Calculate Like A Grandmaster

• Learn the calculation secrets of the world's best attacking players • First book from one of the UK's biggest chess stars • Illustrated with a wealth of examples from top-level chess games This first book from one of the UK's top grandmasters is a penetrating and detailed (though engaging and friendly) study of typical games played by the most exciting chess players of the modern era, those that are renowned as 'attacking' players, from Mikhail Tal, pioneering hero of the ultra-modern attacking style, to Magnus Carlsen, teenage leader of the 'new wave' of deadly attackers, via the immortal Bobby Fischer, 'boa constrictor' Anatoly Karpov and 'King Garry' Kasparov. The author has tried to get into the heads of these stellar players, revealing the secrets of how they choose their decisive moves and succeed in delivering such awesome attacks. This inspiring book encourages you to play more imaginatively and copy the grandmasters' thought processes in your own game.

This is a well-established training manual which encourages the average player to understand how a grandmaster thinks, and even more important, how he works. Kotov tackles fundamental issues such as knowing how and when to analyze, the tree of analysis, a selection of candidate moves and the factors of success.

Alexander Kotov's trilogy, of which this is the second volume and now available in digital format for the first time, marks a landmark in chess literature. For the first time, a leading player managed to tackle the important elements of chess mastery in a methodical way which all chess players could understand, spiced with insight and colourful observation. Furthermore, his ideas and approach are as relevant to players today as they were when the books were first published. Alexander Kotov was one of the strongest players of the immediate post-war period, twice reaching the Candidates stage of the World Championship. He was also one of the leading Soviet trainers but is primarily remembered for his trilogy of classic works on chess coaching, of which Think Like a Grandmaster, one of the best-selling chess books of all time, was the first volume, and Play Like a Grandmaster the second.

Looks at the art of chess calculation, describing when a player should calculate, how to discover moves, and how much time to spend on critical moves.

Have there been times during a game when you have calculated a position for half an hour, only to find out that most of what you were thinking about was of little use? If you have not, maybe the only way to improve your calculation is to upgrade your processor. But if you are human, then this book will offer you practical advice and an effective training plan to think differently and make decisions far more efficiently.In Calculation thinking methods such as Candidates, Combinations, Prophylaxis, Comparison, Elimination, Intermediate Moves, Imagination and Traps are explained to the reader, and ownership of them is offered through a carefully selected series of exercises.

Have there been times during a chess game when you have calculated for half an hour, only to find that most of what you were thinking was of little use? This book will offer you practical advice and an effective training plan to think differently and make decisions far more efficiently. Thinking methods such as Candidates, Combinations, Prophylaxis, Comparison, Elimination, Intermediate Moves, Imagination and Traps are explained, with a carefully selected series of exercises.

When You Are Serious about Improving... To improve and succeed, a chessplayer must be able calculate precisely and visualize prospective positions. This is easier said than done. While pondering the next move, a chessplayer frequently keeps “replaying” the same melody in his mind, thus falling into a kind of trance. This book by Russian grandmaster Konstantin Chernyshov is designed to improve your visualization and calculation skills. With 500 exercises and an additional 250 puzzles, the author provides a vast amount of material to work through for students and coaches of the game. Most exercises require the reader to go through several stages of thought, including visualizing the configuration of the pieces, evaluating the resulting positions, and finally, calculating an accurate continuation. The regimen suggested by the author will require a disciplined approach by serious chessplayers. The exercises and puzzles start out with easy examples, but they gradually become more difficult. And all are meant to be solved without sight of the board. As noted by Ian Harris in his foreword: Cognitive Chess is designed to train you to visualize the board and correctly calculate sequences in your mind, skills that are essential to problem solving in all phases of the game. Players who train in these areas will certainly see an overall improvement in their game. After all, chess is ultimately a contest between opponents to determine who can “out-calculate” the other. Cognitive Chess: When you are serious about taking your game to the next level...