Where am I?

My current rating are:
Slow chess: 2457 ( I guess I am a correspondance chess master)
Gameknot: 1674 (Climbing a tough laddeer, 29/1/0)

I decided to be a more cavalier with slow chess games. I planned to be carefull with gameknot because I like their computer interface and unless I move up in the ranking, the opponent might not be challenging. So far, I have only 3 difficult games.

Starting again

Gosh!
Rook endings are so boring!
How many games I played that reached a lucena or philidor position. NONE!
Most of the time, I kill or I am killed in the middle game. My opening is not an issue because I only played email chess and the database are allowed. The middle game, that is where the action happens.
So,
I am taking an executive decision. I am stopping reading Mednis and move on into
an old love, "Modern Chess Strategy" by Pachman. I read this book several years ago
and it is time to read it again.

Never lose hope

Even when losing, the enemy might let you go. It is hard to substain the winning pressure. So I must be patient when I am in the wrong side of the table.

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I finished passing my notes into supermemo. Now I will continue with Mednis' "Practical Rook endings."

Keep track of our own chess understanding

I came to the conclusion that one of my problem in the past with chess was not having a fast way to review what I study. Several years ago, when I was active in OTB, I used paper flash card to keep my memorized opening moves. Later I found supermemo but I never use for chess but to study German. With supermemo I memorized up to 4000 german words. I suspect that supermemo could help me to break my chess understanding ceiling.

I began passing my chessbase notes into supermemo in the form of questions and answers. First supermemo presents the chess board and a question set,then after I answer it, it shows the right response. If I fail it will present it again on the next day and so on. It uses an incremental learning strategy. It shows only the flash card that have not been learned. It could be a lot of work, but after finishing my strategy and endgame studies, I will have a set to review while I focus my energy into regular tactical exercises and annotated master games.

Tony Kosten's Book complete

I just finished '101 Tips to improve your chess" by Tony Kosten. It is a great book to reflesh some chess wisdom after being away from the game for a several years. After the 85 tips, Tony ran out of steam and it was time to move on. It took me a while to work through the book. I relied on Chessbase 11 to help me along. Tomorrow I will take my notes and drop them into supermemo to review them.

A memory from Fischer days.

I remember that in the first Fischer v. Spasky match there was one poison pawn game. I have the opportunity of taken the white side of the position and played a pretty combination. This is my first unrated game at chess.com. I am not really sure that I could played in that server because slowchess.com and gameknot.com are probably enough.

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A Knight to the rim is a dog.

Finally I made to tip No. 50 of "101 Tips to Improve Your Chess" by Tony Kosten. I am using this book to systematically review what I know about chess. A refresher book that I love.  Here is what I found in Tip No. 50.

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Trapping chess pieces

A very niece strategical game.

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Study plan

1. Alternate study between strategy and endgame
2. Practice Tactics everyday: first 3 levels of CT-ART and Practical Chess Exercises
3. Play about 30 turn based games simultaneously

The analysis of own games will follow after finishing the current book in strategy because I want reflesh my memory about it.

Bishop pair for a drawing game.

I know that bishop pairs are good for winning a game. However, they are also good for drawing a game.(Tip #38 of Kosten's book)

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