i need more hours in the day
so far i’ve managed to maintain my “intense” study schedule. 1 hour of tactics, two master games, one of them being capablanca’s end game study games. today i shall get those in, and tonight is pizza and beer night.
but tomorrow begins the fruita fat tire festival. i shall study, but most of my time will be spent on the bike. perhaps a bit of a break will help?
i wonder though, that fine line between taking a break and chess atrophy. i’m afraid that if i go a day without chess study of some type, i will suddenly lose whatever i have, forget anything i may have learned. this is ridiculous, but i still fear it.
yet i don’t want to burn out, i don’t want to train and study my brain into a fried mess so it shuts down and won’t do anything. or maybe that isn’t even possible and i’m afriad of ghosts?
i’m really enjoying capablanca’s best chess endings. not only can i find games by opponent or opening, but there is an index in back so i can look up games by what capablanca had vs. his opponent. if i want to see him rook against knight and bishop, or queen and rook against queen and bishop, i look in the index and find what game covers that. pretty nifty.
and the endgame starts on a different page than the rest of the game, so if i just want to see the endgame and not how he got there, i can start on the endgame. it’s a really great book, i’m very happy with it
the only other endgame book i have is silman’s endgame course. it seems to have everything i need right now, so that for instruction and capablanca for practical engame in action should do me quite well for now.
now it’s just up to me to actually learn this stuff. and that is a whole other thing entirely.
Sciurus said,
April 23, 2008 at 10:28 am
I totally agree - Capablanca’s best endings is a great game collection. The annotations cover the important ideas well and help me to figure out the details myself. I just got a used copy for $2, which makes it even better, of course. Hell, it’s probably worth 2 bucks a game!
kindredspiritks said,
April 23, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Very enjoyable look at your study habits which is good. I remember as a child being laid up in a plaster restraint much of a summer school vacation due to broken bones and mom got me a chess book to study “Tarrasch’s THE GAME OF CHESS” which covered a lot of endgame play. I studied it for two years because I was confined to my school studies. When I was 13, I got a birthday gift entry into a Chess Review tourney and won it largely because of superior play in the endgames. When I got old enough to travel to Rochester on the bus, I joined the Rochester club and managed to qualify for the finals of their club championship, again due largely to my skill at the endgame. Keep up your endgame study as I can attest to the fact that it helps to win chess battles.
chessloser said,
April 23, 2008 at 7:55 pm
sciurus - $2 !!!! that right there wins. what a great deal you got….
kindredspiritks - other than you had to be laid up in a cast, that was a cool story, thanks for sharing. it’s good to know i am somewhat on the right path. thanks for stopping by and commenting, much appreciated…