The Nine (Ten) Circle Program

I was going to wait until I finished the program before I doled out advice on how one might improve de la Maza's program, but there are a few knights in the early lap of Circle One, so I'm gonna sound off now.

I think there are a few problems with the Seven Circle program.

1) It covers too many problems.
2) It doesn't leave enough time to digest early material before moving on to more difficult material.
3) The first Circle takes too damn long. You have to go two months before you can claim victory.
4) The workload is a bit much for people who and not young and unemployed.
5) "Seven circles" is poetically incorrect. There should be nine circles to correspond to the nine circles of Hell in Dante's Inferno. You won't write the "Eight Commandments of Chess Improvement", would you?

As such, I present
Don's Nine Circles for Tactical Chess Improvement

First, my nine circle program can be completed in the same 127 as de la Maza's. I'm adding more circles, not more time. Second, it actually has 10 circles. This is because hell has expanded since Dante wrote the Inferno. There are several new classes of sinners -- televangelists, sandbagging chess players, spammers, etc. In addition, they had a bit of an overflow problem after the Third Reich started showing up. As such, they had to build an addition. That and I need 10 to make the math work out.

Circle One -- 32 days -- level 10-30 Max time -- 10 minutes

Circle Two -- 16 days -- level 10-30. Max time -- 5 minutes

Circle Three -- 8 days -- level 10-30. Max time -- 2.5 minutes

Circle Four -- 32 days -- level 40-60. Max time -- 10 minutes

Circle Five -- 16 days -- level 40-60. Max time -- 5 minutes

Circle Six -- 8 days -- level 40-60. Max time -- 2.5 minutes

Circle Seven -- 8 days -- Level 10-60. Max time -- 1.25 minutes

Circle Eight -- 4 days -- Level 10-60. Max time -- 37.5 seconds

Circle Nine -- 2 days -- Level 10-60. Max time -- 30 seconds

Circle Ten -- 1 day -- Level 10-60. Max time -- 30 seconds

I think this approach would work better. It would give you more of a chance to master the problems at the different levels before moving on, but it keeps the same last 4 cirlces to cement the pattern recognition.

In the words of Darth Vader, "It is too late for me, my son", but I thought I'd pass this along as future de la Mazians might find it more beneficial than the program as originally outlined.

Level 60 starts tomorrow.

121 days down, 34 to go
954 problems down, 84 to go in Circle Two
Level 10: 97%
Level 20: 88%
Level 30: 76%
Level 40: 68%
Level 50: 63% (finished strong)