Archive - The Chess Improvement Lab

It's OK to just run your games through the engine

Game analysis is good for your chess. But it comes at a cost.

Apr 29 •

February 2025

Can you do 28 mate-in-2 puzzles in a week?

I made a Bluesky bot.

Feb 10 •

December 2024

Vladimir Kramnik is the most boring person in the chess world

Former world chess champion Vladimir Kramnik is very concerned about people using engines to cheat at chess.

Dec 16, 2024 •

May 2024

Me, on Perpetual Chess

I’ve been a listener of Perpetual Chess for a long time, and I’m especially a fan of the adult improver series, so it was very exciting to be…

May 23, 2024 •

11 things I did to take my USCF rating from 1547 to 1976

I’ve had some ups and down in the year since my first Substack post, where I wrote about what was working for my chess improvement, but on net I’ve…

May 8, 2024 •

April 2024

What really decides games at the 1900 level

It's dumber than you think

Apr 30, 2024 •

March 2024

My two favorite chess tournaments

US Amateur Team East and ALTO are the best in-person chess experiences I've found

Mar 4, 2024 •

February 2024

Why I memorize openings

10 minutes a day can set you up for more valuable learning experiences.

Feb 27, 2024 •

January 2024

See the positions where you spent the most time

Want to see the positions from your recent online live games where you spent the most time?

Jan 2, 2024 •

November 2023

The most optimistic indicator for my continued chess improvement is how dumb my moves are, currently

Annotations from a recent tournament

Nov 16, 2023 •

September 2023

One unit of chess improvement

I had an instructive moment in a slow blitz game on Lichess just now.

Sep 19, 2023 •

June 2023

Make sense of chess engine output with Move Highlighter

A new Chrome extension helps translate Stockfish to English (and other human languages)

Jun 8, 2023 •

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