess books! Why? Because you will not understand them. Books require some strategical/tactical knowledge to be read properly and you lack of both of them. Instead try to solve puzzles and watch commented video of chess masters on youtube, this is how I have improved from 1400 to 1600+ OTB rating in one year