Being a Grandmaster and a Chess Mom can be tricky sometimes. After a lot of dedication and hard work, my elder son Tommy finally broke through and won the National 2nd Grade Championship in December. He also became the #1 ranked 7 year old in the country. This was the beginning of the downfall.
After the wonderful successes, Tommy became “over confident”. He resisted solving puzzles. He resisted working on his endgame. He resisted practicing, learning and improving. He thought he was the King of the Hill! This happens to a lot of young players with early strong results.
So what happened? There is no miracle in chess. When you do not practice, you do not improve. In fact, you become less sharp and weaker. Moves do not come so fast anymore. Your calculation skill starts to falter. As the result of this, Tommy lost rating points in 2 consecutive tournaments. Losing rating points is not the issue. The issue is he was struggling with his game.
This past Friday, he played in a scholastic tournament in NY City. So how did he do? As the #1 seed, he went 0-3 and lost 64 rating points! As a Chess Mom, it was a horrible feeling to see my son failed so miserably. But as a Chess Coach, this was the best thing that could have happened to Tommy. It was a real wake up call to him. He finally realized that he is not the King of the Hill anymore. He is now committed to working hard on his chess again. He learned a very hard lesson.
As my father used to say, every day that you do not practice chess, you lose the knowledge of 10 days. Practice makes perfect and it has to be done on a consistent basis. 15-30 minutes a day on busy days is still better than nothing. Even for a son of a Grandmaster and a former Women’s World Champion, there is no magic pill. And this is the moral of the story. Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% talent!
You got it right on the head! Thanks for sharing it with us!
Susan, starting learning chess at the age of 32, being a physician, and even not sleeping to keep up with hospital and studying chess (with books and with a teacher, my rating should be aroud 1400-1500)..
But it’s discouraging “when you don’t study 1 day, you’ll lose knowledge of 10 days”.. Do you have advises for people like me who really want to learn the game and become a player over 2000?
Kind regards..
First, Tommy is an adorable little boy and a good sport. Second, I have seen this happen with so many children. They have a little bit of success, become over-confident and neglect their studies. Sometimes, a wake-up call like Friday’s tournament is just what he needs to get back on the right track and motivated to study hard. I’m glad that you posted this story and particularly glad that you included the quote from your father as we will definitely use it around here!
starting learning chess at the age of 32, being a physician, and even not sleeping to keep up with hospital and studying chess (with books and with a teacher, my rating should be aroud 1400-1500)..
But it’s discouraging “when you don’t study 1 day, you’ll lose knowledge of 10 days”.. Do you have advises for people like me who really want to learn the game and become a player over 2000?
I am not Susan, but another physician who loves chess, but without the inborn talent. I learned chess in my teens, I fell in love with chess, yet despite any studying (self), playing, I could never get to even a “good amateur” level. I am now 59 years old, I still regularly play chess and I am barely better than I was 40 some years ago.
If chess playing ability didn’t have a major genetic component, it wouldn’t be typical to have child chess super-talents.
So, my humble recommendation: settle for your 1400-1500 level, enjoy it among friends, or against computer programs. You would have to ditch your profession to even have a faint chance to become a 2000+ chess player. Obviously, if you enjoy it, you can still study chess, but don’t raise high hopes.
Feel free to disagree 🙂
Gabor
It is true that rating points come and go. I find that for a lot of kids, when they start focusing too much on their rating and start worrying about losing rating points, they have a “brain freeze” when they play chess. If you keep working, whatever rating points you lose, will come back.
To the anonymous poster that I removed 2 posts in this thread:
Don’t come to my blog and insult my son and I and expect your post to stay up. Your post was quite obnoxious.
Susan Polgar
Ok, sorry if i insulted you, Susan. All i said was: nevermind the drawbacks. Progression isn’t linear.
You cannot always win…
Now i feel really bad. This wasn’t meant insulting at all 🙁
Good for You Susan.
The most important thing for a parent is to allow the child to FAIL. There is nothing better than the opportunity to fail when it does not really matter so much in life. Too many kids are sheltered from failure and then when they are adults they have failures that do count and they can not handle it.
I am sure Tommy will be much better for this. Now is the time to learn this lesson. He is such a good kid. We are all supporting Tommy.
Gabor, I think most people at the chess club continue to improve over the years. many go from lower levels to 2000 over a period of time. But it does seem to help if you can just enjoy the game and not worry so much about the rating.
So I would like to say to the doctor. Just enjoy the game and see what happens. Tactics or doing puzzles will get you up there quickest. Try to do some puzzles every day and the rest will take care of itself.
And remember is it ok to memorize the answers to puzzles. Then when the position happens on the board you will be ready.
As another chess loving doctor who also got the “chess bug” as a teenager but who is now 46 years old and finally having a bit more time to play, I can say that the first Anonymous should not be too discouraged. He or she may never reach 2000 but can probably get better. Points to consider:
1. Remember the further one goes in chess the more difficult the opposition. Your opponents won’t drop pawns and pieces and allow obvious combinations so don’t expect that and don’t play with that expectation.
2. You can’t expect to match overnight the level of someone who has played continuously since age ten. Just think about your profession. Do you think someone who is fascinated by medicine can catch up in a few years with a physician who has been in practice for years?
3. You have an advantage in that you already know how to study and how to discipline your time. Take advantage of that. Don’t flit from topic to topic. Work on the endgames so that you know the basic king and pawn, rook and pawn endings cold. Work on tactics. Don’t worry about really hard 4-5 movers, concentrate on the basic 2-3 movers and seeing them in different guises. Remember the old medical adage of common conditions can present in both common and uncommon forms. Pick an opening repertoire and stick with it for at least a year and review your wins and losses. Don’t switch openings after each setback. Finally, find a regular place to play against comparable or stronger players; even casual games will help keep you sharp. Against weaker opposition seek to play sharply and end the games decisively.
I’m still a class level player and may never make expert or master but I enjoy the game more – now when I see commentary on ICC or Chessbase and one of the GMs write “of course White must play move X” sometimes it actually makes sense!
Good Luck!
Another Chess Doc
I agree with most of what GM Polgar wrote, but I humbly disagree on one major point.
It is not mandatory for children to spend time each and every day on chess, especially on busy days. It is not even healthy. Frankly, the kids need to be kids some days. It is also important for children to have a broad range of experiences and if that means no chess for a day (or even a few days), then so be it.
Of course, if you want to be good at chess, then you need to work hard at it. Even that has limits. All of my top students have taken breaks ranging from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, usually due to some school or extra curricular activity. Elementary age kids are supposed to explore many activities. Only later in life should they pick 2-3 to concentrate on.
Just recently, one 2000+ rated 12 y/o took several months off to play in a basketball league. He still spent 2-3 hours a week studying chess (including lessons) but played in no tournaments. In his first event after basketball, he beat a master and picked up over 20 rating points. The layoff didn’t seem to hurt him!
Michael Aigner
Gabor and Another Chess Doctor,
Thank you for taking time to pass your advises.. True that I’ve a very busy schedule at work and even after that I have to read the medical journals and write papers, plus on-calls etc. Still, this chess love in me is not some kind of fun or hobby, it’s almost been my second job. And I’m very sad to be so late to study chess, and am trying to catch up. Several proffessors already told me that one or the other, our proffession does not tolerate such a hard work on some other subject. Don’t laugh but I’m even planning taking several months off (very difficult, maybe impossible) and study chess. Maybe better after I learn a bit more.
I’ve met to a doc who is over 2000 and and is around 50 years old, he also told me not to study chess because being a physician is so demanding and I may fail in chess, but take it as fun. He’s been playing chess from his childhood. However, it seems nothing discourages me. So far work is ok, but I refuse almost all get together offers with friends or movies etc.
Well, many thanks again. Soon I’ll start to play in tournements, I don’t know if it will be very discouraging. I told my teacher to tell me when to start, I don’t want to lose all my games and look like a stupid girl..
Very kind regards,
doc.
Ratings aren’t important!
It’s the joy of the game that counts.
i agree i think getting better comes in leaps rather than gradual progressions. i always belive its better to take a step back and two steps forward than stay at the same level.
wolverine
Tommy is a talented player and did perform below expectation at the NY scholastic tournament, but it would be nice to give his opponents credit for games well-played.
This thread is not about the quality of the games. This post is to help other parents and coaches deal with similar situations. Kids are kids and they get over confident sometimes.
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
To New Chess Doctor,
Your first tournament. Relax. You are going get beat up. I lost my first 4 tournament games. But then I learned to win. Tournaments are different than playing for fun with friends.
I can highly recommend a long tournament like the world open. Your chess will be so much better at the end then at the beginning. Your mind will have time to flip into chess mode. You will get a week of saturation into chess. It is like learning a foreign language. total submersion into chess does wonders.
Also try to do 30 chess puzzles a day. or more if possible. But do not over do it. enough to push your mind but not so much you get tired of it.
Repeat the puzzles for a 2nd, 3rd and 4th time. you will be amazed how easy they are the 4th time.
Get good at tactics and you will be 2000 for sure.
fpawn,
I agree with your comments. When-
ever my 8-year-old son needs a
break after training for and com-
peting in a difficult tournament,
I gladly give it to him. Kind of
like the movie Searching for Bobby
Fischer when the dad wisely goes
fishing for a couple weeks with
Josh and then enters Josh in an important tournament. Josh, after
being rejuvenated, went on to per-
form extremely well.
Being a chess father/coach is a
constant exercise in psychology.
Knowing when to motivate and when
to back off and let him be a kid
is not always easy, but very im-
portant to keep that love for
chess and our father-son relationship strong.
Even a kid as talented as Josh
suffered an apparent bout with
being burned out and had un-
characteristic losses. I am cer-
tain that Tommy will bounce back
and be even stronger, despite
recent difficulties. I’ve seen my
son rebound from disappointing
tournaments through very hard work.
Eric Morris
To the doc:
If you want to get the most out of your first tournament, make sure to accept any post-game offers to analyse the play. A lot can be had from these analysis, especially when one is new to the subtleties of tournment level play.
Watching other players analyse their games can also be helpful – both to get a feel for how these “post-ops” are conducted, and to learn the various thought processes that go into a game.
Also, I think some of the posters here are a bit too optimistic when it comes to tactical knowledge and rating: I regard tactical knowledge and a solid knowledge of the basic endgames pre-requisites for becoming a 2000 player, but they’re not sufficient by themselves. There’s simply *more* to the game than that.
Anwyho: best of luck
“If you want to get the most out of your first tournament, make sure to accept any post-game offers to analyse the play.”
However don’t accept other class player’s word on what is and is not good. Unless of course you’ve gotten to play a GM. Class players even higher than you are not perfect.
DO analyze with them and see how they were thinking. Then go home and analyze with Fritz or Shredder.
Dear all,
Thank you for all your advises. I read them several times. Many thanks for your interest, time, mesages.. I appreciate.
Very king regards, and good games !
New chess doc.
Hi Susan,
I didn’t know you had a blog! Wow, what a tough thing to blog about. Being coach and mom are quite the roles!
Good luck to your son.
Often, when my child would play, I didn’t understand much about what was going on-unlike yourself. To develop some empathy and understanding, I took chess up. It gave me insights into the stresses and complications that arise around the game. And I’m not talking about the chess itself. I’m glad you’re brave enough to touch on the personal experience. For many parents whose kids play chess, it is a rare insight.