I was beaten by a master this weekend. He told that in order to
improve chess players should study endgames.

I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
in any of my real games.

I was beaten by a master this weekend. He told that in order to
improve chess players should study endgames.

I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
in any of my real games.

They'll happen, just not very often.

Most people emphasize endgames to justify their laziness in the opening.


--
"Google maintains the USENET." -- The Honorable R. Barclay Surrick, Eastern
District of PA Judge
From Parker v. Google, E.D.Pa. #04-cv-3918

In article . com,
"Zero" wrote:

I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
in any of my real games.

Your ability to play endgames will improve your middlegame.

When you learn to evaluate endings properly, you'll have another
"weapon" in your middlegame arsenal: the threat to trade into a
favorable endgame. You'll be able to employ more sophisticated attacks
and sacrifices (because you won't need to win overwhelming material in
order to win) and you'll be a better defender.

Studying endgames will also help you improve your handling of the pieces
in a middlegame. Learning how to use two pieces well together - which
you have to do when you only have two pieces left! - will carry over
into your middlegame, and you'll find yourself co-ordinating your pieces
more effectively when you have more of them. Studying endgames will also
probably improve your visualization and calculation.

Now, obviously, studying endgames isn't going to save you if you're
hanging material to a much stronger player on move 12.

Please recognize that Ray Gordon is (to put it nicely) a maverick when
he talks about focusing on openings. In fact, the most common advice
given to players who wish to improve - advice given by World Champions
like Capablanca, Lasker and Botvinnik, as well as respected teaching
professionals like Pandolfini, Reinfeld, and Silman - is to focus on
tactics and endgames if you want to improve rapidly.

Endgame studies aren't everyone's cup of tea. Instead, I'd recommend a
pair of books on more practical endgame play:

Silman's "Essential Chess Endings" which contains the must-know
theoretical knowledge you're going to need, and Soltis' "Grandmaster
Secrets: Endings" - which is a great primer of practical endgame play.

-Ron

Basically, the situation is this.

If you lose most of your games because the opponent wins a piece for
nothing for some point by a two-move combination, then it is true that
you don't need to study the endgame too much at that point (though of
course you should know elementary mates, the opposition, etc.). But
there's little point of deeply studying openings at that point, either,
since you wouldn't have any idea what makes one opening position better
or worse for one of the sides anyway. You should, in that case,
practice basic tactics.

If, however, you reach the point that most of your games reach the
endgame with more or less even material instead of being a piece down,
knowing endgames is what makes the difference between winning and
losing.

It is true that openings come first in the game, but studying openings
in depth is usually a waste of time for a non-master for three obvious
reasons: (a) if your opponent deviates from the "best" line--and he
will in 99% of the cases--you wouldn't know how to take advantage of
his deviation, and (b) you are not going to remember the variations you
studies over-the-board in any case.

You're going to look pretty stupid if you cant win a K+R vs K
endgame.

"Zero" wrote in message ups.com...
| I was beaten by a master this weekend. He told that in order to
| improve chess players should study endgames.
|
| I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
| the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
| Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
| over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
| in any of my real games.
|

We first need to ascertain your general playing strength. Have you ever
studied endgames before?


"Zero" wrote in message
ups.com...
I was beaten by a master this weekend. He told that in order to
improve chess players should study endgames.

I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
in any of my real games.

In "Nigel Short teaches chess" he says exactly the same thing as the
master - study endgames. He also adds that in Russia, chess is taugh
backwards, ie endgames first then middlegames then openings.
I'm sure he also said the following, though I can't find it in the book..
words to the effect that...

If you become stronger at endgames, that will give you more confindence in
the middlegame, because you will be able to steer towards what you have
learnt is a won endgame.





"Zero" wrote in message
ups.com...
I was beaten by a master this weekend. He told that in order to
improve chess players should study endgames.

I don't understand why I should study endgames. If I can't get through
the middlegame or the opening or am I supposed to get to a endgame?
Also I bought a endgame studies book and I don't see the point in going
over these studies. None of these positions are ever going to happen
in any of my real games.

In "Nigel Short teaches chess" he says exactly the same thing as the
master - study endgames.

Short LOST the world championship.

Hell, I could have done that.


--
"Google maintains the USENET." -- The Honorable R. Barclay Surrick, Eastern
District of PA Judge
From Parker v. Google, E.D.Pa. #04-cv-3918

Ray Gordon schrieb:

In "Nigel Short teaches chess" he says exactly the same thing as the
master - study endgames.

Short LOST the world championship.

And we know, that just any patzer can reach a world championship final

Hell, I could have done that.

You think you would have been able to beat Gelfand, Timmermann and
Kasparov in order to get there?

Short was at the end of the eighties, begin of the nineties one of the
strongest players in the world. He still could wipe the floor with you
in tournament chess. So, I think just to wave away his opinion shows
quite an attitude. He was not dreaming in his room in front of his
computer becoming a GM - he is one.

Greetings,
Ralf

Hell, I could have done that.

You think you would have been able to beat Gelfand, Timmermann and
Kasparov in order to get there?

Short was at the end of the eighties, begin of the nineties one of the
strongest players in the world. He still could wipe the floor with you
in tournament chess.

He hung a rook not long ago in a tournament game.


--
"Google maintains the USENET." -- The Honorable R. Barclay Surrick, Eastern
District of PA Judge
From Parker v. Google, E.D.Pa. #04-cv-3918