Jeffrey Ashton

Sometimes I do things on a whim. Earlier tonight I was thinking that I need to play some chess over the summer. An hour later I finished purchasing airline tickets and reserving two nights for my trip to Las Vegas. I will be playing in the National Open Championship section on June 17 and June 18 (I am playing in the two day section). It will be a hectic week. On the week of June 12, I am teaching at the TH Rogers chess camp, after finishing the Klein chess camp the week before. On Friday, after teaching all day, I will immediately pack some things, go to the airport, and fly out at 9:15 pm. I will arrive in Vegas around 10:30 pm Vegas time. Saturday morning I will play 4 games (although I might take a half point bye). Sunday, I will play two more games. At 1:15 am Monday morning, I will then fly back home to Vegas. If my last game on Sunday goes for the full 6 hours, I will have to rush to avoid missing my flight. So I hope I crush my opponent quickly. It will be a quick, tiring, and ...

Someone emailed me a question. If you have any questions that you think are suitable for everyone to view, please post it in the "comments" area, and I will respond in the same way. I will dedicate a post to answering the question though: The person wrote: Thanks for the "inside" information! You wrote that your goal is to spend 2 hours/week and that you did practically no studying last year. May I ask if you became weaker without training or are many things so "hardwired" in your brain that you do not need much studying to keep playing at a given level? I definitely became a little bit weaker, but not by much. The main thing that happens when I am not studying is I might forget a few opening variations, but this shouldn't weaken a player significantly. In my opinion, once you learn something in chess it becomes somewhat hardwired (generally speaking) into your brain. Chess masters rely on intuition and experience for most of their playing strength, an...

Ok, what I am doing normally turns out horrible for most people. You see this pattern with many people. It is like I'm trying to run a marathon, but sprinting the first mile. This leads to burnout, and this happens in many types of training. For example, when people make new years resolutions to join a gym and excercise. You see the gyms are packed in January with people excercising 3 hours a day. Come February, the gym is empty again. The point is, to not get burned out. So when studying.. try to stay with your reasonable goal. I am already over-training. But I should be mindful of this, and not get discouraged when my training slows down a bit. I should make sure to stay with my small 2 hour a week goal. Anyway, I just studied a nice game between Alekhine and Euwe. Here it is: Click Here

The 2006 Klein Chess Camp will be held June 5-9. I highly recommend the Klein Chess Camp. This will be my fifth time teaching there. I have to say that this is one of the most well run chess camps that I have taught at, and I am honored to be a part of it. Jim Liptrap puts countless hours volunteering with Texas scholastic chess and he organizes this wonderful camp. For more information, please visit http://chess.jliptrap.us/camp06.htm

I agree with almost everything in this article and I highly suggest you read it! http://www.chessville.com/instruction/instr_gen_path_to_improve.htm

I just finalized my plans to go to Dallas on Friday March 17 and return to Houston late on Monday March 20. To the parents of my students, I will be missing classes for those days. I will remind you again closer to the date. After that, I don't plan on taking any out of town trips until the summer. Thanks!

A Stalemate is type of draw that occurs when the person to move has no legal moves and is not in check. You often see this happen in games between inexperienced players due to one side being a bit careless. Sometimes at more advanced levels of chess you see tactics executed by the losing side that result in a draw by stalemate. One time former World Champion Anatoly Karpov carelessly stalemated Judith Polgar when he was ahead a queen and bishop (he was very low on time). In the following three games you will see some of the most unique stalemates in chess history. These games are "compositions". Both players first memorized these clever moves, then played them out in a game to result in a friendly draw. Click here for the stalemate "compositions". (I also included the game where Karpov stalemated Polgar).