Playing Chess in Faster Time Controls

When I started playing online chess, I stuck with 15-minute games because I couldn’t imagine playing faster games. I just felt that it was too much pressure and that I wouldn’t be able to keep up so I would simply end up losing on time. But I wanted to explore and try out some new things, moreover I wanted to hustle some people and I thought playing with faster time controls would help me do that. I was dead wrong.

One of the first quick games I played was a 10+1, which does not stand for 10 minutes with one-second increments rather it stands for 10 seconds with one second increments. It was a foolish decision I know but I was able to hustle some games from my opponents by just moving any piece and burning my opponent’s time. I wasn’t playing strategic or even a tactical game, I was just obsessed with beating them on the clock. But as I faced stronger opponents, it became more difficult to keep up because their moves made sense and I mine were mostly trash. So I thought that perhaps I should bring it down a notch and I tried 5-minute games.

I was a bit more successful in the 5-minute games since I had more time to think about my moves and I could relax my pace a bit. Now, when I started to get the hang of it, I felt that blitz games were my thing and I just kept playing them. Another reason why I chose to stick with blitz was that I didn’t need to spend a lot of time on one game unlike 10-minute or 15-minute games. And since this was just a pastime, I didn’t need to spend too much time on it. I just wanted to enjoy myself.

Things changed when I started to actually learn about chess. I watched videos about people who are playing chess and through those videos, I was able to pick up patterns and strategies that I would never have known. I am really grateful for channels like Chess Network, jrobichess, and others like it because it helped me build a more solid grasp of chess basics.

I didn’t know anything about the center or development back then. I know I just needed to move my pieces out of their place and I would just go with the flow and wing it from there. I didn’t know how to plan, how to spot tactics and execute or avoid them, and how to checkmate the opponent. The most basic thing I knew back then was that I had to capture all of my opponent’s pieces and mate with two rooks.

So basically, when I first learned chess, I just knew how to move the pieces. Nobody taught me anything about chess strategy or how to think about the moves that I am making. I mean, I wasn’t a chess prodigy so there was no way I would know how to do all that just by having someone tell me what the goal of the game was. It would have been better if I could observe good players but there weren’t a lot of good players in our neighborhood. There weren’t a lot of players, period.

As I said, Chess Network and other online chess Youtubers introduced me to this whole other world of chess that I didn’t know. And I was already around 13 years old when that happened but even then, I couldn’t say that my understanding of chess was enough to go toe-to-toe even with amateurs. So I watched more chess videos and I played more blitz games wherein I applied everything that I saw and absorbed from the streamers and commentators.

Then I started to look for more structured ways of learning and that’s how I learned about the St. Louis Chess Club and Scholastic Center channel as well as John Bartholomew who I would say helped me form the foundation of my chess learning. I don’t consider myself as having grasped all the concepts of chess but through their videos, I was able to pick the essential parts and put them to good use.

I was an aggressive, tactical player before I saw John and how he methodically plays and teaches chess. I learned to become more pragmatic and to be more positional although technically, all good chess players have as the basis of their skill, a solid understanding of chess strategy. He provided me with that knowledge and I was able to see some results in my online games. It even translated into my over the board games although I haven’t had a lot to say for certain that I have mastered the concepts that John often talks about in his videos.

What I learned most from John is how to be a practical player. He likes simplifying positions so that it would be a lot easier to develop a plan around the resources that you have. Since I’m a big fan of flashy, Morphy-esque sacrifices and combinations, I tended to shun boring moves. But seeing how those “boring” moves enabled me to play the flashy ones, I changed my perspective on playing them, and toned down my aggression.

Right now, I think I am a more balanced player. After all the experience that I have acquired online, in tournaments, and in casual games, I think I definitely have improved a lot from when I started. Although I haven’t really done any serious training or studying in chess which I would love to do when I have a place where I can train and play against other people who have the same passion.