How To Learn Chess As An Adult (or, how I went from 300 to 1500 ELO in 9 months) (2021)

Like most people, late last year I watched the Queen's Gambit. Like most people, I made a Chess.com account assuming I’d become the new Beth Harmon. Unfortunately, more than literally almost everyone, I sucked at chess.

At first, this was unsurprising: I only vaguely knew what the pieces did, and didn't know more complicated rules like castling. But I'm a smart guy (hi white male privilege). If I just brushed up on the rules and played a few games I'd be beating Bobby Fischer in no time.

So I did. In December I played about 500 games of 'Blitz' (fast) chess. That's around an hour a day - it was lockdown after all. What did I learn? I suck at chess! Fucking. Suck. I was not even bad for a beginner, I was one of the worst people in the world.

After 500 Blitz games my ELO rating (the number that shows how strong you are) was 328. Out of the regulars on Chess.com, 11 million players, I wasn’t even 5th percentile. AKA, 95% of players on Chess.com were better than me. Worse still, I wasn't improving, I was getting worse. I slumped to 328 on January 1st 2021, after my month of Blitz.

from Hacker News https://ift.tt/Pp92TnG