Are Chess Coaches Worth It?
With thousands of apps and videos surrounding us, the independent learner can pick up a new skill on just about anything more easily than ever. And chess is no different.
Should a chess player have a coach? Does a student need a teacher?
The answer is clearly yes if the goal is to achieve significant progress. For anyone who wants to seriously improve as a chess player, understanding the following is important:
ChessKid superstar and International Master Carissa Yip has been coached by Denys Shmelov and Andriy Vovyk among others.
What Does A Chess Coach Do?
A chess coach is a teacher, cheerleader, confidant, and friend—someone who shows both the positive aspects of how you play as well as areas where you need to improve by doing the following:
- Preparing a training plan
- Analyzing your games and providing feedback
- Helping you decide on chess tournaments, time controls, openings
- Accelerating progress
- Keeping things FUN!!!
National Master James Canty, ChessKid coach.
Preparing A Training Plan
A training plan is the roadmap that charts your future direction as a chess player. All chess players need plans that are tailored specifically for them, and a good coach makes sure that each plan is customized for an individual player as explained in this article.
This plan identifies a schedule to lead to your improvement as a chess player by making sure that chess concepts, particularly tactics and strategies, are understood. Good coaches understand how to help kids think through their long-range strategic plans, like understanding where to attack on the chessboard. And students learn how to recognize and employ tactics, such as the pin, as part of their chess arsenal.
But as in any sport, practice is important. There's no substitute for good old-fashioned hard work. Famous soccer player Pele says that "everything is practice."
Although the road to chess mastery can be daunting, chess author Irving Chernev reminds us all that "every chess master was once a beginner." And coaching helps accelerate your growth.
Analyzing Your Games And Providing Feedback
With a knowledgeable coach, you can expect to receive expert feedback about your performance in all three phases of a chess game—opening, middlegame, and endgame. When a coach analyzes the games you have played, you learn how effective your moves are. For each move, what is the best choice? Did you select it? Identifying poor moves such as inaccuracies, mistakes, and particularly blunders can help you to avoid similar ones in future games.
Coaches can use tools to help quickly spot mistakes and help students avoid them in the future.
Helping You Decide On Chess Tournaments, Time Controls, Openings
A chess coach can help you decide when you are ready to participate in tournaments and which ones you should enter. Because time controls of tournaments vary widely, a coach’s advice—and preparation—for specific times is indispensable. Long time controls such as 40 or more minutes per player are typical for over-the-board tournament games. Events for top grandmasters often have even longer controls such as in the Sinquefield Cup, won recently by World Champion GM Magnus Carlsen.
In contrast, some events have short time controls known as rapid and blitz. Games with short times are very popular online, and Chess.com lets you select games as fast as just one minute per player. To be prepared for the wide range of time controls, being coached on openings is very important.
Accelerating Progress
...because nobody achieves great progress completely alone. Perhaps the greatest example of solitary chess ambition is the great Bobby Fischer. But even Fischer had a coach called a "second" during his world championship match with Boris Spassky.
Bobby Fischer watches a game being played by his "second," William Lombardy. Photo: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-76052-0053 / Kohls, Ulrich / CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Great coaches are able to skillfully identify a student's strengths and weaknesses faster than any computer, and tailor a custom learning plan to maximize a student's potential. Is the student moving too quickly in the opening? Does she have a tendency to overlook her opponent's threats? Is she strategically strong but tactically weak?
Most importantly, what can we do to accentuate her strengths and minimize her weaknesses? Can we eventually turn those weaknesses into strengths?
Keeping Things Fun!!!
Perhaps nothing is as important as keeping chess fun. After all, chess is a game!
The best coaches know how to push their students hard enough, but also use friendship and humor as a way to engage and keep them motivated. In addition to building up a student's chess skills, the chess coach simultaneously helps her build confidence, resolve, accountability, and a sense of achievement.
Expert and ChessKid coach Steve Abrahams has coached local, state, and national scholastic chess champions. Humor is a fundamental part of his chess lessons.
Benefits Of Using A Chess Coach
The benefits of using a chess coach are numerous. However, foremost among them are the following:
- Giving personalized feedback
- Understanding chess concepts
- Preparing a strong opening repertoire
- Keeping you motivated and tracking your progress
- Changing your mindset
Giving Personalized Feedback
Having personalized feedback is so essential as you learn the game of chess. By working with a coach, you receive advice and guidance appropriate for your skill level. Rather than following a generic lesson for anyone, the feedback you receive from a coach is specific to who you are and how you play.
Good coaches will come up with a custom action plan for their students.
To help you improve, your coach reviews your games and points out mistakes—often these are weaknesses that you previously were blind to. As Bill Gates, cofounder of Microsoft, said: “It is fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons from failure.”
It is fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons from failure.
—Bill Gates, cofounder of Microsoft
Understanding Chess Concepts
The game of chess has many layers of complexity. Even after you learn the basic moves that pieces make, there is so much more to understand about the game. The large body of knowledge on how chess should be played is known as chess theory. Each phase of a game has specific concepts to understand, and a coach is the best resource to guide you in learning them.
Preparing A Strong Opening Repertoire
One part of chess theory pertains to only the opening phase of a game. Developing a strong opening repertoire is very critical before you begin to play in tournaments. A strong opening is indispensable for achieving positional advantages and executing tactics that lead to the ultimate goal in chess: checkmating your opponent.
Experienced coaches will tailor openings to the skill level of their students. Many coaches teach beginners straightforward openings like the Giuoco Piano because it emphasizes rapid development and central control. But as students become more comfortable, they can experiment with fancy openings like the Queen's Gambit or Ruy Lopez.
Coaches will also help explain the theory behind these openings. It's far more important to understand the ideas behind the openings versus simply memorizing the lines.
ChessKid has powerful videos to supplement a student's learning.
Keeping You Motivated And Tracking Your Progress
A coach is indispensable for motivating you to achieve new goals and to keep improving at the game. By setting achievable but challenging goals, a coach can inspire you to continually advance in your accomplishments. By tracking your progress, a coach helps to keep you focused on your training plan and to demonstrate how your development as a player is continuing.
ChessKid's Report Card feature is useful for both coach and student. Instead of a traditional grading system, however, it gives insight into overall lesson and activities progress.
Changing (and Challenging) Your Mindset
A chess coach challenges you: how you think, how you prepare, how you analyze, how you execute. In essence, a coach changes your mindset about the game of chess. As you reflect on the progress you make, your growth as a thinker will be clearly evident.
One of the most difficult parts of a chess player's journey is understanding when to break with normal guidelines. For example, when does it make sense to move the same piece twice in the opening? When does it make sense to intentionally lose a pawn or piece? When does it make sense to retreat a piece that isn't being threatened?
A good coach challenges a student's thinking and helps them understand when to break with normally accepted chess guidelines. Developing a sharp, yet flexible mindset is the key.
Qualities Of A Good Chess Coach
A good chess coach has many valuable qualities. Important among them are the following:
Has Superior Communication Skills
To train and lead a player successfully, a coach needs superior communication skills, which are much broader than simply reading and writing. A coach almost has to be able to read your mind so that they can communicate with you personally in ways that help you understand what they are teaching.
ChessKid coach Nikki Church is a professional communicator. She even communicates with horses!
Acts Professionally
A coach has to act professionally over the board, online, and in any forum. The chess community is very close-knit, and the reputation of a coach is always at stake when engaging another community member, whether that person is a familiar student or a new acquaintance.
All ChessKid coaches are required to pass a safety and background check.
Has Chess Expertise (Both As Player And Teacher)
To be an effective coach, chess expertise is clearly indispensable. As your coach shares their expertise about the game, you will become more knowledgeable and passionate about chess. As you develop as a player, don’t be surprised if you outgrow a coach and need to select a follow-on coach to continue your progress.
ChessKid coaches have well-established reputations as both players and teachers.
Conclusion
Chess is fun. Chess is satisfying. And chess is a really hard game to master!
Hard work is the most important element of chess success. A select few highly motivated individuals can achieve success on their own. But the majority of "self-learners" will plateau, often leaving behind huge untapped reservoirs of potential.
ChessKid superstars Alice, Tani, Brewington, and Shreyas are all chess masters. All of them have coaches.
To improve as a chess player, having a coach is essential and can be the decisive factor in your growth. The benefits of having a coach are numerous, and not having a coach typically prevents a player from reaching their full potential.
Whatever path you choose, may your journey be filled with fun, challenges and satisfaction!
2024 Update: We still think having a coach is very important for all the reasons listed in this article. Which is why offer live small-group lessons through Magnus Chess Academy. Find out more at ChessKid Coaching, or Join Magnus Chess Academy today. Individual coaches mentioned in this article may not be available.
