Chess Improvement Equation - Part 1
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[00:00:00] Hey and welcome back. I'm grandmaster Noël Studer and you are listening to Next Level Chess podcast. And on today's podcast episode, I want to initiate a series of podcasts about one single topic. It's a big topic. It's a new kind of idea I played with for a while. Now, I shared it with my newsletter. The response was very, very positive.

I've shared it with some other chess content creators. They were also happy with that idea. So now I'm sharing it with you guys on the podcast. And this idea is the chess improvement equation. This should be a simple equation that helps you understand what you're doing wrong in your chess improvement and what you need to work on, what you need to improve in order to improve your improvement score.

[00:01:00] And this improvement score will then also reflect in your rating gains. That's at the end of the day what you're training for. Okay, so today is the basic overview episode and then I will have episodes going deeper into each, section of the equation, just explaining more what it is. Okay, so guys, enjoy this podcast on the chess improvement equation.

Improving at chess can feel like running on a treadmill. You're working hard, but getting nowhere. You study openings, grind tactics, and watch endless YouTube videos, yet your progress is painfully slow. Two years ago, I released Next Level Training, a course designed to help players simplify their chess improvement and make real progress.

Since then, over 800 students have used it to transform their training and grow as players. Watching these students [00:02:00] improve, listening to their questions, and learning from their challenges taught me one important lesson. The process can be made even simpler. That realization is why I'm working on a completely new version of Next Level Training, to refine everything I've learned over the past two years and help even more players achieve their goal.

And while redesigning this course, I had this breakthrough idea. Well, I think it's a breakthrough idea. I hope you think too. And I realized that chess improvement boils down to only three key factors. And I created a simple formula to make sense of these three factors. And this is the formula that I call Chess Improvement Equation.

And it goes like this. What you do, times how you do it, times the time you spend on your chess improvement equals your chess improvement score. This equation distills [00:03:00] everything I've learned about what it takes to succeed in chess, and it's designed to help you identify exactly what's holding you back and what to focus on to improve faster.

So in this podcast episode, I explain the equation, help you calculate your own chess improvement score, and set the stage for what's next. Over the next few podcast episodes, we'll then dive deeper into each part of the equation, and I want to give you tools to make 2025 your most successful chess year yet.

So, the idea is really you calculate your chess improvement score. You realize, oh, shoot, I need to work on these things. And then you get the tools that you need to work on them to improve your score and then to improve your rating. Okay, so let's understand the equation together. Improvement in chess boils down to three factors.

What you are doing. The [00:04:00] main question there is, are you working on the right areas with the right resources? Then the second thing is, how are you doing the chess training? Are you doing it with high focus and proper methods? And then the third thing is the time. How many hours are you actually spending on deliberate chess study?

If you multiply these together, you get your improvement score. But attention, so there is something very, very important. We don't just have the same numbers on every of the three things, but what and how go from zero to one. So, zero would be non existent, right? And one is amazing, like perfect, right?

How, what and how have the zero to one score, and then the time is just the hours you spend every week. So, if one of these factors, especially what and how is very low, the [00:05:00] score will be super low as well. You can just, try in your head like 0. 1 times 1 times 10. So that would be spending 10 hours on chess, having a very bad what

and a very good how, that would be an improvement score of one. And that's not really amazing for spending 10 hours. So, the equation should teach you that having either what you're doing very bad or how you're doing it very bad will be so much more important than the amount of time you invest. But also if you just spend half an hour every week, even if you do it perfectly, probably you're not really getting ahead.

Okay. So with this equation, you can play a little bit around and calculate some numbers. And you will realize that yeah, one of the numbers being low, or especially when two numbers are low, like the what and the how score, let's say you both have [00:06:00] a 0. 1. Then, no matter how much time you put in, you're just wasting your time.

Okay. So now let's get it to the scoring system. As I mentioned already, the what is zero to one, the how is zero to one, and the time is the hours you spend. per week. Now, why do most players struggle? I imagine if you're listening towards the end of the year, a podcast like this, well, you want to improve your chess more in 2025.

That means you were struggling a little bit. And the reason why so many chess improvers get stuck Despite putting in quite some time is this equation and this really shows it very well. And I realized there are mainly two types of people that have, difficulty improving their chess and I want to give them a name.

So type number one is the grinder. [00:07:00] The grinder believes in hard work and the grinder really believes that all it takes is just to, do the hard things and, grind, grind, do more, more, more, more, more. And the grinder puts in endless hours, but wastes their time because what they are doing is not ideal and how they are doing it is even worse.

So an example grinder would be what? 0. 4. How? 0. 2. and then 20 hours a week. And now I'll do the math for you. 0. 4 times 0. 2 times 20 is 1. 6. So imagine spending 20 hours a week, but somebody that does two hours with the right things and the right focus will outperform you. That's pretty tough. And then the second problematic category, I want to call them the perfectionists.[00:08:00] 

Perfectionists are obsessed with finding the perfect training plan. They spend weeks researching, tweaking routines, or buying new resources, but barely do the actual work. One of the main signs, if you might be a perfectionist, is that you're jumping around from things and you're never, really doing the thing because you think you might still find a better way.

to do the same thing. So 90 percent of the time that perfectionists put into their chess is wasted researching the latest and best resources. So you, scroll through Twitter, through Reddit, you read recommendations. What could be the perfect book? What could be the perfect opening course? You buy several courses, you start a little bit, you're like, this is not perfect, let me do something else.

And so while grinders buried themselves in hours of inefficient work, Perfectionists take the opposite approach, that they spend so much time researching for the perfect plan that they barely [00:09:00] train at all. So an example perfectionist score would be what 0. 9, how 0. 6, and then the time only three hours a week, which is 1.

6. So we have very similar scores, but different problems. And the perfectionist really has difficulty to stay consistent because the perfectionist is always again, searching for new courses, thinking about other ideas, writing in chat forums, Hey guys, can I, what do you think about this book, that book, this book, that book.

Just talks with so many people about the ideal way of improving chess that they forget to actually. improve their chess. And my question to you now is, which one is more like you? Obviously, it's a spectrum, so you're not only one or the other, but most people that have a difficult time improving their chess will relate to either the grinder or the [00:10:00] perfectionist.

So now I invite you to calculate your own chess improvement score. And this, again, especially for all the perfectionists, doesn't have to be perfect, okay? So we just want to get a rough score. And in the future episodes, I will talk about every single factor. And you might realize, oh, shoot, my score was way lower, or actually a little bit higher than I thought.

But I want you to calculate right now your chess improvement score so you can write it down and think about it and then see where you have the biggest potential. So your improvement score will be the blueprint for your progress and it's pretty simple to calculate. So let's calculate the what. For the what you want to score yourself from 0 to 0.

5 based on which areas you work on. So if you follow my one third rule, which means you study a third tactics, a third [00:11:00] training and analyze, playing and analyzing, and a third openings, middle game, end games. If you follow that, you can rate yourself pretty high. If you basically only do openings, your rating will be pretty low.

And then you can add to that. Again, 0. 0 to 0. 5 based on the quality and level appropriateness of your resources. So let's say you're just randomly scratching some YouTube video off the internet. That's a pretty low score because that won't be really appropriate perfectly for your level, most likely.

And, YouTube videos can be very nice, but it's not the highest quality possible. If instead you're working with a very targeted, rating targeted course, That is high quality produced by a knowledgeable coach, then you can rate yourself very high. Okay, then we can move to the how.

You want [00:12:00] to score yourself from 0. 0 to 0. 5 for your ability to focus. Okay, 0. 5 is again, monk like focus. It's like you're super focused, nothing can distract you, you're always when you study chess, you're fully into chess, you're sleeping well, you're eating well, you're You just can't imagine that someone on this earth could focus better than you.

Okay, that would be 0. 5 and then a lower score would be where frankly nearly everyone falls into. If you're not sleeping as well, often have less than seven hours of sleep. You feel stressed. Your mind is wandering during chess training. All these kind of things. If that's more like you. then score yourself lower towards the 0.

2 scores. And then adds to that score again, zero until 0. 5 for using [00:13:00] effective training methods. That would mean when you train tactics, are you doing it the right way? Now, if you're wondering what is doing the tactics the right way, well, probably your score is lower. You should calculate the full line Before you put in any solution to any puzzle and then you should write it down and only then you should see what is the solution of the puzzle, compare it to your own solution and see what you can do better next time.

Another thing might be how you study openings. Are you actually. Understanding plans and ideas of each opening, or are you just memorizing moves that you actually don't understand? And once you're out of the opening theory, you have no clue what you should do. If it is the ladder, you score yourself low.

If it, you feel like, yeah, I know how I should study each area of chess. I know how to analyze my game. I know how to study tactics, know all of these things. [00:14:00] And I implement them in my training very, very often. Then, score yourself high. Okay, so that was the what. And the how, and now the time, that's the simplest, okay?

So just look in, maybe you have your plan, already a training plan. So look at your training plan, how much hours did you spend? Or if you don't have a plan, really just think back to the last week, how much time did you actually put into chess training, right? So it's not, well, I read a tweet about chess and that is stressful.

chess training. That's not chess training, right? How much time did you put in, trying to get better at chess last week? And it's not how much time you wish you put in, but how much time you actually put in. Okay. And then you multiply these three. numbers. And if your score feels low, really don't worry.

It's just the beginning. Small changes, like improving your house score, for example, from 0. 1 to [00:15:00] 0. 3 can triple your chess improvement score. So this is just a way of understanding where you're at right now. And in a certain sense, the lower your score is right now, the more potential you have. to improve in the future.

It would be very sad to say, Hey, I have, my score is 15 because I do everything perfect and I spend 15 hours a week. And then to realize, wait, but I'm not improving at all, right? So there's something doesn't connect. So if you're not improving, but you're putting in time, your score should be low because it means that you're doing something wrong.

Something along the lines is not going well if you're not improving, but putting in. the time. Okay, so now that you have your chess improvement score, you might ask yourself, what's next? In the next episodes, I'll break down each factor. I'll go [00:16:00] deeper into what, I'll go deeper into how, and I'll go deeper into the time and how you can create habits that you actually stick to your chess training, the one you plan.

And I show you exactly how to improve each factor. And the idea with this really is you have a score now but you have three different factors and you can see which factor is dragging you down the most. And just for picking the lowest hanging fruit, you want to start with the score that is, the lowest and the easiest to improve.

And then when you improve this, you can slowly improve the next lowest score, and then the third lowest. score. And it's super important that you don't only look at this number or you listen to this podcast, but you actually take action. If you don't take action now, you risk wasting another year spinning your wheels frustrated as others surpass [00:17:00] you with smarter training.

Don't let this be your story in 2025. Okay guys, that's it from me for this one. I wish you all the best in the new year and talk to you next time where I go deeper into your WHAT score. See you then.