Butt Kicked
So, I have taken a more sane approach to the program and doing less problems. I sit down last night well-rested and in a good frame of mind. I then proceed to get my butt waxed. I think I found about 5 complete answers all night. I was going to do 30, but called it a night after 27 as I heard myself thinking "Whatever, I'll just play the first move I see". Think it was just a bad night rather than me being a bad knight, but still hard to swallow.
Funny to hear this frustration for everyone. Sancho, who appears to be one of the strongest tactically, often expresses that he is having trouble but then posts pretty impressive numbers. I'd be doing kartwheels if I could get 91% of the level 30's, but he speaks about it like he is missing every other one.
In my case, I think it is the difference between seeing and understanding. The first hurdle in playing a combination is understanding how it works. If you just can't follow the sequence of moves or don't understand that the resulting position is a win for your side, then you don't understand it. Think of the postion that the club champion looks at in a post game analysis that he claims is a win for white because of x. You nod your head sagely and then go home and play it out in Fritz because you have no idea what he's talking about. "Ah, he's right. Black can't take the queen because the bishop is pinned". Now you understand. This is an important step forward, but it by no means guarantees that you will see the tactic when presented again.
My hunch is that I am understanding things a lot better here on day one hundred and FRICKIN eight but I'm still not familiar enough that I can see them. The result is that same on my scoring percentage. The only difference I now note is that I don't often have to fire up Crafty to go through a problem to see about another line. Once I see the solution I understand it immediately.
108 days down, 47 to go
678 problems down, 360 to go in Circle Two
Level 10: 97%
Level 20: 88%
Level 30: 76%
Level 40: 71% (told you I got my butt kicked)
Funny to hear this frustration for everyone. Sancho, who appears to be one of the strongest tactically, often expresses that he is having trouble but then posts pretty impressive numbers. I'd be doing kartwheels if I could get 91% of the level 30's, but he speaks about it like he is missing every other one.
In my case, I think it is the difference between seeing and understanding. The first hurdle in playing a combination is understanding how it works. If you just can't follow the sequence of moves or don't understand that the resulting position is a win for your side, then you don't understand it. Think of the postion that the club champion looks at in a post game analysis that he claims is a win for white because of x. You nod your head sagely and then go home and play it out in Fritz because you have no idea what he's talking about. "Ah, he's right. Black can't take the queen because the bishop is pinned". Now you understand. This is an important step forward, but it by no means guarantees that you will see the tactic when presented again.
My hunch is that I am understanding things a lot better here on day one hundred and FRICKIN eight but I'm still not familiar enough that I can see them. The result is that same on my scoring percentage. The only difference I now note is that I don't often have to fire up Crafty to go through a problem to see about another line. Once I see the solution I understand it immediately.
108 days down, 47 to go
678 problems down, 360 to go in Circle Two
Level 10: 97%
Level 20: 88%
Level 30: 76%
Level 40: 71% (told you I got my butt kicked)
posted by Don Q.
1 Comments:
Thanks for the kind words Don.
Don't worry you will surpass my scores. You have to remember that I did a practice lap, and had messed around with the software playing through the exercises with the play setting on "Tactical Methods" when I first picked it up a long time ago. So I had more than a slight feel for the problems before all of this started.
The funny thing is that you have nailed my mindset on each of the nights that I tank with the "Whatever, I'll just play the first move I see" phrase.
I really believe that a regularly scheduled meeting of the Knights will benefit us all. Especially if we can start bouncing our mindsets off of each other on our up days and our down.
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Sancho Pawnza, at 5:34 PM
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