Category: Review training

Review: Preventing Blunders in Chess

Michel HoetmerLeave a comment

If I didn’t make so many mistakes, I would be…?

You sometimes hear chess players sigh, “If I didn’t make so many mistakes, I’d be a much stronger player!” One or more mistakes in a game are acceptable. We all make them, and they aren’t always fatal. But blunders? They hurt. A lot.

It has happened to me far too often. It’s hilarious to think that I once blundered against Can Kabadayi, the award-winning author of this excellent training course (among other things, Chessable Author of the Year 2024). It was at a weekend tournament in Malmö in 2015. I blundered a bishop for no reason at all. If I remember correctly, it was a classic case of what the author calls “mobility restrictions.”

With the knowledge I have now, that was easy to prevent. The point of this training is to avoid such big and unnecessary mistakes. We can do this well if we teach ourselves to perform a short blunder check every time we’re about to move. This Chessable course teaches you how that works.

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Review: Killer Chess Training

Michel HoetmerLeave a comment
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Nowadays, chess training comes in all shapes and sizes. Of course you can opt for a personal approach. But it logically comes with a hefty price tag. You should count on amounts of approximately €50 per hour. This can of course be extremely useful and with such an approach there is a lot of room for questions and specific problems that the trainee is experiencing. For many, such a price tag is a bit too hefty.

A classroom approach can offer a solution for these players. I have been a member of “Killer Chess Training” for over a year and a half. The driving force behind this online chess academy is the well-known trainer and author GM Jacob Aagaard. But he is far from the only one who provides training. There is an extensive group of masters and grandmasters who provide the training.

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