Thanks for the advice!
I’d love to play in person more, but the only relative who also likes to play only comes to visit once a year or so, and last time we played I beat him every time we played (which made him not want to play anymore I think).
I’ll probably watch some YouTube videos and add some book to my Christmas list.
Google “(your city or biggest one close by) Chess Club” or “(Your State) Chess Association”
If your googling fails you, look up the libraries near you and see when their chess club meets - library ones will be mainly kids in my experience, but you can email and ask whomever leads the club if it is typically adults or kids, and if just kids follow up by asking what the main club is that adults play at.
I don’t know anyone personally to play, and at clubs they usually try to match you with someone around your level so you get good games in.
I hadn’t thought to do that! Quick search results seem promising
Capa fan made me work for the win in the endgame. On move 26 queens came off the board and I had a rook he had a bishop and it was 2v1 and 4v3 pawns on each side, favoring him. It took another 36 moves before he resigned. Click through if you like endgame maneuvering- it was by no means easy as I had to dance from one side of the board to the other and back again.
Had another crazy game with CapaFan1888 (aka Arthur Kade…not sure if he has posted here). I tend to get into these sharp positions with wild swings of advantages that no one ever seems to figure out while playing because we aren’t good enough lol. Anyway, we got into this really funny position I wanted to share: every square of the g-file is occupied while every square of the adjacent f and h files are empty.
Sorry, haven’t been checking this thread.
Enjoying my tournament games so far. Going to pull off a win against IPD (I mean mizizark) after he beat me in a very sharp game the first time around. I felt like I was holding off his attack enough to win, but alas, it was too much.
In Mayan’s post, I never found the move for black, but I do see the continuation for white. I lost to something similar fairly recently in frustrating form.
The g-file setup above looks like a puzzle you would see where I would say “what a fake position, this never happens in a real game.”
Also excited about my game with Mayan (I mean Minnesota). Our first bunch of meetings, he just slaughtered me, so anytime I stay in the game I feel good. And this one I am sure I had a winning position at certain points. That’s not to say I will win, of course.
You might have me confused with mizizark on chess.com I recently changed my username on there, but am now SneakySneeky
As for that g-file position, i didn’t even realize it til it happened, and then all I could do was laugh.
Totally, I confused you and Mayan for mizizark and Minnesota. Replace everything I said with those names above. Thanks.
For the black one it isn’t really a “winning tactic” that would make it into a puzzle, more just the best continuation.
Nxb2 was just devastating
For the white one I felt like the trick was realizing why 2. Bh6 fails since that feels like the most natural move
That was my main candidate move, but didn’t see an immediate win, just a strong position.
Good game 1695814. Beat me in game 1, and now playing a solid game in game 2. I think I took you for granted. In game 1, I just kept on waiting for you to make a mistake and hand me the game.
Not sure where to put this but if you’re looking for a strange chess variant consider downloading “5D Chess with mulitverse time travel” - because of the “time travel” feature games go quicker than regular chess but its sometimes hard to keep track of the moves. I thought it was a bit crazy and manged to checkmate my son without realizing it but my son seemed to enjoy it.
Sounds interesting. It’s an app?
He downloaded to his computer yesterday.
Yeah, I felt really good that whole first game. My play can be really…random…sometimes wonderful…sometimes blunderful.
Chess year in review as I have no plans to play any more rated games this year. 22 rated games, got my first ever win over an expert and ended the year at a new peak rating - though I was up in the low to mid 1700s pre-covid. After the long break I was a bit rusty at the end of 2021 / beginning of 2022 before returning to form. Also earned my “2nd Category” title through USCF tournament norms this past year.
2022
Rating start: 1658
Rating end: 1772
| Rating Range | Wins | Draws | Losses | Percent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0000-1200 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 100% |
| 1200-1400 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 75% |
| 1400-1600 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 86% |
| 1600-1800 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 67% |
| 1800-2000 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0% |
| 2000-2200 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 50% |
| Total | 16 | 0 | 6 | 73% |
Lifetime stats
| Rating Range | Wins | Draws | Losses | Percent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0000-1200 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 100% |
| 1200-1400 | 10 | 0 | 4 | 83% |
| 1400-1600 | 22 | 1 | 8 | 78% |
| 1600-1800 | 12 | 1 | 5 | 69% |
| 1800-2000 | 0 | 1 | 7 | 13% |
| 2000-2200 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 13% |
| Total | 55 | 3 | 26 | 67% |
That’s a great breakdown to start out your chess career! Do you tend to play in big or small tournaments?
I have only played in a handful of OTB games in the last decade, and my percentage is coming in around 55.6%. While my rating is technically in the 1700’s right now I am sure I’d be rusty and worse playing OTB again. I want to real bad though, COVID can’t end soon enough.
Very small - typically weekly-rated games at the club as part of a month-long tourney in the U1900 section. I might move up to the open section once OTB chess starts back up and I play a month or two to shake off the rust.
I’ve got small kids so the bigger tournaments are too much of a time commitment for me - though I’d love to play in my section at the US Open at some point in time, though that may be 15 years from now 
