For whatever reason, watching more top GM games helped me a lot with maintaining mental balance in tournaments. I used to lose a bad game and want to withdraw from the tournament - and I often did. Then I watched the top guys lose and they just pick themselves up and beat the hell out of someone the next game like the loss didn't happen. And I realized you don't have to let the loss consume you, you can just go back to, as you wrote here, enjoying the act of playing chess.
Ohh that's interesting Andy. The higher the level, I suppose they've found a way to deal with setbacks in a way that one bad game doesn't make them collapse, they need unreal consistency. And of course there's pure chess ability too (which I suppose the mental side is one part of) - I'm reminded of hearing from GM Raymond Song that he said he thought he was decent at chess (being a GM) but then he analysed with Radjabov and felt like he knew nothing about the game!
I'm surprised you used to withdraw from the tournaments, but glad to hear you were able to grow out of it. I still see some masters do that often and it seems like a negative cycle.
Patrick Wolff has a similar story about working with Vishy Anand prior to the 1995 WCC. Wolff was a very promising young GM, he'd won the US Championship, but he said that Anand saw everything instantly and that he suddenly realized he was never going to be world champion.
Thank you for this piece. I was actually one of the people playing the tournament, and despite the fact I got nowhere near your board I had lots of fun. I saw your game against the kid in round 2, very fun game!
Thanks for reading Atticus, and glad you enjoyed the tournament too. Ohh he played amazing that game, I was lost in that endgame - and I think there might have been a threefold he could have claimed too (I didn't notice during the game either). Scary that he is only going to get a lot stronger still!
For whatever reason, watching more top GM games helped me a lot with maintaining mental balance in tournaments. I used to lose a bad game and want to withdraw from the tournament - and I often did. Then I watched the top guys lose and they just pick themselves up and beat the hell out of someone the next game like the loss didn't happen. And I realized you don't have to let the loss consume you, you can just go back to, as you wrote here, enjoying the act of playing chess.
Ohh that's interesting Andy. The higher the level, I suppose they've found a way to deal with setbacks in a way that one bad game doesn't make them collapse, they need unreal consistency. And of course there's pure chess ability too (which I suppose the mental side is one part of) - I'm reminded of hearing from GM Raymond Song that he said he thought he was decent at chess (being a GM) but then he analysed with Radjabov and felt like he knew nothing about the game!
I'm surprised you used to withdraw from the tournaments, but glad to hear you were able to grow out of it. I still see some masters do that often and it seems like a negative cycle.
Patrick Wolff has a similar story about working with Vishy Anand prior to the 1995 WCC. Wolff was a very promising young GM, he'd won the US Championship, but he said that Anand saw everything instantly and that he suddenly realized he was never going to be world champion.
Thank you for this piece. I was actually one of the people playing the tournament, and despite the fact I got nowhere near your board I had lots of fun. I saw your game against the kid in round 2, very fun game!
Thanks for reading Atticus, and glad you enjoyed the tournament too. Ohh he played amazing that game, I was lost in that endgame - and I think there might have been a threefold he could have claimed too (I didn't notice during the game either). Scary that he is only going to get a lot stronger still!