Road to FM Week 2: Olympiad ideas & A New Book!

Introduction Week 2.

Hello Lichess family!
For those who are new here, I’m on a journey toward the FM title, currently rated around 1770 FIDE.

In this blog, I share my training routine, games, and interesting positions I come across during my study.

This week, the biggest event was the FIDE Olympiad in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. With World Champions, Candidates, and many 2700+ players competing, it was impossible not to follow the games. I will be sharing some of my personal favorite games/positions from rounds 1-5 of the Olympiad here so stay tuned!

Lets get started!

What did I work on this week?

Since the Olympiad started 5 days ago, most of my time was spent following the games (almost 800 games are being played every day!).

But apart from that I also focussed on the following areas:

• OPENINGS:
  Revised my openings and added some interesting novelties which I found in the Olympiad games! (Getting opening ideas from 2700s for free can't be missed!)
• Chess Structures by Mauricio Flores:
  I had mentioned in my Week 1 Blog that I would start with the Sokolov book, but I was recently advised by a stronger player to first complete Chess Structures by Mauricio Flores. Since I already had the Chessable course, I decided to start working on it instead.

Came across this interesting position in the Structures book.
It shows the attacking possibilities in the Isolani structures
Black to play.

Btw this reminds me of a quote:

"Tactics Flow from a superior position"

What went well?

I feel this week I was way more productive if we compare with the last week and I was enjoying the process. Studying Olympiad games without the engine made me calculate (and also sometimes realise how dumb I am...).

I was also watching Peter Svidler's commentary on FIDE Chess YT channel which was fun as well as instructive. I was watching chess like a sport!

Btw my friend sent me a position which made my week even more beautiful (benefit of having chess friends):

Its white to play. (Friend said its a Fischer game but I don't see a single game on the database)

What didn't go well?

This week wasn't perfect in the terms of structure or planning. My study sessions were not very structured or planned. Lot of my time went in studying the Olympiad games (shouldnt be regretting that right!?)
which reduced my time in Calculation and endgame work.

Next Week, Chess Positions and Conclusion.

Next Saturday I am going on a tour (Chess tour ofcourse) Playing FIDE rated Classical, two FIDE Rapid tournaments and a FIDE Blitz tournament and only then coming back home. I will share my games in the next blog. (Hope I play some interesting games!)

Until then I will follow the Olympiad (Ive been saying this word too many times in the blog), Revise my openings and get ready for the tournaments!

Some Chess Positions! (Olympiad games included!)

Take your time and try to solve these positions as if they were from your own game. The satisfaction of finding the solution yourself is far greater than just seeing it immediately. I will provide the solutions at the end of the blog! Enjoy Solving!

#1 Kovalenko's 15 move win!

Start with an easy position. I saw his opponent play a5?? live during the game.
White to play. After this move, black resigned.

#2 Liang Awonder's nice combination!

White to play. I think this one should also be easy.

#3 A cool Mate in 5!

White to play. Mate in 5
This one took me about 2-3mins slightly harder than the previous ones. This is beautiful!

#4 The World Championship Challenger

Black to play. Think creatively like Sindarov!
I didn't get to solve it (Lichess broadcast chat spoiled the answer for me but okay atleast I got to see it)

#5 From the Analysis of Wei Yi's game.

White to play
Wei Yi played an excellent Ruy Lopez game. But there was a nice combination which was found in the analysis of the game (Unfortunately it didn't happen).

Conclusion and Solutions of the positions.

This week was amazing I must say. Analyzing so many games played by top GMs has improved my understanding a lot.

A few things that I learnt this week:

#1. Svidler's Tip.

While watching the stream Svidler said something that I'd not heard before and it sounded very interesting.

"Keep your rook on the open file or open the file of your rook"

Sounds funny right? but the point he's trying to make is very interesting. Imagine your rook is on a1 and there are no open files on the board then you can play a4-a5-a6 or push it even further. Congratulations your rook is on an open file! I don't know if this makes sense or will improve our game in any way but I found it interesting.

#2. About Isolated Pawns (Chess Structures book)

"The side with the isolated queens pawn is supposed to gain counterplay by attacking the enemy king and/or break in the center to achieve an overwhelming advantage"
"While playing against the Isolated Queens pawn, one must trade pieces to achieve a superior endgame and/or blockade the pawn and try to win it"

"Against Isolated pawns one must, blockade it, attack it and win it" - Nimzowich Aron.

If you want to learn about structures in depth Id definetly recommend the book Chess Structures by Mauricio Flores Rios.

Ive learnt a lot more chess related things this week, Positional ideas (Gukesh's g5 in round 3 for example), tactical patterns (lots of chess games), New openings and much more. I'd definetly recommend the viewers here to spend some time studying the games being played at the Olympiad they are gold!

You can checkout the solutions and some more positions in the Lichess Study below:

Feel free to dm or write to me on the forum below this blog if you wish something couldve been better, maybe in the blog or in my training routine.
PS: India vs Uzbekistan starting now as am writing the blog. Will be a very interesting match to watch!

Happy Chessing!