Ok, I have looked at 3 games briefly...

The game against Harrington (huh?) was not too bad after all. Actually it developed quite logically. Moves like 14...g5 are overambitious, weaken the kingside and should be avoided though! I think that black was even slightly better at move 37 (R+B vs. R+N). After the exchange of minor pieces it is definitely a draw. Unfortunately 44....Rf8 allows a standard tactical motive for connected rooks.

In the game against the "dour faced girl" you win a piece in the opening (thanks to Dzindzi) but then you have trouble in converting the advantage. Your one and only concept is to exchange material and that dominates your whole thinking. You even discard the totally obvious 45. Kf6 in favor of Qf4 to exchange queens and blunder away yours in the process. Watch out for patterns like that in your mistakes. The good news is that you spot the mate in the end.

Finally in the game against Piper you complete an opening scheme/tabia and continue with standard moves (like g4) totally ignoring that he has not castled yet. Once you notice that your attack strike air you go into exchange mode again. 32. Rf2 sets up a nasty discovered check, but both players don't see it, because the g5-pawn looks so interesting. Then for some strange reason (maybe he underestimated you after you overlooked the winning move) he gets overambitious, plays a totally hopeless sac and loses the endgame. No comment.

There is a standard rule for beginners that helps later on also: Look at all checks, pins and captures. 33. Nxd4 would have been a check and a capture.

Here is a way how to proceed after you played a game:
1. Enter the notation in Chessbase
2. Include all lines that you calculated
3. Write down how and when your mood changed during the game
4. Use an Rybka to check everything including your calculations
5. Use the "reference" function in the opening to find out how GMs play the line
6. Make a concious decision if you want to repeat the variation otherwise find an improvement
7. Write down 3 things that you have learned from this specific game

I think that you should forget about my recommendation of the Noteboom and stick with Dzindzi's Nimzo. You are doing better in clear positions where you have a plan. With white you should probably switch to 1.d4, because the resulting positions are more rational.

Last but not least, there is a problem with your bet and this is the rating system. Once you have an established (lower) rating, you need to play better than your target rating because the lower rating remains as an artifact in your next rating. For instance if you have 1999 you can't just play 2000 to reach 2000. You need to play better than 2100 to win your bet and that is highly unlikely within the given frame of time. I cannot quantify it, but you are probably trying to hit a 1-outer on the river. Plan B would be to do it the Azmaiparashvili-way, but I won't get deeper into that.

If you want to win the bet, you need a personal trainer. There is no way around it! I don't know how much money is on the line, but if it is like "a lot", get a GM to work with you. Veterans like Walter Browne or Roman Dzindzichashvili should be available in the US. If not, contact Jan Gustafsson and if you don't want to pay, just offer him a few advanced poker concepts in return. I am sure GodGusti will bite...

Well the Bd2 b4 Ne2 line is again a much more subtle mistake than e6. The problem with it is that you ruin your piece harmony for no good reason. I mean after Qe2 in 'normal' lines white can really rush his play through fast. The queen on e2 helps ensure that our breaks come with initiative and threats. With our queen on d1, bishop on d2, and knight on e2 our pieces are all just getting in each others way and you restrict yourself almost exclusively to playing some variant of h3/g4/Ng3 but since you've dedicated yourself to a single primary plan, black can actually respond to it preemptively.

For example: 1. Bd2 b4 2. Ne2 Nf6 3. h3 h5!? Normally a move like this would be impossible as black's king would come under immediate fire in the center and kingside, but here - white's position has too little coordination to do anything at all about it, so black can make white's play really difficult to get going and then going on with his own play pretty quickly. Why would white want to allow any of this?

The bet isn't for him to reach a certain rating goal. It's to beat Howard Lederer in 1 game.

Wow, I haven't checked this thread for a while and it had certainly become very interesting. I didn't expect Allen to post games in here, but that's a great decision. I see that this set of games has been analyzed already, but I guess I might as well take a look at them and see maybe I will spot something else. You guys ITT are doing a great job, props!

Placing your knight on e2 is nothing unusual in this kind of positions. There is a well known variation in the English Opening (which is the Sicilian with reversed colors if you play 1...e5) where black moves his knight to e7 in a similar structure: 1.c4 e5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.g3 g6 4.Bg2 Bg7 5.d3 d6 6.Nf3 Nf6 7.0-0 0-0 8.Rb1 a5 9.a3 h6 10.b4 axb4 11.axb4 Be6 12.b5 Ne7. Btw, the idea of 8...a5 is to open "a" file for the rook, so 8.a4 in the position form AC's game is completely pointless, since black pawn is already on b5. Obviously, 8.Bd2 isn't a good move but it's still better than 8.a4.
I like your idea of h5 but white is still ok after 0-0 Be7 c4.
Moving a knight to c4 would be a good idea if black hadn't a pawn on d6. There's no point to waste 3 tempos (Nb1-d2-c4) and be pushed away from c4 by d5 pawn.

d2d4, that position isn't really even comparable at all. Note how cohesive and organized black's position is compared to white's position after Ne2. And please reread my post, I did not and would not ever recommend a4 in that exact position - I even briefly mentioned the point about d5.

If you really want to argue it would be more proper to mention that Bd2 is actually a fairly typical idea in those positions (although not on move 8 where it is definitely a mistake) because once the white queen is on e2 white has the common maneuver Nc3->d1->e3 available, and the bishop on d2 does not get in the way of the e file for Qe2+f5/e5 ideas. But even there it is a sidetrack because I am talking about Bd2 in that exact position, not after Qe2.

Then the title of this thread is misleading and his odds are pretty much close to exactly zero. He could cheat though...

Let me make this clear. The most likely outcome of a game between equal players is a draw, so AC must be much stronger than Howard to have realistic winning chances. Even if AC is guaranteed to have white, Howard still knows which openings to expect, so he can prepare for the game. I suggest a buy-out.

I didn't say that you recommended a4, I just commented this move which was mentioned in your post.
I agree that the knight on e2 is a bit misplaced but Ne2 costs much less time than long maneuvers like Nb1-d2-c4.

We push a draw and he hasn't played in years and promises not to practice. Earlier the pundits guessed if I got to around 1900 my chances would be close to equal.

It surprises me that someone who displays a decent knowledge of chess in some/most of his posts, can write nonsense such as in this one. I´m too lazy to elaborate right now, so I will let others do that.

You push a draw and he promised not to practice....hmm ok. Preparation could still be a factor, because it qualifies as theory and not as practice. You should either keep your openings secret or prepare something new for the match.

David, is that you?

Given my original (wrong!) assumtion, how would you judge that parlay? AC has to improve from beginner to be strong enough to win the only game he plays against an opponent with 2100 strength who even knows which openings to expect. If you give him more than 0.01%, then you must be an optimist.

I'm 90% sure that next year I'm going to have to remind him we even have a bet. Unless I don't think I'm ready, in that case I might let it slide.

Kidding, I'll show up and lose like a man.

Even with 400 points difference your expected score is more than 1%. Draws are fairly rare in rapid games at this level (between 10-20% on FICS at standard for 1800-2100 players) so even if he only gets to 1800 10% of the time his chances are much much better.

Hey Allen,

I was at the tournament also and saw you there several times. I considered coming over and introducing myself, but I knew you wouldn't know who I am so I didn't bother. This was actually the first tournament I played in over ten years and had a really good result (tied for 2nd in the Open Section). I've written an article about my comeback which will be up at Chess Life Online today or tomorrow at latest.

I think it's really great that you are attempting this - over my years of being involved in the chess community, I've seen more chess players than I can count basically giving chess up in favor of poker and its potential for a much better paycheck so it's nice to see someone occasionally go in the other direction, at least to some extent!

Although I haven't read every post in this thread carefully, I would caution people about giving advice on how Allen should improve no matter how well intentioned. In my experience (and this certainly doesn't apply only to chess, I'm a math professor) when trying to teach someone about something that you are more skilled at then them, if you are not experienced at doing so it's easy to do it in a completely wrong manner. While I've never tried to teach a Class C player myself, I definitely agree with Dynasty that telling them to learn concepts like Q+N vs Q+B or about the importance of the Bishop pair is silly - those concepts can only come at a much later stage. Again, when most people go about teaching someone they often do not make the necessary adjustment of thinking at that person's level, trying to teach at their own level instead of the level that the student is at.

If I had to give advice on how to improve myself (at least this was the major thing to me back when I was around your level) it would be: tactics, tactics, tactics. The vast majority of games at that level are unquestionably decided in the middlegame via tactical errors by one side, NOT by things like one side having the Bishop Pair or anything of that nature, so getting as adept as possible at tactics would imo be the best road to improvement. I really do not recommend also what you kind of hinted at in your recent tournament analysis - your need to work on endgames. While that is something that will obviously be helpful to your (or anyone's) game, once again the vast majority of games at your level are simply not decided in that phase of the game. Certainly there is nothing wrong with trying to get better at them, but I would not make them a high priority.

Also, to those of you who are saying or implying things like "he has to study this way since he needs rapid improvement to get to level X in time to win the prop bet", I think that's a really terrible idea - that to me is likely to be a surefire way to NOT improve at all. While obviously some people improve faster than others, I highly doubt that those who did so faster did it by means of "I'll study material for 2000 players even though I'm only 1400 strength since I need to reach 2000 strength by the end of the year". There is a systematic way of doing things and studying inappropriate material (concepts that you are not ready for) in such a fashion is more likely to be a detriment to your game than a help to it.

Anyway those are my initial thoughts, hope they're helpful, and maybe I'll introduce myself at the next tournament where I see you.

This is why a GM wouldn't be a good coach for a low rated player. 1000+ rating points gap is way too big. A grandmaster can't imagine how a 1400 player thinks. A certified coach rated 2000 would be a much better trainer.

I think there's some great advice in this thread, and it doesn't really matter if there is also some bad advice mixed in, it all provokes discussion and Allen is going to keep playing and learning no matter what.

Arun's article on CLO:

http://main.uschess.org/content/view/10298/585

He's too modest to point out that he ripped it up after a 15-year hiatus!

I agree tactics are important, also adult students seem to pick up rather quickly on positional concepts, which just makes tactics more important. But besides tactics, calculating itself is key (identifying candidate moves, trying to identify critical moments when you must calculate longer and harder than usual, looking for loose pieces, etc, Forcing Moves is a good book that addresses this, Think Like A GM too, though both books are somewhat advanced.)

Also it's important to make sure chess study does not make you play worse. Like in poker, a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and I think adults are especially prone to this.

I like to think of chess skill as combining your instincts with active thinking when your instincts are insufficient. Instincts alone make up the majority of skill- that's why a 2400 player can beat 20 1800s in a simultaneous exhibition, without thinking at all.

Best, Jennifer

stop tarding the thread up with arguments about who wrote what or who should actually read the thread first, and stick to giving advice. I've deleted a bunch of posts that were off topic, don't want to have to delete any more

http://www.chessclub.com/activities/teachers.html

http://web.archive.org/web/200504061...er_reviews.cgi

Allen, I'll teach you for free if you give me some money.

Btw, there is also some great training software on the market: http://chessok.com/shop/index.php?ma...products_id=94

This one provides you with a nice collection of strategical and tactical patterns.

Download the demo and give it try!

All Convekta programs are great.

Allen, sent you a PM. Let me know if you want to play some games in Vegas. I think Huck Seed plays some chess as well

Allen - Get a coach. There are a few very strong chess players-turned poker pros in your area. PM me if you want their contact info. You prob already know who they are - just may not know their chess background.

I think someone should commit to being at the match and relaying moves a/la live replay when this goes down - we have too much invested in Allen to just find out two week later

RB