Chess how to get rid of blunders. Chuzhakin system

Gross mistakes as a result of oversights ruined many excellent games, many hopes for a successful performance were cut short because of them. Many chess players are afraid of them. Even the American grandmaster Robert Fischer, who was compared to a computer for error-free play, before returning to the tournament fight again in 1970 after a two-year break, had previously insured himself in one company ... against views over the board.

“I was assured that this was madness on my part,” the head of the firm once said, “but my intuition told me that in this case I was not taking too much risk.

His intuition did not fail him, Fischer played beautifully and two years later became the world champion.

Jose-Raul Capablanca did not indulge in the mistakes of his rivals. In Sweden, in 1964, a collection of Capablanca's games, which he lost, was published. This book turned out to be a thin, pocket size. There are only 36 parts in the collection.

Here is one of them, played by the ex-world champion as black with grandmaster Friedrich Sämisch during the Carlsbad International Tournament (1929).

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. a3 Bxc3+ 5. bc d6 6. f3 e5 7. e4 Nc6 8. Be3 b6 9. Bd3

As always, elegant and self-assured, Capablanca contemplated his next move. However, having shifted his gaze to the auditorium for a moment, he froze in surprise. Along the aisle in the direction of the stage, his wife, who had flown in from America without warning, was walking unexpectedly.

Meanwhile, according to eyewitnesses, one spectacular person was already sitting in the front row ... The confused ex-world champion quickly made the first move that came to hand, stood up and hurried to meet his wife.

The party did not last long. After 10. Qa4 Bb7 11. d5 Capablanca resigned.

"Search a woman!" - advise the French, if you can not find the true cause of inexplicable phenomena.

There were two of them here!

Is it a yawn or a victim? This question often arises from the player, if there is an opportunity to take a substituted pawn or piece from the opponent.

– Did you sacrifice an exchange or missed it? one of the spectators asked the master during a tournament game.

“I can’t answer your question yet,” the master said to the surprise of the amateur. - If I win, then I donated, and if I lose, I overlooked it.

But one day it was the spectators who helped grandmaster Vladimir Simagin figure out whether he blundered a pawn or sacrificed it. There was another round of the USSR championship. Considering the options during the opponent's move, Simagin suddenly noticed that he was losing an important pawn. With a depressed mood, he sat in anticipation of the inevitable punishment. Suddenly, from the auditorium came clapping, which all intensified.

“Someone is making a combination,” thought Simagin and looked at the demonstration boards, but everything was calm there. Suddenly, an emotional exclamation of some fan was heard:

Bravo, Simagin!

The Grandmaster went deeper into his position. Oh miracle! It turns out that a pawn cannot be captured because of a forced mate, and if you do not take it, then it can be queened without hindrance!

So Simagin won the game he was about to resign.

Playing with Oleg Romanishin in the Kiev International Tournament (1978), Alexander Belyavsky had an extra exchange and an easily won position, but unexpectedly made a rude blunder. Romanishin managed to "pick up" a whole rook. Fortunately for Alexander, this allowed his mighty opponent only to prolong the resistance, but not to save the game.

- Did you deliberately give up this rook or "blundered"? fans asked Belyavsky after the game.

- I just take it on purpose! Grandmaster replied.

The English grandmaster Joseph Blackburn, playing with the Polish maestro Shimon Vinaver at the London International Tournament in 1883, "yawned" on purpose. Vinaver had a hopeless position, he decided to use his last chance: he set up his knight. If Blackburn takes it, then a pawn attack on the queen will follow, winning the game.

One of the spectators asked Vinaver:

- Why did you frame the horse?

- Who knows? Maybe Blackburn will take it!

As soon as this was said, Blackburn smiled and, to Winawer's amazement and the great amusement of the spectators, actually took the horse. In a moment, Vinaver understood his colleague's joke, attacked the queen with his pawn, and immediately... resigned! Truth has triumphed.

The most unexpected "yawns" can be found in the practice of amateurs. A long tournament with a large number of participants was coming to an end. Among all the chess players, only one stood out with her cheerful appearance. Still, in the endgame she had a decisive advantage: two knights and two pawns for a rook.

White decided that he was inflicting the final blow and played 1. Nc6+?, but did not take into account that the d5-pawn was pinned. The capture followed 1. ...Rxc6. All this was seen by the coach of the chess player who substituted the knight. At first he was very agitated, but then he calmed down. Winning chances are lost, but White has no problems on the way to a draw. The party continued. On 2. Nb4 Black put the rook back in place 2. ...Rc8, and White again, this time the second, put the knight on c6. 3. Nc6+?? Naturally, the second sacrifice was also accepted 3. …Rxc6.

The coach walked around the tournament hall, removed several white horses from the tables and, going up to his ward, said:

- Take some more!

Belarusian chess player Elena Zayats became an international master at the age of 18 (1988). As a child, she loved to step on. With a direct attack on the king, in which the queen played the main role, Lena completed most of the games. One of the first official meetings (Baranovichi, 1979), 10-year-old Lena began confidently. Her coach Tatyana Alexandrovna Poznyak calmly left the tournament hall, but less than two minutes later she heard someone sobbing behind her back. The coach turned around and saw the pupil.

- You lost?

“No,” Lena answered, and began to explain something through tears.

From all that was said, Tatyana Alexandrovna understood only one word "queen".

- The queen "yawned"? the coach asked.

– No, I “blundered” the exchange of queens.

The exchange of queens at that time for the young chess player was tantamount to… his loss.

Yawns are a major problem for most players.

They can ruin a game or even an entire tournament! In addition, they prevent a chess player from improving his results and raising his rating. That's why I once wrote .

I gave advice on how to avoid blunders, and suggested that if a player could reduce the number of mistakes, his chess strength would increase by 200-300 rating points almost immediately. It's obvious that yawns are very bad, aren't they? Surprisingly, this is not always true: sometimes a blunder can save your game!

Surprised? Let me show you an example from a recent tournament.

Black's position is completely lost. The engine suggests that they give up the knight with 33...Ne2. Of course, after this move, Black has no chance. Mammadyarov blundered checkmate in two moves and saved the game!

I have no doubt that it was not a bluff, and Mammadyarov simply did not notice the checkmate in mutual time trouble. If he had seen checkmate, he would have made a different move and probably lost. A yawn helped him escape!

Here is a similar example:

Kramnik saw that with any capture of the queen on f8, White's response 32.Qg6 would be very dangerous. On 31...Rxf8 32. Qg6 leads to forced mate in four moves. After 31...Kxf8 32.Qg6 Black is in a bad position, but after 31...Bxf8 32.Qg6 Bg7 the outcome is unclear.

Naturally, he played 31...Bxf8. This move still has one drawback: White checkmates, and in order to save himself, Black will have to give up the queen.

Imagine that Kramnik saw a loss after 31...Bxf8. He would have had to continue 31...Kxf8, and after 32.Qg6 he would most likely have lost, and after a terrible blunder 31...Bxf8 he won!

By the way, recently Mammadyarov himself suffered from a "happy yawn".

Black is down a pawn and is doomed to a long defense in an unpleasant endgame. Wait, can't they just take the b5-pawn? Try to understand what will happen in this case.

In the game, both grandmasters missed this simple refutation, so Black won the game and knocked his dangerous opponent out of the World Cup! Again we see the yawn turn golden!

Finally, let me show you a game that proves that humans are superior to engines in some ways. For years, we have heard that due to intuition and knowledge of positional patterns, in certain situations, people can go beyond the horizon of a computer account (using the so-called "horizon effect"). Recent advances in chess engine makers, especially the enigmatic AlphaZero, have almost completely scrapped this theory.

But in some ways, computers will never overtake us. They can never make mistakes like humans, and sometimes mistakes are good! Here is an old batch of programs that prove it. Try to find the best move in the following position:

Did you find it? Easy? You ask how the engine could blunder a forced checkmate? Good question! Of course, the winner of the first World Championship among computer programs did not blunder a mate, but preferred to give up a rook:

Not a single person would play 34...Re8 - after this move, Black has no chance to save himself. A protein chess player would play 34...Kg7, hoping that White would not notice the blow 35.Qf8!! According to the reports, none of the people present at the championship found the combination, and the programmers at first explained the victim as a computer malfunction.

Of course, everyone was shocked to see the variations Kaissa was considering after the game and to find that she had given up a rook to avoid checkmate. By the way, the same report says that the Duchess program also did not see checkmate due to the aforementioned horizon effect. Therefore, the blunder 34...Kg7 could have saved the game!

Although we have seen quite a few games today where blunders helped save or even win in bad positions, I wish you to allow fewer blunders in 2018!

This is when, at the end of November 2016, the Norwegian Magnus Carlsen played with our grandmaster Sergey Karjakin. The whole world followed this match. Among the audience were Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and Donald Trump.

Magnus Carlsen is the chess player of the future. His rating is just over the top. He has already become world champion twice, having dealt with the previous champion Viswanathan Anand like a child.

Magnus Carlsen

Sergey Karyakin is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest grandmaster. He received this title at the age of 12. In the match against Carlsen, Karjakin held a draw in several games, then won the game (which was generally considered impossible), then lost. And in the end lost in a tie-break. And Carlsen defended his title for the second time.

This match made chess a fashionable sport, and Carlsen and Karjakin were as popular among girls as cute football players and brutal gymnasts. So it's time to pump brains, not muscles.

Sergey Karyakin

Grigory Levenfish will help in pumping the brains - several generations of chess masters have grown up on it. And first, remember seven simple rules to help you improve your level of play. Of course, you won’t checkmate a grandmaster, but you definitely won’t lose in the first five minutes.

1. Do not miss pieces and pawns

Often an experienced chess player does not need to show high technique against an inexperienced player, because the latter blunders pieces and loses. Chess players call the loss of a piece or pawn due to inattention a blunder. This phenomenon is common among beginner chess players, but it also occurs among professionals. For example, in the recent Speed ​​Chess Championship online tournament, grandmaster Georg Mayer blundered pieces several times due to lack of time and lost games to Sergey Karjakin.

Dealing with yawns is easy. Before each move, look for all the pieces and pawns that you and your opponent can beat, and note for yourself which ones are undefended. There are three main ways to save a piece: destroy the attacker, retreat, or defend with another piece.

So, decide on a move and check the square where your piece will go - whether it is under attack by enemy forces. Imagine that you have made a planned move. Did your other piece come under attack after it?

The level of your game will increase if the application of this simple instruction becomes a habit.

2. Do not play with one piece at the beginning of the game

Playing with one piece in the opening is one of the most common mistakes of beginners. The strength of the figures lies in their harmonious interaction. The tactic of single attacks is unlikely to create problems for the enemy, but it will waste valuable moves. An experienced player at this time will have time to withdraw the pieces and create threats.

A separate conversation about the game with the queen. To beginners, he seems to be a strong and self-sufficient figure that can be sent to the enemy's rear. Remember: at the beginning of the game there are many pieces and pawns with which you can catch a lone queen.

Final game Castaldi - Reshevsky

The white queen made its way to the eighth rank and beat the black rook. But after the knight's move to b6, Black wins - the white queen does not have a single retreat. Losing a queen without sufficient compensation is a guaranteed loss. As my coach used to say, if you give up the queen, you should see how you checkmate.

A good place for the queen at the beginning of the game - in the rear, where she will not be attacked by enemy pieces.

3. Look for enemy threats and create your own

A player who does not see the opponent's threats is doomed to lose. The ability to see threats is trained simple exercise- after each move of the opponent, think about what the opponent wanted to achieve. Strange and obscure moves should receive special attention - they are rarely done without a reason.

Party Legal - Saint Brie

White made an unexpected move 1. Nf3xe5. Black didn't see the threat and beat the queen 1... Bg4xd1. A spectacular checkmate in two moves followed: 2. Bc4xf7+ Npd8-e7 3. Nc3-d5x

This beautiful combination went down in history under the name "Legal checkmate" and was played in thousands of games. But if Black saw the threat, then instead of capturing the queen, he would have beaten the knight with 1... Nc6xe5 and were left with an extra piece.

The ability to create threats is as important as the ability to see them. It is developed by a special exercise - before your move, look at which pieces and pawns of the enemy are not protected or stand unsuccessfully, and then look for an opportunity to attack them. In the previous example, White exploited the weakness of the f7-pawn and the open position of the black king and checkmated.

4. Pay special attention to kings

The king is a weak and vulnerable piece. The example with Legal's checkmate shows how important it is to watch for threats to the king and defend it in time. Remember: there are a lot of pieces on the board at the beginning and in the middle of the game, so the king can get under a quick attack. The best way to protect him is to castling. Castling short is considered safer because the king protects all three pawns in front of him.

After castling in the long side, the pawn on the a-file becomes vulnerable, since it is not protected by the king, but the rook becomes active on the d-file.
Before castling, see if the place of future shelter is safe. Castling under attack is a bad idea. Dragging out with castling is also bad.

When there are few pieces left on the board, the king becomes the active piece. This usually happens at the end of the game.

5. Develop figures

You can get rid of many problems at the beginning of the game by simply bringing your pieces to active positions.

Famous children's mat

After 1... Nc6-a5 2.Qf3xf7x Black gets checkmate, although he could have defended himself with a simple move 1. Ng8-f6.

When developing pieces at the beginning of the game, you should not make many moves with one piece. Try to draw a new figure every move. Bring out the knights, then the bishops, castling, looking for a safe place for the queen. It is better to leave the rooks on the initial rank (1 for white, 8 for black) and move them to the ranks where there are no pawns. So they will actively participate in the game, protect the king and each other and not interfere with the rest of the pieces.

As the game progresses, it is also important to check how your pieces are worth. If the figure stands badly or far from the place of the main actions, find time and an opportunity to rearrange it better.

6. Fight for the center

The center is the fields inside the square c3 - c6 - f6 - f3. Pieces in the center of the board have more moves than pieces on the edge or in the corner. For example, a knight in the center of an empty board has 8 possible moves, a knight on the edge has 4, and a knight in the corner has only 2 moves. Elephant - 13 in the center and 7 in the corner.

But if we simply bring our pieces to the center, then the opponent can push our pieces back with pawn moves. First, the center must be captured with pawns to create a safe space for the removal of pieces. Therefore, at the beginning of the game, 1. c2-c4, 1. d2-d4, 1. e2-e4 are good moves for White and a mirror for Black.

Pawn moves on the f-file must be done carefully, because they weaken the positions of the kings.

7. Don't make mistakes when trading

Errors in the exchange of pieces arise due to ignorance of the value of the pieces or the rules of exchanges. Remember: a rook is worth 5 pawns, a knight and a bishop are worth 3 or 3.5 pawns depending on the situation, a queen is worth 9 or 10, a king is priceless.

Before exchanging, you need to calculate the number of attacks and defenses on the piece or pawn that you want to exchange. If the number of attacks and defenses is equal or there are more defenses, then the exchange will be fair. If there are more attacks, then the attacker will win.

The exchange should start with the weakest piece and continue to beat the pieces as their strength increases. Before exchanging, be sure to imagine what you and your opponent will get as a result. If your opponent gets more, refuse to trade. Remember that the exchange is almost always beneficial to the stronger side.

And most importantly - do not consider the enemy a fool

Many beginner chess players hope that the opponent will make a mistake or not notice something. This approach is wrong. You need to play, starting from the mistakes and weaknesses that the enemy has already made, and not from the mistakes that he can make. And if he doesn't?

Many chess players' mistakes have “…one reason, and we consider this reason to be the most effective: most often it lies at the basis of the most rude overlooks and blunders.

When calculating a long variation, a grandmaster is naturally afraid of not noticing something, of missing out on any opportunity that may arise in the position in five or six moves. It is not so easy to see the subtleties, to foresee everything from afar, so the chess player devotes all his attention to that distant future position.

And it happens that already on the first move, so to speak, at the foot of the calculation tree, a chess player does not notice an elementary blow, the simplest threat. Remember, reader, how often this was the main reason for your chess mistakes. Personally, in my practice, such blindness, viewing what lies close, "underfoot", is a frequent phenomenon.

How to prevent this serious danger? Many years ago, we discussed this problem with a prominent Soviet master, who did a lot to clarify the psychological laws of chess struggle, Veniamin Markovich Blumenfeld. He defended his dissertation (in 1945 - Note by I.L. Vikentiev) on the psychology of chess. Blumenfeld also complained that he often did not see “under his nose”, and argued that such a phenomenon, to one degree or another, occurs among the strongest among the strong.

To combat this serious scourge, Veniamin Markovich deduced the following rule, which I will allow myself to call the Blumenfeld rule (let the reader not be offended by its long wording).

Having finished the calculation of variations, having run through all the branches of the calculation tree, you must first of all write down the proposed move on the form. Just before you make a move! I have watched many of my colleagues and noticed that most grandmasters first write down the move, then make it on the board, and only a few do the opposite.

You need to write in full notation, calligraphic handwriting. Look at the record of moves Botvinnik, Smyslov, Keres- each letter, each digit on their form is displayed extremely clearly. By writing down the move on the scoresheet, you are somehow distracted from the distant world of the future of your game, to which you have just given half an hour of precious time, and return to the world of the present, to the position standing on the board. And when you, after writing down the move, look again at the arrangement of the pieces, it will no longer be the view of a science fiction writer , looking forward: You will look at the position through the eyes of a fighter in the tournament hall, a person who has a sense of reality, a clear understanding of the concerns of the present moment. This was your first step back into reality. And yet, even then, do not move the figure on the board, take your time. Spend one more minute - you won't regret it later - and look at the position "through the eyes of a beginner", as if you are not a grandmaster, not a master, but a beginner chess player. Checkmate in one move does not threaten me? And at two? My queen is not under attack, but are my rooks? Am I missing a pawn? Such an elementary check of the position will certainly save you from looking at the first move and will be a reliable reinforcement for the deep position research that you have just completed.

Following this rule, you will successfully combine the depth of thinking with practical accuracy and infallibility.

Kotov A.A. , Secrets of the Chess Player's Thinking, M., "All-Russian Chess Club", 1970, p. 63-64.

To begin with, let's figure out how yawns differ from views. In his book Practical Chess Secrets, John Nunn wrote the following:

“Views and yawns are two varieties of the same phenomenon. If you have overlooked something and, thanks to good luck, the consequences were not too serious, then you have made a review; if the results are catastrophic, then you blundered.

From the foregoing, we can conclude that a blunder leads to a sharp deterioration in the position, or a checkmate. In the games of amateur chess players, it is not uncommon for one of the opponents to lose a queen. Less often, opponents "exchange pleasantries", i.e. first one blunders the queen, then the second. Examples of such parties are presented in the article.

In commentary on moves, yawns are indicated by two question marks "??" - "gross mistake".

No matter how strange it may sound, grandmasters, who are among the best chess players in the world, sometimes yawn. We gave similar examples in the article.

In this article, we decided to collect tips from professionals to combat views and yawns.

Blumenfeld's rule

"Blumenfeld's rule" - the definition was invented and formulated by Alexander Kotov in his book. Here are excerpts from this book.

“Many mistakes of chess players have “…one reason, and we consider this reason to be the most effective: most often it lies at the basis of the most rude overlooks and blunders. When calculating a long variation, a grandmaster is naturally afraid of not noticing something, of missing out on some opportunity that may arise in the position in five or six moves. It is not so easy to see the subtleties, to foresee everything from afar, so the chess player devotes all his attention to that distant future position. And it happens that already on the first move, so to speak, at the foot of the calculation tree, a chess player does not notice an elementary blow, the simplest threat. Remember, reader, how often this was the main reason for your chess mistakes. Personally, in my practice, such blindness, viewing what lies close, "underfoot", is a frequent phenomenon.

How to prevent this serious danger? Many years ago we discussed this problem with Veniamin Markovich Blumenfeld, a prominent Soviet master who did a lot to elucidate the psychological laws of chess combat. He defended his thesis on the psychology of chess. Blumenfeld also complained that he often did not see “under his nose”, and argued that such a phenomenon, to one degree or another, occurs among the strongest among the strong. To combat this serious scourge, Veniamin Markovich deduced the following rule, which I will allow myself to call the Blumenfeld rule (let the reader not be offended by its long wording). Having finished the calculation of variations, having run through all the branches of the calculation tree, you must first of all write down the proposed move on the form. Just before you make a move! I have watched many of my colleagues and noticed that most grandmasters first write down the move, then make it on the board, and only a few do the opposite. You need to write in full notation, calligraphic handwriting. Look at the record of moves - each letter, each number on their form is displayed extremely clearly. By writing down the move on the scoresheet, you are somehow distracted from the distant world of the future of your game, to which you have just given half an hour of precious time, and return to the world of the present, to the position standing on the board. And when you, after writing down the move, look again at the arrangement of the pieces, it will no longer be the look of a science fiction writer, a look directed to the future: you will begin to look at the position through the eyes of a fighter present in the tournament hall, a person who feels reality, clearly imagines the concerns of the present moment.

This was your first step back into reality. And yet, even then, do not move the figure on the board, take your time. Spend one more minute - you won't regret it later - and look at the position "through the eyes of a beginner", as if you are not a grandmaster, not a master, but a beginner chess player. Checkmate in one move does not threaten me? And at two? My queen is not under attack, but are my rooks? Am I missing a pawn? Such an elementary check of the position will certainly save you from looking at the first move and will be a reliable reinforcement for the deep position research that you have just completed. Following this rule, you will successfully combine the depth of thinking with practical accuracy and infallibility.

Following the Blumenfeld rule, after each move, you need to look at the position with a new look and ask yourself basic questions related to your own safety:

• Does checkmate threaten in one move?
• Is checkmate in two moves a threat?
• Is the queen under attack?
• Are the rooks under attack?
• Am I missing a pawn?