Happy Old Year?

It is that time of the year when we cover-up last year's resolutions by making new resolutions. Fair Enough!

I think a great deal can be learned from our failed resolutions and in my case I can clearly see that I must stick to simple and measurable goals. Life is complicated as it is and the Fun Time quota is limited.

This year, I feel the Force is working for me. I have .... not decided but perhaps accepted the idea as an alternative...... considered not to buy any chess books for a while. I soon realized that the well defined time period "a while" might be less than a week. However, the Force kicked in and I might be able to prolong "my while" for some time.

A book I have been keen on for quite some time appeared on an online book seller's list. I placed an order but got the message that the book was unavailable. I could live with that as I discovered that the book also was available in mint condition at an US based shop. No problems ordering the book but for unknown reasons they charged the same shipping fees for single books as for orders of 3+ mid sized elephants.

A friendly online chess player informed me that the book was available from a German bookseller. However, they refused to accept orders below 15 Euros and my planned purchase was listed at 14.95 Euros. A few friendly emails might allow me to bump the cost upwards by a fraction of an Euro or I should go with the flow and obey the Force.

My Chess Goals for 2011

Here are the draft list of my Chess Goals for 2011

• 50+ Slow Games
• Read three or more chess books
• 50+ Stoyko Exercises
• Study 100+ Annotated Mastergames
• Play few corr games
• Do 50+ Guess-the-Move Exercises
• Write a weekly Training Report
  

Short List of Chess Books to Read 2011

- Elements of Positional Evaluation: How the Pieces Get Their Power by Dan Heisman
- Looking for Trouble: Recognizing and Meeting Threats in Chess by Dan Heisman
- Simple Chess: New Algebraic Edition - by Michael Stean- Essential Chess Endings: The Tournament Player's Guide - Paperback (June 30, 2003) by James Howell
- New York 1924 by Alexander Alekhine

Kickstarting New Year's Resolutions

I realized two things that will make it easier to achieve My goals:

1. Starting Early
and
2. Keep it Simple

My Chess goals will be to read three chess books carefully and to play 50+ slow games before 2012.

I could use the extra time to decide on the books to read.

Happy New Year!

The Holiday Season has been pretty lazy but the New Year waiting around the corner is a reminder to get up to speed with my chess training. I will take a short break from the Team4545 League and instead join some ICC tournaments. The Team League is great fun but scheduling the games is a pain due to the time zone differences.

The top priorities for the immediate future is to digest more annotated master games and to become more confident with the black pieces.

One of my chess mentors suggested that improving my ICC rating by on average three points per game played would be a reasonable expectation. That is great news!

Members of the Movement --- Please Join!

I have noticed a few Chess posts on New Year's Resolutions. Please update me about other members of the movement!

Members of the Movement:

ericmittens
deepgreene
Begin Chess
Russ Bastable
PetrS
MidwayChessClub

New Year’s Chess Resolution

The Guru hereby invites all fellow chess improvers to join the New Years Chess Resolution Movement! I strongly believe in simplicity, goals and peer pressure. I kindly invite blogging chess improvers to do the following:

• State a Long Term Chess Goal (possibly linked to a suitable number of short term goals)
• State a Chess Promise
• Defining a penalty for failing the chess promise

Hopefully the members of the movement will blog about their efforts and support fellow improvers with feedback on their blogs. How does that sound?

Farbror the Guru's New Year's Resolution:

• Long Term Goal: Reach 1400 at ICC
• Chess Promise: Daily Chess Training (30+ minutes) and Keeping a Weekly Training Log
• Penalty for Failing: Not to buy any books for a year

Members of the Movement:

ericmittens
deepgreene
Begin Chess
Russ Bastable
PetrS
MidwayChessClub