Tactics, tactics, tactics: Winning Chess Tactics for Juniors

There is a little-expressed and I suspect little-followed belief that for club level players [which is what I aspire to] studying tactics is the best way of improving your results. The vast majority of chess books and DVDs are devoted to the start of the game with four volume treatises on the latest lines in fashionable GM openings not unusual. I would guess that most of the chess books I own relate to opening theory. If a golfer sees the swing as the bedrock of the their game, amateur chess players mistakenly believe that strong opening play will lay the foundations for success later on in the game. The problem is that while you might follow a Kasparov endorsed line in the Sicilian Nardorf for 15 or 20 moves at some point you'll be on your own and clueless about what to do next.

Encouraged by a book I borrowed from Hackney Library I've finally started doing what I knew I should have been doing all along. Instead of the endless reading of positional textbooks, game collections and worst of all opening books I've devoted all of my little available chess studying time to book I bought in a secondhand shop on Well Street Market: Winning Chess Tactic for Juniors.

I've been working though a page or so of 6 boards each day on the tube to work. The book's introduction encourages you to solve them from the diagram rather than setting them up on a board which is great for travelling, and that also you go through the book three times skipping ones you can't solve in five minutes to come back later. The revisiting problems is also to see whether the solution to that type of position has 'stuck' and if it comes up in a similar (as it's unlikely to be an identical) position if you'll spot it.

I really like the book as there's no messing, just problem after problem and over 500 of them. The solutions are no messing too, little more than a line of moves, no other annotation.


The introduction suggests that you spend no more than 5 minutes on any one problem and if you can't do it in that time move on. There are a few things that have occurred to me so far:

1. I often get the right move or idea but not necessarily in the right order. The lesson is that once you've spotted the theme, check it and check it again to make sure you have the strongest continuation. Given that these are forcing combinations then if there isn't a checkmate or win of material then you've missed something.

2. Which brings up the next point. In studying the positions knowing that you're looking for a combination obviously helps. You don't spend a great deal of assessing the positional niceties (although if the other side has a mate in one you do need to do something better - usually a forcing mating sequence.

Update three days after drafting this post: I've realised that if I don't up my rate I'll die before I've been through the book three times so I'm now aiming at doing 20 a day. Having said that I haven't played any matches so who knows if I'm getting any better.

Updating the update: I played for Hackney last night against Metropolitan and I did feel that I had a greater awareness of tactical possibilities. Nothing major, no winning combinations but when my opponent pushed his e pawn forward attacking my bishop I realised straight away that he couldn't capture it as the pawn was pinned against his unprotected Queen. I'll post the game soon.