Starting to document my chess improvement journey

Who are you?

I'm a 19-year old club player, who currently is rated around 1650 Elo in FIDE classical and has about 1690 DWZ (German national rating). I love chess and have been playing classical chess for around three years now. Besides chess I'm currently in the process of graduating from school and will be (hopefully) beginning to study computer science in October. I may consider writing more about myself sometime in the future, but for now that's all you get.

What is this?

This is the start of my "chess improvment blog". I'm currently in somewhat of a slump and I'm hoping that by writing and updating this blog regularly I'll climb out of this hole and gain some valuable motivation. I'm also hoping to maybe get some tips and motivate others to undertake a journey of their own. I will be updating you regularly with progress I've made, interessting things I've learned, cool/not so cool moments from my games or whatever else I deem fitting for this blog. I'm also considering to publish all of my games after I've annotated them, but I'm not sure about that yet.

What are your goals?

Depends mostly on how far in the future we're looking, although one goal that does not depend on that, is the goal to enjoy playing chess and having fun. I don't want chess to become only a chore. Saying that, I fully understand that chess improvement is a rough journey and that I won't always be having 100% fun, but I want to try to enjoy it as much as I can.

By the end of the year I want to be at 1800 DWZ, with my FIDE Elo (which usually is higher than the DWZ) catching up to my DWZ or outgrowing it. These may change as the German chess federation wants to boost everyone's DWZ in July, like FIDE did with their classical Rating in 2023.
For the next one or two years I want to get to 2000 DWZ and Elo. For a long time this was a life goal of mine, but it currently feels extremly achievable, as I have beaten someone just under 2000 DWZ at the beginning of the year. Of course it will still take some time to manage that consitently, but I feel like it's not too far off.
As I started to recognize, that 2000 DWZ/Elo is very much possible, I set a new goal for myself: the FM-title. Now, before you think that Im underestimating it: This is a goal for the rest of my life. I don't think I'm getting above FM-level at chess ever, atleast not without fully commiting to it (I still want to study CS and work in the field mind you, I'm not about to study chess as a full time job). It also definitely won't be a cake walk and I may also not manage it, but that's what I'm aiming for. I imagine it taking about a decade, maybe a little bit less if I'm lucky.

Besides my classical rating, I also want my blitz/rapid ratings to reflect my classical skill level. Currently I'm terrible at faster time controls, my play in blitz is a joke compared to my play in classical, but I'm hoping to change that.

I'd also like to win an open once and compete regularly on (federal) state-level in team games. But this will probably come as I'm getting better

How do you plan on achieving your goals?

Firstly, regular chess training. If I am not going to the (chess!) club or playing a classical game on a given day I want to go through a training routine. Currently it looks like this:

• 30 minutes of tactics
• 40 minutes of analysing my classical games if there currently are any to analyze OR work on some current focus of mine (e.g. positional play, endgames, ...), at the moment the focus is strategy
• 20 minutes of endgame puzzles (not tactics, rather it's about finding the correct way to play an endgame)

As of now I'm using the following materials:

• Tactics: "The Woodpecker Method" by Axel Smith and Hans Tikkanen (just the puzzles, not the method)
• Strategy: "Mastering Chess Strategy" by Johan Hellsten
• Endgame: "Chess Endgame Workbook for Kids" by John Nunn (I tried the grown up version "The Chess Endgame Exercise Book", also by John Nunn, but I got humbled [the damn thing is too hard for me], I'll have to retry further into my journey)

I will of course use more advanced materials as I progress. As I will also have a lot of free time soon inbetween Uni and School, I am also considering to put in more time per day, but we'll see. Naturally I may change the plan in the course of my journey. I'm also considering to hire a coach at some point (currently I'm too broke for that ̄\_(ツ)_/ ̄), so that could also have an influence on the plan.

Secondly, I want to play two classical games per week. For the purposes of making life somewhat easier for me I'll count online classical, although the quality on there may vary. I'll use the Dojo Classical, the Lichess Leagues (Lichess4545, Lonewolf), schedueled matches with people I want to play and anything else I can find to get some games in when I don't have any OTB games schedueled. I also want to use oppertunities in real life, like my club's classical tournament (one classical game a month), my regional cup (when I don't get knocked out in the first round :,( ) and regular team games to get some high quality chess in. And of course I'll visit as many tournaments as I can.

What's the plan going foreward?

I've had a rough tournament two days ago as of writing this and have taken a break for these two days. But now I'm back! I'll probably be writing something every weekend from now on. Everything is still taking shape and I may consider changing the form of this blog (video, audio, ...?) or changing the frequency of the writing (every two weeks, every month). But for now it's going to be a weekly blog right here on Lichess. See you next weekend! :)