The Study Buddy Group?

Submitted by farbror on Wed, 03/19/2008 at 7:39am.

I am so far pretty pleased with my silicon based Study Buddies (CD-discs from Convekta) but I am not at all pleased with my sparring partner (Chessmaster). It appears to be very difficult for software to play bad and humanlike chess.

Now when Live Chess is getting in place it might be a doable thing to get a Study Buddy Group going? I was thinking of a rather small group of players aiming for a 1400-1600 OTB rating. A group of players interested in playing a few slow games each month and to spend some time analyzing those games.

Why would a player with a turn-based rating much higher than that aim for an OTB rating of 1500ish? Well, playing OTB is in my opinion quite a different thing. I have spent a lot of time on my games to avoid blunders and to track down useful master games. My turn-based rating is badly inflated. I think a OTB rating in the 1500 region should be a perfect goal for the end of the year given my results in different tests such as Tactics Trainer etc.

The Study Buddy group might also be a perfect forum for a Chess Book Reading Group.

So, Any Takers?

» posted in farbror's Blog

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Comments:

by Masky - 6 months ago
Montreal Canada

Member Since: Aug 2007
Member Points: 80

i like it!

by farbror - 6 months ago
Uppsala Sweden

Member Since: May 2007
Member Points: 1218

What I had in Mind:

The purpose of”The Study Buddy Group” is to help each other improve our OTB rating. There will be few formal commitments but I would like to ask all members to start a thread in the group forum called “X’s training Journal” (Oh, and replace “X” with your own name!).

The Journal can be as detailed as you like but it would be nice if it started with a short presentation of your chess life and your chess goals.

I would like to see some kind of Reading Group within the study group. The recently updated version of “My System” might be a suitable book to read and discuss. Another interesting task is to co-work on analyzing slow games. My idea is that we use the group forum to post self annotated games and then discuss the analysis. It would probably be more interesting if we discuss slow live games between group members.

Peer pressure is a nice driving force and I hope “The Study Buddy Group” will help us to develop and reach our goals.

Thoughts? Comments?

http://www.chess.com/groups/home/the-study-buddy-group

by musiquismo - 6 months ago
df Mexico

Member Since: Jan 2008
Member Points: 109

yea im in

by farbror - 6 months ago
Uppsala Sweden

Member Since: May 2007
Member Points: 1218

Speaking of comittment: I have two kids!

If I aim for one game/month I will be happy to bag one every six months.

by Stratford - 6 months ago
South Africa

Member Since: Mar 2008
Member Points: 1

That's a good idea, Patrik, and I'd like to participate although I am aware that I'm probably rather lower rated given my lack of success on the Tactics Trainer etc. Hopefully the group would help me learn, seeing as I clearly lack the discipline to do so effectively on my own.

I would also particularly enjoy a chess book reading group, too. I have a lot of chess books but I don't get as much out of them as I feel I ought to because there's nobody to ask if I don't understand something from the book - which is a common occurrence!

If the chess reading group were to go ahead, what book(s) might be good to start with? Any suggestions? I've been making my way very slowly and painfully through 'Pawn Structure Chess' by Andrew Soltis, and would love some help with that (I simply don't know enough about openings to get much benefit). But I was thinking that maybe Nimzowitsch's 'My System' would be a classic that everyone could benefit from. I've read it once, a few years ago, and did enjoy it and felt that there was interesting material on topics such as overprotection, reorganising attacking pieces, and isolated pawns but I can't honestly say that I've ever implimented a lot of it in my play. There's a new edition by Quality Chess which is supposed to be superior to older translations, too.

by Foodle - 6 months ago
Moncton Canada

Member Since: Feb 2008
Member Points: 55

sign me up

by regnskog - 6 months ago
Stockholm Sweden

Member Since: Dec 2007
Member Points: 110

sounds like fun! I'm just worried about the time. Will I be able to pass one "game night" or do you want a commitment of the type "I hereby pledge to be available all Thursday evenings throughout the whole year for playing chess games with you"? :)

In my first ever OTB game I lost a very even game to a 1410-rated player and I feel that I could easily have beaten him if I could just keep my concentration during the whole 2 hours that the game lasted. I feel that a rating of at least 1500 should be acheivable for me.

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