From the Depths of Hell

I'm well into Circle four now. Here's the numbers:

Level  Circle 1 %  Circle 2 %  Circle 3%  Circle 4%
-----  ----------  ----------  ---------  ---------
10         96%         99%        100%       100%
20         91%         93%         95%        97%
30         74%         80%         87%        93%
40         69%         74%         82%  (in progress)
50         67%         72%         81%
60         55%         64%         75%
70         60%         58%         68%
80         57%         --          64%
90+        55%         --          58%

As you can see, I'm still seeing steady improvement in the numbers. By the end of tonight I'll have level 40 finished. Boy it goes by quickly when you are doing an insane # of problems per day. A problem I'm running into is that I'm just not fast enough. The first day took 3.1 hours (not bad), but days 2 and 3 took 5.3 and 6.0 hours respectively. (I actually had to do some of day 2 on day 3). Day four (today) is looking to be between 5 and 6 hours. If I am going to have any hope of finishing on schedule, I am going to have to speed up since I just don't have 6 hours after work to do problems. (How convenient that MDLM didn't have a job while he did the plan...)

Therein lies the problem. To go as fast enough to finish in a reasonable amount of time I have to pretty much have the problems memorized, or just guess and get a pathetic score on the ones I don't remember. Of course guessing like that really doesn't help me improve much, so one has to question the benefit of this practice. Since I'm so close to being finished, I think I will continue to go forward per the plan. However, I will have to give some thought to what changes I will recommend for others who choose to undertake the plan.

I think the yardstick for measuring the plan is not "Does it work?" If you're spending 5 hours a day practicing something, you will likely improve with even the poorest of plans. The real question is, "How does MDLM plan compare to alternate plans?" Is there some better way I could be spending my 5 hours a day? (Boy I hope not...) Of course it is difficult to make such an assessment, so I'll have to settle for something like "What kind of improvement do you get from the MDLM plan?" Oh, wait, I have no rating so I have no way to measure this. Oh, well, at least my OTB play against OJ has improved. Luckily that's good enough for me.

In Other News
I got an email the other day from someone here in Austin who had read my blog and was interested in getting together and playing (Hi Chuck!). We had lunch the other day and we're planning to starting playing after I finish the MDLM plan. He's rated about 1500 OTB so we should be a good match. I'm psyched because he's also serious about improving his chess so I think we can really push each other, analyze together, etc. Even better he plays the white side of the King's Gambit, just like my sparring partner OJ...

Turns out Chuck has been taking internet lessons from Dan Heisman, so I'm curious to hear more about his experience. Right now he is doing some tactics (though not as intensely as the MDLM plan) and going over master games, and a few other things Dan has also recommended on his Novice Nook column on ChessCafe. I have been thinking about doing lessons with Dan myself (I've liked his books and columns) so I will have to learn more about this. I think the main benefit would be getting solid commentary on my games and identifying problems in my play. The other stuff- practice tactics, go over master games, fix my thinking process, and play more slow games I can do without help. I'll probably read all of Dan's Novice Nook entries and then decide what to do next. After the MDLM plan, of course...

Coming Up
Tuesday night I'm in Houston on business and since we're having dinner with a business associate, I probably won't get anything done Tuesday night. I have a wedding to go to Friday - Sunday, so I probably won't get much done then, either. The following Tuesday is my wife's birthday, so I will definitely take that night off (she's very understanding and supportive, and I want to keep it that way). I'm trying to schedule circles six and seven for a three-day weekend. The net of it is that I'll probably have to take the next two Tuesdays off, and I will try to get one day's worth of problems done over the wedding weekend. That will allow me to do circle 6 two weekends from now, and I can take the following Monday off work for the final assault in circle 7. I still don't know how on earth I will do circle 5 while still going to work every day, but I'll worry about that later. :-)

Wish me luck..!

Update at 12:19 a.m.
Just finished the day's problems. I really sped up for the last group of 59 or so (mostly level 40 and a few level 50), but I still managed to finish level 40 with 88%, a pretty decent improvement over before.

One thing that is heartening is on one of the early level 50 problems that I have had trouble with before, the move that was impossible for me to find before just jumped right out at me- not because I memorized it (I forgot that particular move), but because it was a knight fork that I hadn't noticed before. Of course the square was defended so the knight was taken, but that allowed the finishing moves. I can't believe it took this long to finally realize the forcing nature of that move. Ah, well, at least I'm starting to see a little more, even as I speed up.

One thing I forgot to mention earlier. I am really growing to hate the plan at this point. Circles 1 and 2 were fun since I had time to work through things, but now that I'm just going along at breakneck speed I am not enjoying it as much. Circle 3 was okay, but circle 4 is getting miserable.

Okay, time now to do our yearly income taxes, and then get up a little early tomorrow so I can do problems before work. Like I said before, sleep is for the weak...