In the past, I have played backgammon mainly against a Turkish friend, playing without the doubling cube.

I want to start playing in backgammon tournaments and need to increase my doubling cube and match play skills.

I am looking for recommendations of books, articles, and other means of improving in these two areas of the game.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

There is surprisingly little literature about doubling strategy. The -backgammon encyclopedia- by Kit Woolsey is all about doubling, though it covers just a part of the doubling discipline, and is quite expensive with respect to the other books.

Doubling strategy is all built around understanding the given equity each player has in a given board setup. This is unbelievably hard and complex at points - even for the very best players.

One of the ways I find helpful to start looking at doubling technique is just to try and consistently keep track of the ebb and flow of a matches equity when playing the bots, and start taking note of the key positions where doubling choices arise. Try and look at the key themes of the positions - focus particularly on the race lead, the key assets involved and the threats involved.

As a very general rule, if you hold an advantage in two of these key areas in the early stages, you should double, if you have an advantage in any of them, you should take if doubled.

These decisions become much harder late in the game as the degrees of complexity increase, and the only real advice you can be given is that you need to start working on understanding what the overall equity is in as many patterns as possible and use this knowledge to make better doubling choices.

It's also worth remembering that the doubling cube adds an extra dimension of cruelty to an already very brutal game, so working on your anti tilt skills is also an important aspect of good cube play if you are starting to play for stakes that matter to you.

A good place to start is "Winning with the Doubling Cube" by Peter Bell. It's intended for people who are new to using the cube, and covers all the basic concepts in depth. It's also well-written and easy to understand. After you've read that you can go on to more advanced books. It's available at Amazon.

I do not wish to disagree with any of the above but I would say skip the Peter Bell book. Buy "Backgammon Bootcamp" by Walter Trice instead. Why? Well firstly the Trice book is excellent and covers match play and most of the stuff you need to know in an easy accessible way. Also the reviews of the Bell book are mixed. http://www.bkgm.com/books/Bell-Winni...blingCube.html Read ALL the reviews. Yes he wrote an excellent article on Doubling which you can read at http://www.bkgm.com/rgb/rgb.cgi?view+1003 for free.
"The Backgammon Encyclopedia" by Kit Woolsey is also pretty good and recommended. Practise on FIBS as it is free. Also pretty good Is "Improve your Backgammon" by Paul Lamford. Match play can be confusing but a lot of fun.

I still consider myself learning to play matches better, even though 8 weeks ago I managed to win my countries 2013 Backgammon Champs for the second time. I was also one of the organisers - which did not help as I was pretty exhausted by the end of it. Like all things in Backgammon, when you think you have "got it" you learn how little you really know.

P.S. (1) Kit Woolsey also wrote an excellent article called the 5 point match http://www.bkgm.com/articles/GOL/Aug99/fivept.htm
(2) The online magazine GammonVillage has some excellent articles by Stick Rice on playing individual scores

Thanks Grant for your suggestions of books and articles on doubling and match play.

The Woolsey article on 5-point matches is most helpful as is the Bell rgb article on doubling theory.

I purchased your e-book, Priority Thinking, which I am finding helpful in finding the right approach to backgammon positions more generally.

Cheers.

What are this more advanced books on doubling cube?

Of the sources that remain in print, you could try the following:

BG Encyclopedia, by Woolsey
How to Play Tournament BG, by Woolsey
501 Essential BG Problems
Back issues of Inside BG, which had a lot of cube articles and discussions over 8 years.

I play against GNU and every single cube decision, I hit the "Hint" button to see the equity for both sides and thus get a feel for what kind of positions to cube, accept cubes, drop cubes, or play on for the gammon.