Adrian Garcia-Cortes Rocha
How to Progress in Chess?
In this blog I will tell you the ways you can progress and things I did to do it.
Two years ago, I was rated around 600–700 Elo. Today, I’m consistently playing at the 2000–2100 level. The journey wasn’t easy, but it was fast because I trained with focus and intention. Here are the three most important things I did to make that leap:
1. I Treated Tactics as the Foundation of All Chess Strength
From day one, I knew that no matter how much opening theory I memorized or how many endgames I studied, nothing mattered if I couldn’t spot simple tactics. I committed to solving 10+ puzzles every day—not just blitzing through them, but pausing and calculating all variations in my head. Over time, my board vision improved drastically. I began recognizing patterns instantly: forks, pins, skewers, deflections, double attacks, and mating nets. This one habit alone eliminated most of my losses due to blunders and transformed me into a dangerous tactical player.
2. I Simplified My Opening Repertoire and Went Deep Instead of Wide
At lower levels, players switch openings constantly. I did the opposite. I chose one opening with White (1.e4 and the Italian Game), and two defenses with Black (the Sicilian vs 1.e4 and the Indian vs 1.d4). I studied model games from masters, learned the typical pawn structures, common traps, and long-term plans. By narrowing my focus, I became extremely comfortable in those positions and stopped losing time in the opening. My confidence grew because I knew the middlegame ideas that followed from my openings.
3. I Analyzed Every Game Like a Coach Would
After each game—win or loss—I would go back and analyze it in depth, first by myself and then with a computer engine. But I didn’t just accept “+3.2” as the answer—I asked why. I looked for patterns: Was I losing on move 10 every time? Was I missing tactics, playing too passively, misjudging trades? I wrote down my recurring mistakes and actively worked to eliminate them. I also started reviewing games from titled players and guessing their moves to train my strategic thinking. This reflection process helped me level up faster than just playing hundreds of games.
Here I leave a game after I had 2000 Elo level:
(1)
Then what you can do is look at the lines and do your best even if it is a position where you have already seen a good play, just like this phrase says:
"If you see a good play, look for a better one." Emanuel Laker..."
(2)
Afterwards, I'll give you some advice (it really helped me a lot), if you're losing a lot of games, rest because either you lose Elo or you're losing a tournament, also read, do sports or just sleep and then you'll be fresher, when I did this, I won or drew, but it also helped me win more games and not get tired so quickly or easily.
(3)
And then... Study without excess, excess is bad for chess as with other sports, everything is done to a measure.
I hope you liked it :)
