King's Gambit - A Chess Prodigy's Journey Back to 2200 | "The Chess Angle Podcast" with Neal Bellon

[00:00:06] [SPEAKER_03]: Everybody needs a quest and I've been on a quest. I've been on many quests in my life

[00:00:11] [SPEAKER_03]: And some have worked out for me and some haven't but

[00:00:15] [SPEAKER_03]: No matter whether you get to the goal of your quest like for instance King Arthur's Knights

[00:00:20] [SPEAKER_03]: We're on a quest for the Holy Grail

[00:00:22] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't think they ever found the Holy Grail

[00:00:24] [SPEAKER_03]: But the quest itself is filled with adventures and I think I'm gonna do a podcast just about the notion of a quest

[00:00:30] [SPEAKER_03]: The word quest is of course in

[00:00:33] [SPEAKER_03]: In the word question and you have a question for yourself like oh

[00:00:38] [SPEAKER_03]: Can I achieve a certain thing? What are the steps along the way? I've achieving that thing and

[00:00:44] [SPEAKER_03]: What kind of person do I need to become to achieve the goal?

[00:00:48] [SPEAKER_03]: What are all the different ways I need to improve myself? What are the paths I need to take?

[00:00:53] [SPEAKER_03]: So I've been on a quest

[00:00:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Many of you know what that quest is and then has changed my life in so many ways so far

[00:00:59] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm nowhere near the end of that quest at least it doesn't seem that way and that's sometimes frustrating

[00:01:04] [SPEAKER_03]: But part of going on such a journey is dealing with failure and frustration

[00:01:08] [SPEAKER_03]: but anyway, I want to know someone else's podcast the chess angle and

[00:01:14] [SPEAKER_03]: He did a very good job interviewing me

[00:01:16] [SPEAKER_03]: And we decided to present it on this podcast some new things

[00:01:21] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm figuring out all along the way on this journey on this quest and here it is

[00:01:26] [SPEAKER_02]: This isn't your average business podcast and he's not your average host. This is the James Altiger show

[00:01:51] [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the chess angle

[00:01:53] [SPEAKER_00]: This is not your typical chess podcast

[00:01:56] [SPEAKER_00]: If you're an amateur or club level player, the chess angle is for you

[00:02:01] [SPEAKER_00]: Our content is aimed at busy adults who are serious about the game but have limited study time

[00:02:08] [SPEAKER_00]: Featured guests include both amateur and title players alike

[00:02:13] [SPEAKER_00]: And now here's your host director of the Long Island chess club Neil Belon

[00:02:23] [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome everyone to season 5. It's great to be back some quick production notes first on our YouTube channel

[00:02:31] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm looking into posting video versions of our interview episodes

[00:02:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Rather than just having audio with a still image. That's in beta so to speak

[00:02:41] [SPEAKER_01]: But it is something I'm working on

[00:02:43] [SPEAKER_01]: Also, I'm going to be experimenting with chapter markers as part of the show notes

[00:02:49] [SPEAKER_01]: That's also in beta, but I'm looking into adding that feature as a permanent fixture

[00:02:54] [SPEAKER_01]: I'll talk more about this and some other ideas when I do my first solo episode of the season

[00:03:00] [SPEAKER_01]: My guests this week to kick off season 5 needs no introduction

[00:03:05] [SPEAKER_01]: And is a popular figure in both the chess and business worlds

[00:03:09] [SPEAKER_01]: I am of course referring to James Altucher

[00:03:13] [SPEAKER_01]: James is a national chess master

[00:03:16] [SPEAKER_01]: successful podcast or an entrepreneur and a best-selling author his podcast the James Altucher show

[00:03:23] [SPEAKER_01]: Which is part of my own weekly podcast rotation is a top show that receives millions of downloads on a regular basis

[00:03:31] [SPEAKER_01]: he's the author of 18 books including The Power of No and

[00:03:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Choose Yourself which were Wall Street Journal best sellers

[00:03:40] [SPEAKER_01]: I was honored to speak with James recently and the bulk of our conversation was about adult improvement

[00:03:47] [SPEAKER_01]: especially as we get older and

[00:03:49] [SPEAKER_01]: James's quest to get back to a reading of 2200 that's coming up right now

[00:03:58] [SPEAKER_01]: So James good to see you really appreciate you coming on the podcast. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast

[00:04:03] [SPEAKER_01]: I really appreciate it definitely so I'm gonna jump right in maybe you could tell us a little bit about your

[00:04:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Current tournaments like what kind of events you're playing in sure

[00:04:12] [SPEAKER_03]: So let me just start off by saying just real quickly

[00:04:15] [SPEAKER_03]: I started playing in tournaments when I was 17 years old. So kind of late to the game and

[00:04:22] [SPEAKER_03]: Then of course, I stopped in college because girls and then I picked it up again

[00:04:30] [SPEAKER_03]: Kind of in between jobs later on and when I finally hit the age of about I guess 28 I

[00:04:38] [SPEAKER_03]: hit

[00:04:39] [SPEAKER_03]: master level like 2200 strength and

[00:04:42] [SPEAKER_03]: I played in a few tournaments after that. I got up to about 2249

[00:04:47] [SPEAKER_03]: I think was my peak and then I remember two tournaments specifically gave me heartache

[00:04:53] [SPEAKER_03]: I was having a good run. This is back in 1997

[00:04:56] [SPEAKER_03]: I was having a really good run love of not losing against people my level like 2200 or so and

[00:05:03] [SPEAKER_03]: Then I had two games in a row one where I played this little kid

[00:05:08] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if he was like 10 years old 11 years old and

[00:05:12] [SPEAKER_03]: He was beating me and there was this other tiny little kid who couldn't see the board

[00:05:18] [SPEAKER_03]: He was about six or seven years old. I don't know he couldn't see the board

[00:05:21] [SPEAKER_03]: So he kept jumping up to see the board and then after the game was over which I had lost

[00:05:27] [SPEAKER_03]: This other little kid who was like six or seven years old was like

[00:05:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Showing us all these moves that we both should have done and that was a car. Oh and I

[00:05:38] [SPEAKER_03]: Figured oh my gosh, these kids are getting better than ever

[00:05:41] [SPEAKER_03]: What's going on here? And then in the next tournament I played in was a local tournament at the Manhattan Chess Club and

[00:05:48] [SPEAKER_03]: I

[00:05:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Lost the game and

[00:05:53] [SPEAKER_03]: The girl who won the game

[00:05:56] [SPEAKER_03]: Told me maybe on move nine you shouldn't have moved Bishop B4 and

[00:06:01] [SPEAKER_03]: I was and this was the 13 year old Irina crush and so I figured you know what I'm done

[00:06:07] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm retired. I had fallen from 2249 to a little above

[00:06:13] [SPEAKER_03]: 2200 and I decided you know what being above 2200 is

[00:06:18] [SPEAKER_03]: kind of

[00:06:19] [SPEAKER_03]: Important for my career just because of the cult this you know

[00:06:22] [SPEAKER_03]: I was whatever

[00:06:24] [SPEAKER_03]: 27 years old 28 years old it was early on in my career and it was 25 years ago or a little over 26 years ago now and

[00:06:32] [SPEAKER_03]: It does have some cultural significance

[00:06:35] [SPEAKER_03]: Being a master. I didn't realize you take the master title with you once you get it

[00:06:39] [SPEAKER_03]: No matter what your rating is you're still like a national master

[00:06:41] [SPEAKER_03]: So I didn't want to lose that title so I stopped playing and it was all it's only in the past

[00:06:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Year and a half almost coming on two years now that I decided hey

[00:06:53] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm gonna make a quest of this which is

[00:06:57] [SPEAKER_03]: Can't everybody says I can't but can someone in their fifties now get back to where they were before

[00:07:04] [SPEAKER_03]: Before and so many people kept telling me no no it's impossible your brains older these kids are geniuses

[00:07:11] [SPEAKER_03]: They're computers now and their study techniques are different blah blah blah and of course when someone tells you you can't you feel like

[00:07:18] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, I really should and chess is always something I loved and I figured you know what why not be pursue

[00:07:24] [SPEAKER_03]: my childhood love now as a as an adult as a seasoned adult and

[00:07:30] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll tell you Neil it is

[00:07:33] [SPEAKER_03]: Difficult I've done a lot of difficult things

[00:07:35] [SPEAKER_03]: In my life for better or for worse. This is like difficult. It is really hard

[00:07:40] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if I could do it, but I'm still trying yeah, and the players just seem

[00:07:46] [SPEAKER_01]: So much stronger even defensively as well

[00:07:49] [SPEAKER_01]: Like do you find that because everything is like you know these young kids with tactics

[00:07:52] [SPEAKER_01]: But I'm finding even on the other end of the board even defensively and positionally

[00:07:56] [SPEAKER_01]: They're a lot stronger because traditionally the kids it was always like tactics tactics tactics attack

[00:08:02] [SPEAKER_01]: But it seems like they can also play solid and defend as well. Do you find that do they play solidly?

[00:08:09] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean there's I've done so much research on all this like what actually does change in the brain between the ages of

[00:08:15] [SPEAKER_03]: 27 and 55 which is what I am now. I've explored issues of memory

[00:08:20] [SPEAKER_03]: calculation

[00:08:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Even my strategic sense and how the brain works with strategy versus calculation, but to answer your question

[00:08:29] [SPEAKER_03]: I think the kids are better defenders

[00:08:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Now than they were then first off there weren't that many kids in tournaments then now you go to a tournament

[00:08:38] [SPEAKER_03]: It's 70% kids back then it was maybe 80 percent adults 20 percent kids, but that leaving that aside. I think

[00:08:46] [SPEAKER_03]: The younger kids are just they're better tactically they have better memories

[00:08:50] [SPEAKER_03]: They they're better at the opening so sometimes I get crushed in the openings

[00:08:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Which is never used to happen to me before openings is studied in a much different way now than it was

[00:08:59] [SPEAKER_03]: what in the 90s and

[00:09:02] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, there's other aspects too

[00:09:04] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't think they're that great at

[00:09:08] [SPEAKER_03]: Strategic play and I don't think they're that great at end games. I mean of course there's exceptions

[00:09:13] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not making a I'm making a huge generalization

[00:09:15] [SPEAKER_03]: But I think there are some aspects of the game where I've improved in ways that I don't see the kids really

[00:09:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Developing skills because they don't have to because their their calculation is so great and

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_03]: Their opening knowledge is so great and I do think they have a better basic positional sense than when I was starting out maybe not

[00:09:35] [SPEAKER_03]: well, let's say the 2200s are the equivalent of

[00:09:40] [SPEAKER_03]: 2400 tactically and

[00:09:41] [SPEAKER_03]: 2000 positionally from from when I was playing and the tactics count for more for better or for worse now. What is your?

[00:09:49] [SPEAKER_01]: Study regimen look like in other words, you're trying to get back to 2200 now

[00:09:53] [SPEAKER_01]: What does that look like for you as far as studying it? Are you just mostly playing are you studying it doing both?

[00:09:57] [SPEAKER_01]: Are you studying anything specific?

[00:09:59] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm studying and playing

[00:10:01] [SPEAKER_03]: I think you need to study and play if let's say you're trying to get better at I don't know archery

[00:10:06] [SPEAKER_03]: You can't just read a bunch of books about archery and suddenly hit the target the first time you go to an archery range

[00:10:13] [SPEAKER_03]: You have to play you have to analyze your games

[00:10:16] [SPEAKER_03]: You have to study the classics you have to study openings you have to study tactics you have to study end games and

[00:10:23] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I've changed my regimen quite a bit in the past year and a half

[00:10:26] [SPEAKER_03]: But I would say like right now today. It's an hour of tactics a day

[00:10:32] [SPEAKER_03]: maybe an hour of looking at classical games and

[00:10:35] [SPEAKER_03]: Then I'll play six five plus three blitz games

[00:10:39] [SPEAKER_03]: So five plus three is five minutes plus three second increment after each move

[00:10:43] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll analyze those which I'll then later go over with a coach

[00:10:47] [SPEAKER_03]: So I work with Avertec Gregorian. You could find them at chess move calm

[00:10:51] [SPEAKER_03]: I've worked with many coaches over the years all of them have been great

[00:10:55] [SPEAKER_03]: I've never worked with a bad coach and

[00:10:58] [SPEAKER_03]: Just lately I've been working with avatix and it's going very well and that's about it

[00:11:02] [SPEAKER_03]: You know a combination of classic study

[00:11:05] [SPEAKER_03]: positional study tactics end games and now I don't study as much openings

[00:11:10] [SPEAKER_03]: But about six months ago. I was studying like 80% openings just because I was switching my repertoire

[00:11:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Right, and what does that look like now?

[00:11:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Like do you have a set opening repertoire?

[00:11:19] [SPEAKER_01]: Like I'm just gonna stick with these or are you mixing that up a little bit

[00:11:22] [SPEAKER_03]: So when I hit 2200 back in 1997

[00:11:25] [SPEAKER_03]: I only played D4 and I had a very specific repertoire

[00:11:30] [SPEAKER_03]: I had one line for you know the Nimzo for the Kings Indian for the Benoni and then I used to play

[00:11:36] [SPEAKER_03]: The Kings Indian against Ponte Queen 4 and the modern defense against Ponte King 4 and that was it

[00:11:43] [SPEAKER_03]: And I only studied those from the ages of 17 to whenever it is

[00:11:47] [SPEAKER_03]: I stopped 27 or 28 years old, but then when I restarted I

[00:11:52] [SPEAKER_03]: decided I'm gonna switch everything because

[00:11:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Right away. I saw that the openings were completely

[00:11:58] [SPEAKER_03]: Different than when I was like Kings Indian

[00:12:02] [SPEAKER_03]: I had one plan which is get into a lock center then do F5 F4 G5 G4

[00:12:08] [SPEAKER_03]: Sack on H3 with my bishop and checkmate. That was my only plan and

[00:12:13] [SPEAKER_03]: You know with D4, let's say I played a Queen's Gambit

[00:12:16] [SPEAKER_03]: My only plan was like to do night G2

[00:12:20] [SPEAKER_03]: I think this is now called the botvinic plan but night G2 night G3 F3 E4

[00:12:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Maybe E5 F4 F5 check sack something and checkmate. These were like my only plans and

[00:12:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Now I'm playing pawn to King 4 and I switched also my my responses to black and

[00:12:37] [SPEAKER_03]: It's a completely different game. It is like comparing apples and oranges

[00:12:41] [SPEAKER_03]: It's like I'm playing I went from playing checkers to playing chess or maybe that's not a fair comparison because D4 is not

[00:12:47] [SPEAKER_03]: Chose it's like switching from checkers to backgammon. It's like I'm playing a completely different game

[00:12:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Because the positions are much wilder. They're much more open

[00:12:55] [SPEAKER_03]: There's different sorts of plans

[00:12:58] [SPEAKER_03]: So I've had to expand not only my repertoire of openings with my repertoire of plans that I understood

[00:13:04] [SPEAKER_03]: There was very few plans

[00:13:05] [SPEAKER_03]: I had to understand when I was younger playing D4 and also that's just that the nature of how openings are studied now too that

[00:13:12] [SPEAKER_03]: Everybody studies every line. So I remember I was still when I first started playing again after this 25 year break

[00:13:19] [SPEAKER_03]: I was still playing the Kings Indian and then Gwain Jones will come out with a new course on a Friday on Chessable about the Kings Indian and

[00:13:28] [SPEAKER_03]: On Saturday, you know, let's say it's the National Open in Las Vegas

[00:13:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Suddenly everybody's playing the newest lines that came out the day before so these younger people

[00:13:38] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll say instead instead of kids they have phenomenal memories

[00:13:41] [SPEAKER_03]: They absorb all the lines

[00:13:42] [SPEAKER_03]: They need to know and I feel like I used to be able to do that when I was younger

[00:13:47] [SPEAKER_03]: But I didn't even need to do it that much people didn't really

[00:13:51] [SPEAKER_03]: study the openings as

[00:13:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Detailed as they do now like like when I was younger. I had a book by Geller called the Kings Indian defense

[00:13:59] [SPEAKER_03]: That was my studying of the Kings Indian now. It's there's chessable courses. There's the computer lines

[00:14:06] [SPEAKER_03]: There's six thousand games played a day in your obscure 20 move sideline

[00:14:11] [SPEAKER_03]: variation that you

[00:14:13] [SPEAKER_03]: Thought you were the only one who knew it but not only does everyone know it everyone's also studied your games

[00:14:19] [SPEAKER_03]: Playing it so like studying the openings is a different beast which has its pros and cons which we can get into and

[00:14:27] [SPEAKER_03]: So I figure where am I gonna get my edge because again, it used to be if you had a good position

[00:14:32] [SPEAKER_03]: yes, sometimes people could defend but most of the time people just rolled over and died and

[00:14:37] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't want to say that's all the time

[00:14:39] [SPEAKER_03]: But on my way up from like 1800 to 2000 to 2200

[00:14:43] [SPEAKER_03]: That's what my experience like I won the under 2000 in the world open

[00:14:47] [SPEAKER_03]: I won the under 2200 in the world open. I had a pretty smooth ride up and

[00:14:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Now just

[00:14:56] [SPEAKER_03]: It's it's just difficult like you could play a 1500 rated kid who will have spurts of playing like a

[00:15:03] [SPEAKER_03]: 2200 because they'll either know the opening really well or you get into some tactical situation

[00:15:08] [SPEAKER_03]: They've stated a million times on puzzle rush where I figured I could have my edge is

[00:15:13] [SPEAKER_03]: Doing something I've never done before which is studying end games and

[00:15:20] [SPEAKER_03]: Positional stuff just as an example when I was younger even in my 20s. I never studied any positional stuff at all

[00:15:26] [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't know what a space advantage meant. I was 20 over 2200

[00:15:30] [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't know what a week square was or how to play with you know against the week square

[00:15:34] [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't need to maybe that's why I stopped at 2250. I don't know but now

[00:15:40] [SPEAKER_03]: This is like a huge area of study for me is studying these more positional aspects studying classical games

[00:15:47] [SPEAKER_03]: which I never really did before and

[00:15:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Really trying to expand my you know, let's call it chess wisdom. I feel younger people don't

[00:15:56] [SPEAKER_03]: Have that as much because they have they have that raw let's call it athleticism of the tactics and the opening knowledge

[00:16:19] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I want to explore two areas. I want to talk about

[00:16:23] [SPEAKER_01]: You are studying with your coaches your current coach

[00:16:26] [SPEAKER_01]: And I know you had studied with Jesse cry and then I want to get into some ideas about

[00:16:32] [SPEAKER_01]: Jess improvement like over the age of 50 right because you said you're 55. Is that right? Yeah, all right

[00:16:38] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm 51 so we're old. We're a quote-unquote old

[00:16:42] [SPEAKER_03]: But I want to I want to mention I am the Georgia over 50 champion right now

[00:16:48] [SPEAKER_03]: And when I was a kid, I was the New Jersey Junior champion

[00:16:51] [SPEAKER_03]: So I'm proud that I've bookended. I wish I had played in the middle 25 years

[00:16:56] [SPEAKER_03]: But unfortunately it is what it is. So I feel like

[00:17:00] [SPEAKER_03]: Among my cohort, you know people over 50 I'm doing well

[00:17:05] [SPEAKER_03]: But when I'm in an intense tournament situation like the Chicago open national open world open

[00:17:11] [SPEAKER_03]: It's it's really hard. It's a different experience for me than when I was younger, right now

[00:17:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Let me hold on a second

[00:17:16] [SPEAKER_01]: Let me sort of interject with this before we get into the other things when you play in these

[00:17:22] [SPEAKER_01]: Major tournaments with classical time controls

[00:17:25] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you play in every game or do you take buys because there's some thought that

[00:17:29] [SPEAKER_01]: You know once you get to a certain age because of the endurance that you should just you should take some

[00:17:34] [SPEAKER_01]: Strategic buys to give yourself a rest. Do you do that? Do you play every game?

[00:17:39] [SPEAKER_03]: I play every game because if I'm gonna travel someplace

[00:17:41] [SPEAKER_03]: Spend money on a hotel and all that kind of stuff. I'm playing every game

[00:17:46] [SPEAKER_03]: You know why because I'm not there

[00:17:48] [SPEAKER_03]: To win that tournament although that would be nice

[00:17:51] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not there to win every game although that would be nice

[00:17:54] [SPEAKER_03]: But I do want to learn from every game and if I don't play the game

[00:17:57] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not gonna learn so so I if I am going to

[00:18:02] [SPEAKER_03]: A nine-round tournament the Chicago open I'm playing a bunch of 2200s and all although sometimes I'll play GM

[00:18:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Sometimes I'll play lower rated. I

[00:18:12] [SPEAKER_03]: Want to learn from every single game

[00:18:16] [SPEAKER_01]: Otherwise, I'm wasting my money there, but do you think it would be I'm just curious not not to I don't want to

[00:18:22] [SPEAKER_01]: Sound like I'm pushing back on this. I'm just curious

[00:18:23] [SPEAKER_01]: I understand that point. Do you think your results would be

[00:18:28] [SPEAKER_01]: Better if you did takes and buys though because that that's something that I feel for myself if I were to do that

[00:18:33] [SPEAKER_01]: I think I would do better

[00:18:34] [SPEAKER_01]: But do you think it would be the same and that you would just be wasting around or do you think it might

[00:18:40] [SPEAKER_01]: Actually help you in the games you do play. It's a really good question. I don't know

[00:18:44] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I do know this is that my stamina

[00:18:48] [SPEAKER_03]: Does seem to wear out like like when you're playing

[00:18:51] [SPEAKER_03]: For some reason my games tend to be like

[00:18:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Like I'm usually like the last one in the playing hall if even if there's like 500 people there

[00:18:58] [SPEAKER_03]: So so if you're playing if it's 11 p.m. At night and you're on the 10th hour of play that day

[00:19:04] [SPEAKER_03]: My stamina is not going to be as strong as my opponents

[00:19:08] [SPEAKER_03]: But you know, I'm also trying to learn how to have more stamina or how to play well

[00:19:14] [SPEAKER_03]: Even when my stamina is down. So those are all learning points as well that that hopefully I can

[00:19:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Increase my stamina by putting myself in those difficult you only learn when you get put yourself in a difficult situation

[00:19:25] [SPEAKER_03]: So yes, those are difficult situations

[00:19:28] [SPEAKER_03]: but I'm trying I'm trying to learn and and this is different also about my chest learning now it used to be

[00:19:34] [SPEAKER_03]: Did I learn the openings that I study tactics now? It's did I get good sleep?

[00:19:39] [SPEAKER_03]: Did I is my diet good so I have the stamina did I?

[00:19:44] [SPEAKER_03]: Eat properly right before the game, you know or two hours before the game

[00:19:48] [SPEAKER_03]: So I'm not digesting while playing that I

[00:19:51] [SPEAKER_03]: Exercise enough to increase stamina. So all these things now are on my mind where I could have cared less when I was younger

[00:19:59] [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't even think about all these things

[00:20:00] [SPEAKER_03]: I didn't even think about from end games to diet to sleep

[00:20:05] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I now have to think about like Neil

[00:20:08] [SPEAKER_03]: Let me ask you this have you ever played like so I play in some locally

[00:20:11] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll play in like, you know rapid, you know like 30 minute tournaments and

[00:20:17] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll I'll run out of time without even looking at the clock like I'll remember

[00:20:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, I looked at the clock when I had six minutes left. I'm fine. Then the next thing I know my opponent flags me

[00:20:27] [SPEAKER_01]: It's like an old man move with those game 30s. Yeah, because those game 30s are dual rated

[00:20:33] [SPEAKER_01]: But I tried those many years ago and like I got crushed those ratings. I don't know

[00:20:37] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not a fan of those dual rated

[00:20:39] [SPEAKER_01]: I think that's one of the best ways for people to like actually lower their rating

[00:20:42] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, what do you do you play a lot of those they call what are they called those action?

[00:20:46] [SPEAKER_03]: I play I do play a lot of those I do play a lot of those and so

[00:20:50] [SPEAKER_03]: You know

[00:20:50] [SPEAKER_03]: It's one thing losing on time in a 30 minute which is like you say is both classical and rapid rated

[00:20:55] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's another thing where the last six minutes of play. I was just so focused on what move

[00:21:01] [SPEAKER_03]: I was me. I didn't even look at the clock. So that's the skill is time management

[00:21:05] [SPEAKER_03]: I never had to think about before because I was always just moving fast like any other young person and

[00:21:10] [SPEAKER_03]: now

[00:21:11] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm losing on time if I don't regularly look at the clock like I have to look at the clock and I have to calculate

[00:21:17] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, this game is gonna probably go another 15 moves. I've got

[00:21:22] [SPEAKER_03]: Three minutes. So I need to basically spend no more than 10 to 15 seconds on average per move

[00:21:27] [SPEAKER_03]: I have to actually think about these things and I never had to think about that before

[00:21:30] [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, do you like those game 30s? Like when you join it? Yeah, like yeah cool game 30

[00:21:35] [SPEAKER_01]: Or do you just do it or because some people actually prefer that they like that

[00:21:39] [SPEAKER_01]: Some people like myself. I'm just curious like do you enjoy those game 30s? I do but here's my general thinking and the one thing

[00:21:47] [SPEAKER_03]: I might regret is that I didn't stick to playing online a little bit more

[00:21:52] [SPEAKER_03]: And I went straight into over-the-board tournaments in this sort of comeback journey, but it's all correlated, right?

[00:21:59] [SPEAKER_03]: You're not gonna be

[00:22:00] [SPEAKER_03]: 1600 at 30 minute and

[00:22:03] [SPEAKER_03]: 2000 at classical you're gonna be 1600 and both or you're gonna be 2000 and both your lead chest your chest

[00:22:09] [SPEAKER_03]: You're over the board classical you're over the board rapid

[00:22:12] [SPEAKER_03]: They're all gonna be roughly the same within 100 points of each other

[00:22:15] [SPEAKER_03]: So if you get better at any one of those maybe bullet is the one exception

[00:22:19] [SPEAKER_03]: If you get better at blitz, you're gonna get better at classical and vice versa

[00:22:24] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean when I was hitting 2250

[00:22:28] [SPEAKER_03]: In 1997 it meant my performance ratings were over 2300 and I was beating 2300 set blitz all of a sudden

[00:22:34] [SPEAKER_03]: so

[00:22:35] [SPEAKER_03]: I enjoy it all except bullet, you know, sometimes they get carpal tunnel syndrome if I play that so I

[00:22:41] [SPEAKER_03]: Try not to play that and I think there's value in all from blitz on up

[00:22:45] [SPEAKER_03]: And by blitz I mean five plus three from blitz on up. I think there's value

[00:22:50] [SPEAKER_03]: There's learning there's educational value in everything, you know and classical

[00:22:55] [SPEAKER_03]: You're thinking of so many ideas and so many plans

[00:22:58] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, it's so great to study those deeply whereas blitz

[00:23:01] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll just study, you know the opening and and what plan did I come up with

[00:23:06] [SPEAKER_03]: And what might have been a better plan and I'll go over them with every blitz game I play

[00:23:09] [SPEAKER_03]: I go over with my coach and of course every over the board game. Okay. So speaking of your coach

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_01]: I want to go back to the original

[00:23:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Topics I mentioned

[00:23:18] [SPEAKER_01]: You had studied correct me if I'm wrong you studied with gm. Jesse cry for a while. Yeah, correct

[00:23:23] [SPEAKER_01]: And can you tell us? Yeah, tell us a little bit about that

[00:23:25] [SPEAKER_03]: so when I was like

[00:23:27] [SPEAKER_03]: 18 or 19 I played in the u.s. Junior Open

[00:23:30] [SPEAKER_03]: And the young jesse cry

[00:23:33] [SPEAKER_03]: Was also playing and he was about 2300

[00:23:35] [SPEAKER_03]: I beat him in round one or round two. I still remember the game

[00:23:39] [SPEAKER_03]: I like sacked my queen and I remember thinking

[00:23:43] [SPEAKER_03]: This guy is a really

[00:23:45] [SPEAKER_03]: Nice polite good person like here. I

[00:23:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Had this great attack sacked the queen one first thing he does

[00:23:53] [SPEAKER_03]: He like

[00:23:54] [SPEAKER_03]: You know talks to the people playing all around us like oh my gosh

[00:23:57] [SPEAKER_03]: Did you see what this guy just did like he was bragging about my move to other players?

[00:24:02] [SPEAKER_03]: I thought that was a really good

[00:24:04] [SPEAKER_03]: Sportsmanship way to play and we had been facebook friends, you know all along, you know

[00:24:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Obviously facebook wasn't made then but you know in the past 15 years. We've been facebook friends

[00:24:13] [SPEAKER_03]: so

[00:24:14] [SPEAKER_03]: At one point I saw him, you know online with twitch

[00:24:18] [SPEAKER_03]: I I we played a little bit and then I asked him to give me lessons

[00:24:23] [SPEAKER_03]: He was very good. He has a very classical approach. It's very much focused on

[00:24:29] [SPEAKER_03]: positional play and he really

[00:24:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Likes to go over the class we could spend weeks going over

[00:24:34] [SPEAKER_03]: One classical game that I play which is good like that's a certain kind of studying and we go really deep into studying

[00:24:41] [SPEAKER_03]: A classical game, but I really needed to get up to speed

[00:24:45] [SPEAKER_03]: in you know, make sure my openings didn't have major holes and

[00:24:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Make sure I understood enough of the plans in a new opening

[00:24:54] [SPEAKER_03]: So I needed kind of like quantity almost of course quality, but I really needed quantity and with avatic regorian

[00:25:02] [SPEAKER_03]: I play let's say six blitz games a day. So about uh, whatever it is 40 blitz games a week and then

[00:25:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Once every week or so I'll have a bunch of over-the-board games

[00:25:12] [SPEAKER_03]: And we go over we meet once a week

[00:25:15] [SPEAKER_03]: And sometimes it'll be a six hour lesson, but we go over every blitz game

[00:25:20] [SPEAKER_03]: And it's just bam bam bam like in in this opening

[00:25:24] [SPEAKER_03]: There's this plan this plan this plan and this plan

[00:25:27] [SPEAKER_03]: And we'll go over all of them just like quantity and then I'll forget them the next week

[00:25:32] [SPEAKER_03]: We'll go over it again

[00:25:33] [SPEAKER_03]: And then I'll write them down like which ones am I remembering which ones am I am I forgetting?

[00:25:38] [SPEAKER_03]: He'll give me homework. So I'll get like the next day

[00:25:41] [SPEAKER_03]: If I was really bad on winning one position

[00:25:44] [SPEAKER_03]: So give me a bunch of positions, you know white to move and

[00:25:48] [SPEAKER_03]: Win a one position or if I'm having problems defending lost positions

[00:25:52] [SPEAKER_03]: So give me

[00:25:53] [SPEAKER_03]: Exercises on that or if I'm having problems understanding why a bishop pair is better than a bishop in the night

[00:25:58] [SPEAKER_03]: He'll give me problems on that. So I should mention in a lot, you know, some of my study each day involves

[00:26:05] [SPEAKER_03]: uh

[00:26:06] [SPEAKER_03]: This homework and also

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_03]: He'll send me back the games we analyze and I'll write down the things that I'm having trouble remembering

[00:26:13] [SPEAKER_03]: I should also mention I took

[00:26:14] [SPEAKER_03]: memory lessons from the world memory champion like chest of all help set that up for me and uh

[00:26:22] [SPEAKER_03]: That was very interesting. I've spoken to I don't want to say I've had lessons from lots of coaches

[00:26:27] [SPEAKER_03]: But I've spoken to a lot of people about

[00:26:29] [SPEAKER_03]: improvement at this age

[00:26:31] [SPEAKER_01]: Now well, tell me a little bit about that memory lessons like gave me a little snapshot of what that looks like

[00:26:36] [SPEAKER_03]: so if I was trying like if I was trying to remember a super tactical line of

[00:26:41] [SPEAKER_03]: Let's call it, you know, the alakine defense

[00:26:45] [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, I was having trouble remembering and you know, then I would remember a line

[00:26:49] [SPEAKER_03]: And then somebody would prepare for me

[00:26:52] [SPEAKER_03]: And no five computer lines deeper, you know computer moves deeper and just because they have better memories. So

[00:26:59] [SPEAKER_03]: With with this guy, uh, and this was about a year ago

[00:27:03] [SPEAKER_03]: We'd work on how to kind of store memory the opening variations in what's called a memory palace, which is a

[00:27:09] [SPEAKER_03]: A technique used by memory champions

[00:27:13] [SPEAKER_03]: But it was good. I did memorize those variations, but what's been much better for me is really

[00:27:19] [SPEAKER_03]: bulk understanding all the plans in a certain type of position

[00:27:23] [SPEAKER_03]: Like I said before in the kings indian

[00:27:26] [SPEAKER_03]: There I had one plan well now if I were to play the kings indian, I'd also understand

[00:27:31] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, okay, there's also opportunities to get play on the c file

[00:27:35] [SPEAKER_03]: There's opportunities when they exchange e f g f so you can't do your normal kingside pond storm

[00:27:42] [SPEAKER_03]: So I don't I understand more plans every opening has

[00:27:46] [SPEAKER_03]: Dozens of plans and nuances associated with it that I really wasn't aware of before

[00:27:51] [SPEAKER_01]: Now let's get into

[00:27:53] [SPEAKER_01]: chess improvement as you know a quote unquote older adults say over the age of 40 or in our case over the age of 50

[00:28:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Do you feel you touched on this a little bit, but let's kind of take a deeper dive

[00:28:05] [SPEAKER_01]: Do adults quote unquote like age out of improvement does it do you think it gets to a point where you can only improve so much?

[00:28:12] [SPEAKER_01]: and then

[00:28:13] [SPEAKER_01]: As part of that question you do have people

[00:28:15] [SPEAKER_01]: who

[00:28:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Claim to spend hours and hours studying and they're buying all the books and yet, you know, they've been rated 1400 for like 15 years straight

[00:28:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Like what are your thoughts on that? It's almost really two questions. And I'll deal. I'll start with the first one which is

[00:28:30] [SPEAKER_03]: do

[00:28:31] [SPEAKER_03]: older people plateau and

[00:28:34] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't think the end I think the answer is

[00:28:36] [SPEAKER_03]: definitively no

[00:28:38] [SPEAKER_03]: But it gets harder for lots of reasons one is the brain so again through this journey. I've talked to

[00:28:46] [SPEAKER_03]: Neuroscientists, I've talked to psychologists. I've talked to performance coaches

[00:28:50] [SPEAKER_03]: So on the neuroscience side

[00:28:52] [SPEAKER_03]: The brain does change things like memory and raw calculation

[00:28:59] [SPEAKER_03]: Start to decline no matter what like I can say my memory is still

[00:29:04] [SPEAKER_03]: exceptionally good

[00:29:05] [SPEAKER_03]: But not good enough not as good as it was when I was hitting 2200 back in the day

[00:29:12] [SPEAKER_03]: And memory just simply declines like how often you make it to the afternoon and you forgot what you had for breakfast that day

[00:29:18] [SPEAKER_03]: Like that starts to decline when you're like 40 or even in your 30s and

[00:29:23] [SPEAKER_03]: you know

[00:29:24] [SPEAKER_03]: You see this all the time like with why do kind of the older world champions who come back to play

[00:29:31] [SPEAKER_03]: They switch from playing the sharpest to sillions tonight f3 g3, you know d3 b3

[00:29:37] [SPEAKER_03]: You know because those are

[00:29:39] [SPEAKER_03]: A little easier to get a position and then they figure it out

[00:29:43] [SPEAKER_03]: So that that's neither good nor bad, but you know, maybe that's a technique

[00:29:47] [SPEAKER_03]: I have to do eventually but so far I haven't been doing that

[00:29:50] [SPEAKER_03]: But the other thing that changes is your raw

[00:29:55] [SPEAKER_03]: Calculation ability and it's not just in chess by the way you see this in

[00:29:58] [SPEAKER_03]: You know mathematics for instance the peak age for a professional mathematician is 25 years old

[00:30:05] [SPEAKER_03]: That might be the peak age for a chess player, you know, magnus is in his 30s

[00:30:09] [SPEAKER_03]: But he you know, he's the world champion. He might be an exception

[00:30:12] [SPEAKER_03]: You know typically the most of the people

[00:30:15] [SPEAKER_03]: In the top 10 or top 20 are people in their 20s this

[00:30:19] [SPEAKER_03]: When I turned 40, I remember I was like, oh, I'm an old man now and I looked at the

[00:30:25] [SPEAKER_03]: Top 20 chess players and the only one over 40 at that time. I think was was anand

[00:30:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Uh, and so everybody else was under 40 and on onto his credit is still like a top 10 or top 20 player

[00:30:38] [SPEAKER_03]: He's amazing

[00:30:38] [SPEAKER_03]: But what improves with age?

[00:30:41] [SPEAKER_03]: People don't realize and maybe this is kind of more new discoveries

[00:30:45] [SPEAKER_03]: The brain does improve as it gets older. There's something called neuro plasticity

[00:30:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Which is the brain's ability to learn new things you you still have neuro plasticity

[00:30:53] [SPEAKER_03]: It's just in different parts of the brain and so

[00:30:56] [SPEAKER_03]: What does improve and it's going to sound weird

[00:30:59] [SPEAKER_03]: And it only improves if you work at it is wisdom. So for instance, I'll give an example

[00:31:04] [SPEAKER_03]: The peak age for historians now remember the peak age for mathematicians 25 the peak age for historian

[00:31:11] [SPEAKER_03]: Is 69 and the peak age for writers in their 60s

[00:31:15] [SPEAKER_03]: And the reason is is that

[00:31:17] [SPEAKER_03]: Is that your ability to recognize patterns in many disparate areas and then combine them to form cohesive

[00:31:26] [SPEAKER_03]: theories

[00:31:27] [SPEAKER_03]: Becomes better. So you might say to yourself. Oh the air conditioner was invented in 1900

[00:31:34] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if it was but let's just say the air conditioners invented in 1900

[00:31:38] [SPEAKER_03]: Southern

[00:31:39] [SPEAKER_03]: Urbanization started to happen in the early 1900s like skyscraper started to be built

[00:31:43] [SPEAKER_03]: Well, then you can make the connection air conditioning which cools down the highest floors

[00:31:50] [SPEAKER_03]: Enabled urbanization to happen in the south which increased the economic development of the united states and led to a booming

[00:31:56] [SPEAKER_03]: You know innovative united states for the next century with with innovations happening both north and south

[00:32:01] [SPEAKER_03]: So historians make those connections and connect those dots and then write good books about it and refer to other books and refer to other things

[00:32:08] [SPEAKER_03]: and and

[00:32:10] [SPEAKER_03]: In chess the same thing could happen

[00:32:13] [SPEAKER_03]: Like oh, I saw this position

[00:32:16] [SPEAKER_03]: on the black side of a portuguese Scandinavian

[00:32:20] [SPEAKER_03]: But now it looks like I can do it in a roi lopez over here

[00:32:25] [SPEAKER_03]: So you make connections between plans and positions you saw in one game

[00:32:28] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, I remember when olf anerson played this versus bobby fisher or bobby fisher played this versus spasky and

[00:32:34] [SPEAKER_03]: You form more of these kind of

[00:32:37] [SPEAKER_03]: Wisdom connections now the question remains though

[00:32:40] [SPEAKER_03]: Which is why by the way

[00:32:41] [SPEAKER_03]: I study a lot more of the classical games than I ever studied before and I said a lot more

[00:32:45] [SPEAKER_03]: End games than I ever did before because that's all pattern recognition end games

[00:32:49] [SPEAKER_03]: And these classical games there are tactics, of course you need tactics to win

[00:32:53] [SPEAKER_03]: But you need that pattern recognition

[00:32:56] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh

[00:32:57] [SPEAKER_03]: This is the time when I had to go king h1 rook g1 g4 g5 and attack that way as opposed to f3 e4

[00:33:05] [SPEAKER_03]: You know your pattern recognition for good positions versus bad positions

[00:33:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Is better and so you don't need maybe as many

[00:33:13] [SPEAKER_03]: tactics the question is

[00:33:15] [SPEAKER_03]: Is what you lose

[00:33:17] [SPEAKER_03]: greater than what you gain or vice versa and

[00:33:20] [SPEAKER_03]: The theory is that what you lose is worse than what you gain

[00:33:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Losing memory and losing calculation

[00:33:27] [SPEAKER_03]: Is worse than what you gain

[00:33:29] [SPEAKER_03]: But again, you see among like older players like older grandmasters and so on

[00:33:36] [SPEAKER_03]: Well, let's use an example of computers

[00:33:38] [SPEAKER_03]: The stock fish style computer and there's the alpha zero style of computer stock fish looks at like

[00:33:43] [SPEAKER_03]: Let's say 20 million moves in a second or 500 million moves in a second alpha zero actually looks at relatively few moves

[00:33:50] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's

[00:33:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Evaluation function per move is much greater

[00:33:55] [SPEAKER_03]: And so so it doesn't need to look as many moves and it's the same thing

[00:33:59] [SPEAKER_03]: When your pattern recognition and your quote-unquote wisdom

[00:34:02] [SPEAKER_03]: Is good when you're older the idea hopefully is that you don't have to have as many tactics

[00:34:06] [SPEAKER_03]: Although I do spend an hour a day on tactics. So I think

[00:34:10] [SPEAKER_03]: That's what when you're older you kind of have to really

[00:34:13] [SPEAKER_03]: Learn new things. It's like I'm learning chess for the first time

[00:34:18] [SPEAKER_03]: And learning things I never knew before

[00:34:20] [SPEAKER_03]: Like like what to do with the space advantage never knew what what to do when you have bishop and bishop versus bishop at night

[00:34:26] [SPEAKER_03]: Never used to know

[00:34:27] [SPEAKER_03]: Didn't need to know didn't care

[00:34:45] [SPEAKER_01]: I know you're writing a book about your own journey

[00:34:50] [SPEAKER_01]: As someone trying to get back to

[00:34:52] [SPEAKER_01]: 2200 over 50 a lot of it is improvement over the age of 50

[00:34:56] [SPEAKER_01]: So can you tell us a little bit about you know the book and you know, maybe give us a little sneak preview

[00:35:01] [SPEAKER_03]: What kind of things you know, we'll see with that. This has not just been a journey of improvement. It's really been

[00:35:06] [SPEAKER_03]: an exciting

[00:35:08] [SPEAKER_03]: quest

[00:35:09] [SPEAKER_03]: for me back into this

[00:35:11] [SPEAKER_03]: game and this subculture

[00:35:13] [SPEAKER_03]: That I loved so much when I was

[00:35:16] [SPEAKER_03]: you know

[00:35:17] [SPEAKER_03]: 25 26 30 years younger and

[00:35:21] [SPEAKER_03]: So so yes initially I thought I was going to be just about

[00:35:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Here's what I did like I had written this book called skip the line which talks about how to learn things very quickly and a lot of my

[00:35:31] [SPEAKER_03]: The neuroscience stuff and the psychological stuff

[00:35:34] [SPEAKER_03]: And other things are included in that book skip the line now

[00:35:38] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm specifically applying it to chess and I thought it'd be barely straightforward, but

[00:35:43] [SPEAKER_03]: You know also I will add that this has been such an exciting

[00:35:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Adventure, you know because I had a whole career for those 25 years. I wrote lots of books. I was uh

[00:35:55] [SPEAKER_03]: You know like a hedge fund manager. I was on cnbc quite a bit

[00:35:59] [SPEAKER_03]: I wrote

[00:35:59] [SPEAKER_03]: I've written books about going broke and failing and coming back from that so I built an audience from that

[00:36:05] [SPEAKER_03]: I've written books about entrepreneurship

[00:36:07] [SPEAKER_03]: So I have an audience of people from different, you know, I did stand-up comedy and toured the country for six years

[00:36:14] [SPEAKER_03]: I've done lots of different

[00:36:16] [SPEAKER_03]: Things for better or for worse. I could be a jack of all trades master of none is what my fear is

[00:36:20] [SPEAKER_03]: But you know when I first went to my my first tournament coming back into this at like in december 2021

[00:36:28] [SPEAKER_03]: I had readers of my books and listeners to my podcast come up to me

[00:36:32] [SPEAKER_03]: And it was a nice feeling

[00:36:33] [SPEAKER_03]: And then new and chess magazine, which was my favorite magazine as a kid

[00:36:37] [SPEAKER_03]: Asked me to start writing columns for them and I couldn't believe it like oh my gosh new and chess

[00:36:43] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I'm a total imposter

[00:36:46] [SPEAKER_03]: Imposter syndrome on there like there'll be an article from yan timon than me than judith polgar which one doesn't belong

[00:36:53] [SPEAKER_03]: And it's me and you know, I've uh, you know all along the way. I

[00:36:59] [SPEAKER_03]: You know garricka sprawls been on my podcast a bunch of times. We've become good friends

[00:37:03] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I just was in norway

[00:37:05] [SPEAKER_03]: Speaking at the norway business summit, but that was side by side with the norway chess tournament

[00:37:09] [SPEAKER_03]: So I met a lot of the top players had dinner with

[00:37:14] [SPEAKER_03]: Magnus carlson his dad peter nelson his coach

[00:37:17] [SPEAKER_03]: And every day something new happens, which is part of this adventure and part of this

[00:37:23] [SPEAKER_03]: This journey of really immersing myself in again in a different way now as as as an older person rather than as a young person

[00:37:31] [SPEAKER_03]: It's different and that's been exciting

[00:37:34] [SPEAKER_03]: it's been frustrating sometimes the the learning part because

[00:37:37] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not learning

[00:37:39] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean

[00:37:40] [SPEAKER_03]: So peter nelson says something interesting to me and that's magnus's coach peter nelson said, you know, you might already be better than

[00:37:47] [SPEAKER_03]: You were it's just that the chess world as a whole has is a lot better than it was

[00:37:52] [SPEAKER_03]: 25 years ago

[00:37:53] [SPEAKER_03]: And so, you know, that's worth thinking about and I don't know how to measure that

[00:37:58] [SPEAKER_03]: But that's worth thinking about. I mean, I guess a way a little I mentioned that is how I do against other people in their 50s

[00:38:04] [SPEAKER_03]: But that's not really that accurate because who knows what they're what they've been doing these years and

[00:38:11] [SPEAKER_03]: It's just been an interesting journey. I I I spoke to one. I am

[00:38:15] [SPEAKER_03]: At the last so i'm representing georgia in this senior championship coming up at the u.s. Open and last year

[00:38:21] [SPEAKER_03]: I did as well

[00:38:22] [SPEAKER_03]: And I was speaking to one. I am who was representing california's elliot winslow was an i am back in the 80s

[00:38:29] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:38:30] [SPEAKER_03]: He told me he's 250 points lower than his peak

[00:38:34] [SPEAKER_03]: And he always thinks he's going to get back and he never and he says and I and I know I never will now

[00:38:39] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:38:40] [SPEAKER_03]: He said don't don't delude yourself in the thing you're going to get back

[00:38:43] [SPEAKER_03]: And so i'm not saying he's an a-sayer

[00:38:45] [SPEAKER_03]: you know

[00:38:47] [SPEAKER_03]: That's his experience and and and he might be right. I haven't made it back yet

[00:38:52] [SPEAKER_03]: But I did go down the list of everybody playing in that tournament

[00:38:55] [SPEAKER_03]: And there were a lot of people who are

[00:38:58] [SPEAKER_03]: Like there was my old coach john fedora was representing new york in that tournament

[00:39:03] [SPEAKER_03]: Everybody was 200 to 250 points lower than their peak 100 percent of the people

[00:39:08] [SPEAKER_01]: I was gonna add we were talking a little bit about that in the pre interview. Yeah 200

[00:39:13] [SPEAKER_01]: That seems to be the magic now whenever people take a hit. That's like the magic number

[00:39:17] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and i'm 200 points lower than my peak. Yeah same here. I know I have more

[00:39:22] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, but this could be self delusion, but I feel like I have more knowledge

[00:39:27] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's really hard. It's just it's really hard playing in tournaments because of you know

[00:39:34] [SPEAKER_03]: Issues we spoke about earlier. It's the kids now they're

[00:39:39] [SPEAKER_03]: They're just super good tactically their their memories are great on openings

[00:39:43] [SPEAKER_03]: Every kid's got a coach, you know because of zoom and you know, you call up somebody and

[00:39:48] [SPEAKER_03]: You know a gm in whatever country you could pay

[00:39:51] [SPEAKER_03]: 10 dollars an hour. I don't know for lessons and

[00:39:54] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I know people who have former top 10 players giving them lessons for hardly anything and

[00:40:01] [SPEAKER_03]: uh

[00:40:02] [SPEAKER_03]: It's a really different competitive

[00:40:04] [SPEAKER_03]: environment

[00:40:05] [SPEAKER_03]: Hikaru does this one video a few months ago

[00:40:07] [SPEAKER_03]: I saw it where he described how he would study openings

[00:40:11] [SPEAKER_03]: In the year 2000 compared to how he studies openings now and

[00:40:15] [SPEAKER_03]: It reminded me I the way I studied openings. He didn't really have to know everything

[00:40:19] [SPEAKER_03]: You just had to know kind of the basic ideas and you go out there and you play it

[00:40:23] [SPEAKER_03]: Now you have to know you have to have huge files on every possible move

[00:40:28] [SPEAKER_03]: And that's the kids do it or I should say young people do it

[00:40:32] [SPEAKER_03]: It's it's just very hard to do

[00:40:34] [SPEAKER_03]: But we'll see. I mean

[00:40:36] [SPEAKER_03]: I again, I feel like um

[00:40:39] [SPEAKER_03]: Improving but sometimes I just I have a lot of volatility

[00:40:42] [SPEAKER_03]: I've beaten the highest rate of players

[00:40:44] [SPEAKER_03]: I've ever beaten during these this past year and a half

[00:40:47] [SPEAKER_03]: Over the board, but I've also lost to the lowest rate of players. I've ever lost to

[00:40:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Even when I first started playing back when I was 17 now, that's something I wanted to ask you about

[00:40:57] [SPEAKER_01]: How are you at handling?

[00:41:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Those tough losses like do you find yourself tilting a lot because I know for me, that's a big problem

[00:41:04] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm just curious how you handle that. I do everybody tilts. I don't think there's a way to truly avoid

[00:41:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Everyone gets upset you you play four hours a game

[00:41:12] [SPEAKER_03]: You're winning for three hours and 59 minutes and then you make a blunder and lose

[00:41:17] [SPEAKER_03]: That is not going to be something you celebrate

[00:41:19] [SPEAKER_03]: It's going to be it's going to feel painful and you should feel pain from it. You should feel

[00:41:24] [SPEAKER_03]: You know a little bit of loss of respect for yourself. You lost the game. You should have won

[00:41:29] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:41:30] [SPEAKER_03]: And that pain will will either drive you to quit as it did for me when I was 27 or 28

[00:41:37] [SPEAKER_03]: Or it'll drive you to learn as I'm trying to

[00:41:40] [SPEAKER_03]: Do now I mean

[00:41:42] [SPEAKER_03]: between that time when I last played chess and now

[00:41:45] [SPEAKER_03]: I

[00:41:46] [SPEAKER_03]: Built businesses. I sold them. I made money

[00:41:49] [SPEAKER_03]: But then I also went broke several times where I made

[00:41:52] [SPEAKER_03]: A ton of money

[00:41:53] [SPEAKER_03]: And then I would just make very poor decisions with that money

[00:41:56] [SPEAKER_03]: And go completely broke back to zero and have to do it all over again and then go completely broke again

[00:42:01] [SPEAKER_03]: So I've been through kind of ups and downs and I realize

[00:42:06] [SPEAKER_03]: I realized that

[00:42:08] [SPEAKER_03]: Through time and persistence

[00:42:11] [SPEAKER_03]: You you can learn from these mistakes, but you have to really

[00:42:14] [SPEAKER_03]: Try to you don't

[00:42:16] [SPEAKER_03]: It's more important to break bad habits than to get

[00:42:20] [SPEAKER_03]: Good habits because what's really causing you to lose a one position

[00:42:24] [SPEAKER_03]: Is some bad habit like maybe you you lack confidence or you

[00:42:30] [SPEAKER_03]: Uh

[00:42:31] [SPEAKER_03]: You decided you were winning you're already thinking about how you're going to show other people

[00:42:35] [SPEAKER_03]: Oh look at my great win and

[00:42:37] [SPEAKER_03]: And you forget it you miss a tactic

[00:42:39] [SPEAKER_03]: You're not as focused or you or you don't focus as much on time management

[00:42:42] [SPEAKER_03]: You're just like bragging in your head to yourself or this is me at least and so so

[00:42:47] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I try to tell like last tournament I played in chicago open. I was just around

[00:42:54] [SPEAKER_03]: 2100 so I was really kind of I had bounced off of my floor at 2000

[00:42:59] [SPEAKER_03]: And in just like a month and so I felt like okay

[00:43:02] [SPEAKER_03]: I could really make a run now to 2200 and then I lost the first seven games

[00:43:07] [SPEAKER_03]: Like that is brutal

[00:43:10] [SPEAKER_03]: And after like three or four, I called my wife and I'm like, you know, I I just may have to give up

[00:43:15] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:43:16] [SPEAKER_03]: she didn't necessarily disagree but

[00:43:20] [SPEAKER_03]: She did say that

[00:43:22] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I do have a tendency to bounce back from these moments

[00:43:26] [SPEAKER_03]: And I I did try to transform it afterwards to like wow, this is valuable

[00:43:31] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm bringing a treasure trove of material to my coach like because you learn more from losses than wins

[00:43:36] [SPEAKER_03]: So I'm certainly going to learn learn a lot this time from this tournament

[00:43:39] [SPEAKER_03]: so I try to reframe it and it's hard but

[00:43:43] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I don't let myself really tilt and I I have a tendency to win the last round or two in these tournaments

[00:43:49] [SPEAKER_03]: So I I try not to tilt

[00:43:51] [SPEAKER_03]: As much as my opponents because in the last round or two everybody's sucking

[00:43:55] [SPEAKER_03]: So if you're if you're if you're sucking and you're playing people in the last run, they're sucking also

[00:44:00] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you just have to suck less than the other guy. Yeah, right

[00:44:04] [SPEAKER_03]: It's like that saying like you don't have to run if a bear is chasing you

[00:44:08] [SPEAKER_03]: You don't have to run faster than the bear

[00:44:10] [SPEAKER_03]: You just have to run faster than the other people running from the bear. Yeah, exactly, right

[00:44:14] [SPEAKER_01]: So James, I do listen to your podcast and one of my favorite episodes was

[00:44:21] [SPEAKER_01]: Alex Benayan where he talks about the third door as far as success

[00:44:25] [SPEAKER_01]: So for the uninitiated and James correct me if I'm wrong

[00:44:29] [SPEAKER_01]: When you want to achieve something in life or get somewhere there's essentially like

[00:44:33] [SPEAKER_01]: Like three ways and he uses the analogy of getting into a nightclub, right? So you have the people

[00:44:39] [SPEAKER_01]: It's a small amount of people

[00:44:41] [SPEAKER_01]: They're powerful. They know people it's all politics. They can kind of have a connection

[00:44:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Most people aren't in that situation. That's one way the other way is what most people do

[00:44:51] [SPEAKER_01]: Which is they wait online like everybody else and they hope the bouncer lets them in

[00:44:55] [SPEAKER_01]: But then he talks about

[00:44:57] [SPEAKER_01]: The third door like you sort of find a window to kind of sneak in like a creative way

[00:45:03] [SPEAKER_01]: So is there like a third door because I you know, I was thinking about this as it relates to the chest

[00:45:07] [SPEAKER_01]: Is there sort of a third door

[00:45:10] [SPEAKER_01]: That older adults can use to get better or is that a myth? They just have to study like anyone else

[00:45:14] [SPEAKER_01]: Like are there hacks that someone over 50 can use

[00:45:18] [SPEAKER_01]: As opposed to say like an energetic 20 year old. Yeah, that's a great question and

[00:45:24] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't fully my initial assumption

[00:45:27] [SPEAKER_03]: Was yes because this is very similar also to the theme of my book skip the line

[00:45:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Like what he's really talking about is to get in the nightclub is you have to figure out a way to skip the line

[00:45:36] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:45:39] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll give you an example

[00:45:41] [SPEAKER_03]: One of my daughters was having trouble getting into college one year

[00:45:44] [SPEAKER_03]: She basically applied to 20 different colleges got into zero of them

[00:45:50] [SPEAKER_03]: It's very competitive

[00:45:52] [SPEAKER_03]: And so I said to her look and she was very upset and I said to her look

[00:45:56] [SPEAKER_03]: Why don't you take a year off and let's figure out an unusual like

[00:46:01] [SPEAKER_03]: No, don't do charity. Don't do

[00:46:05] [SPEAKER_03]: Don't have an a plus grade like that that stuff doesn't matter. Everybody who applies to college has 1600 s at score now

[00:46:11] [SPEAKER_03]: Whatever

[00:46:12] [SPEAKER_03]: Let's do something unusual. So I gave her a bunch of options including chess actually because there's very few

[00:46:18] [SPEAKER_03]: Compared to men. There's very few women who are moving up the ranks in chess

[00:46:22] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not saying women are not good at chess. I'm saying there's fewer

[00:46:25] [SPEAKER_03]: The more women should play chess. There's fewer women doing it

[00:46:28] [SPEAKER_03]: So I gave chess is one of the options. She chose race car driving

[00:46:31] [SPEAKER_03]: So I sent her to a race car driving school. She got a race car driving license

[00:46:36] [SPEAKER_03]: She participated in some professional races

[00:46:40] [SPEAKER_03]: And lo and behold next year she applies to college. She got into every college like doesn't matter high high

[00:46:46] [SPEAKER_03]: How high the tier she is is going to duke university right now and

[00:46:50] [SPEAKER_03]: And I don't even approve of kids going to college, but that's a whole other story

[00:46:54] [SPEAKER_03]: But it was a skip the line technique

[00:46:57] [SPEAKER_03]: Like who else was a professional a female race car driver applying to college?

[00:47:02] [SPEAKER_03]: She stood out

[00:47:04] [SPEAKER_03]: By the way, one of the reasons I stopped playing chess before I went below 2200 is I wanted

[00:47:09] [SPEAKER_03]: I got jobs because of chess. I raised money for businesses because of chess

[00:47:13] [SPEAKER_03]: I raised money for hedge funds because of chess

[00:47:16] [SPEAKER_03]: I get I got introduced

[00:47:18] [SPEAKER_03]: You know corporations hired me to be a speaker because I was a chess master like chess is

[00:47:23] [SPEAKER_03]: important cultural significance

[00:47:26] [SPEAKER_03]: So it's a being strong at chess is a good skip the line technique in the alex benign, you know style

[00:47:34] [SPEAKER_03]: And so okay, but now just for getting better at chess

[00:47:38] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, there's there's a couple of

[00:47:41] [SPEAKER_03]: A couple of

[00:47:42] [SPEAKER_03]: Let's say third doors

[00:47:44] [SPEAKER_03]: But I I don't think any of them work consistently

[00:47:47] [SPEAKER_03]: So for instance

[00:47:49] [SPEAKER_03]: If you learn a lot of gambits, you're gonna win you're gonna win some games particularly in blitz

[00:47:53] [SPEAKER_03]: Just on

[00:47:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Those gambits like that'll add, you know 50 to 100 rating points to you if you if you are good at memorizing

[00:48:00] [SPEAKER_03]: All the obscure lines and like the staffer gambit for instance

[00:48:03] [SPEAKER_03]: And it doesn't matter how many times grandmasters prove the staffer gambit is no good

[00:48:08] [SPEAKER_03]: If you're 1800 or 1900 2000, you're gonna win a lot of games with the staffer gambit

[00:48:13] [SPEAKER_03]: You know what the most successful move is in bullet

[00:48:18] [SPEAKER_03]: after

[00:48:20] [SPEAKER_03]: e4

[00:48:21] [SPEAKER_03]: g6

[00:48:23] [SPEAKER_03]: d4 bishop g7

[00:48:25] [SPEAKER_03]: The most successful opening move is bishop h6

[00:48:29] [SPEAKER_03]: so

[00:48:30] [SPEAKER_03]: Because uh, it's just like you'll you'll either win the piece immediately or if you're down a piece

[00:48:35] [SPEAKER_03]: It's not necessarily an immediate loss at bullet like you could still play on so

[00:48:40] [SPEAKER_03]: You know stuff like that is like almost a third door technique in in bullet

[00:48:46] [SPEAKER_03]: But I think my suspicion now is

[00:48:50] [SPEAKER_03]: is that

[00:48:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Playing a good end game

[00:48:54] [SPEAKER_03]: For older people is a good third. I have won many more end games

[00:48:58] [SPEAKER_03]: That I've won out of the opening even though I studied opening. I know my openings very well

[00:49:03] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll win in the end game and even from

[00:49:07] [SPEAKER_03]: If if a young person even offers me a draw and they're upon ahead and totally crushing me

[00:49:12] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll refuse to draw

[00:49:13] [SPEAKER_03]: Because I know I'll know the end game better than them

[00:49:16] [SPEAKER_03]: And so now there's a famous quote between the opening and the end game. There's the middle game

[00:49:21] [SPEAKER_03]: So you have to know middle game strategies and plans as well

[00:49:25] [SPEAKER_03]: So that's a third door if you know what to do with a bishop pair. That's like a little bit of a third door

[00:49:30] [SPEAKER_03]: and

[00:49:31] [SPEAKER_03]: tactics

[00:49:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Are a third door like so again even though my tactical ability is probably worse than when I was younger

[00:49:38] [SPEAKER_03]: I try to keep it up there. I study it an hour a day

[00:49:42] [SPEAKER_03]: Avertec Gregorian the coach I'm working with

[00:49:45] [SPEAKER_03]: He tells me he doesn't feel tactics are you know, they're definitely worth studying. He says but you really have to know

[00:49:52] [SPEAKER_03]: positional middle game strategy to be

[00:49:55] [SPEAKER_03]: 2200 and 2300 these days. And so I've been really focusing on that

[00:50:00] [SPEAKER_03]: But you know, everybody has their opinion on this and I don't think we we know and again

[00:50:04] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll tell you more when I hit 2200 again. What what does really work?

[00:50:08] [SPEAKER_01]: Hopefully you will reach 2200 and we'll have you back on and we can discuss that journey

[00:50:13] [SPEAKER_01]: You know getting up those extra 200 points, but

[00:50:16] [SPEAKER_01]: James Althacher really appreciate you coming on the podcast. It was an honor to speak with you. Thank you

[00:50:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Neil thanks so much and good luck on your own journey as well. Absolutely. Thank you

[00:50:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And for those of you listening at home as always, I hope you win your next game. Have a great day everyone