Working the Puzzles

The Puzzles feature on Chess.com has always been there, but I’ve used it only sporadically. That changed recently.

As of mid-December 2022 I had solved less than 5000 puzzles during 15 years on the site. Something motivated me to get to 5000 by the end of the year when I noticed that less than 300 more would get me there. Then, briefly on Christmas Day I peaked at a rating of 3002! Alas, my friend Anthony was at 3012. In the effort to catch him I fell back down to 2700 over the next hour. That session, one of my longest, logged a low of 2706, a high of 3002, and ended at 2802. I attempted 133 puzzles, getting 68 correct. The site shows a solving time of 2 hours and 15 minutes. 

In the past few months, I have completed over 3000 puzzles and finally got back over 3000 a couple of days ago. I hit a new peak of 3042 the morning of April 1, then 3043 in the afternoon. The next day, yesterday, I made it to 3044. Then, late at night when I was too tired to function, I pushed for more and fell to 2995. This morning the first three puzzles were fails, dropping me to 2944. However, by the time my coffee cup was empty, I had passed 14 and failed 8, ending with a rating of 3034.

Several friends remain higher. Anthony is currently at 3086. My top student is laboring to catch me. He certainly will. It is only a matter of when. It is my job to keep moving his goalposts as he nears them.

Books remain my preference for training. Currently, I’m working through Jesus de la Villa, 100 Endgames You Must Know, 4th ed. (2015) along with occasional work with the two companion volumes, The 100 Endgames You Must Know Workbook (2019) and 100 Endgame Patterns You Must Know (2021). Also on my table of active books is Sergey Ivashchenko, The Manual of Chess Combinations, vol. 2 (2002). I’ll likely repeat the sixth stage after I complete it because I fail half of the problems about every fifth page. Most often I correctly solve 5/6. Thomas Engqvist's 300 series also gets worked into the mix now and then.

Solving puzzles on Chess.com has become a principal part of how I enjoy that site. When I check my stats, I look at the quantity over the past 7, 30, and 90 days, expecting to see that the number of puzzles attempted exceeds the number of games played.  One goal over the next few months is to see more puzzles than games played over the past year. That will require a lot of puzzles.

Obviously, I have a long ways to go on puzzles to match and exceed my play.