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Game Studies & Fragments - Videos By S. Farmer

 The Windmill Technique This video discusses the Windmill Technique and one of the prime examples of this technique is presented here in the game Torre vs Em. Lasker. Lasker gave his opponent an opening for a very nice combination and if you've seen any of Torre's games you will know that he is a capable tactician!

 Heavy Piece Attack [38:40] This a game fragment illustrating how to attack with the heavy pieces. I played the White pieces and Ed Yetman was playing Black. A careless move on my opponent's part led to a comfortable game for me, but, the only way to attack was with the rooks and queen with minor pieces being relegated to a minor role. In this video you will see the use of the 'Lawnmower' technique.

A Puzzler For You [7:11] During one of Ben Marmont's games an interesting position came about in the post-mortem. This is a little quiz for you, it won't take long, go on! Enjoy!

Trend Reversal - This video takes a look at several game fragments where the players did not keep an eye on trend reversals. This happens when a person is defending or attacking but something happens in the game to reverse the roles and one of the players is not aware of the new trend. Had the player been aware, perhaps a proper attitude could have changed the result of the game. There are three games, one against Ted Day, and two with Ed Yetman. In the last two Ed and I switched roles in noticing trend reversals.

Showcase: Richard Reti - This video contains three games from this great master plus his famous pawn ending composition.

Some Memorable Game Fragments [26:41] This presentation shows some memorable moments from my games represented as game fragments.

Pattern Recognition - This video brings to light some patterns that are fairly common and should be known by those seeking to improve.

Making a Reference Database in Chessbase 8 and Fritz - This video shows how to make a reference database to use with Full Analysis. With this, you can set Fritz to do full analysis that will list other games from the opening you are playing so that you can stay on top of theory in your favorite lines.

Learn Openings With Database Tools [38:34] How to use the free Opening Database program SCID

Heavy Pieces In The Attack - This was an interesting game I played against my long-time friend and for whom I work on this site for, Ed Yetman. Ed in this game makes one opening mistake and it's all over... but, he doesn't make the task an easy one and seeks to eliminate my minor pieces to decrease my attacking chances. As a result I found myself having to attack with only the heavy pieces. Now, everyone knows how mobile the queen can be, but the rooks are often very cumbersome and need a good amount of proper planning to get them in the game.

Game Fragments from 50 Years Of Ed - Here we look at many game fragments from Ed's 50th birthday tournament. Happy B-day buddy!

Keep Your Eyes Open And Stay Alert! [35:38] This presentation is a hodgepodge of games from 2500+ rated players who have gone home early owing to some pretty crazy mistakes or miscalculations. I wanted to present something so that all of us patzers would not feel so bad when our opponent not-so-politely grabs one of our hanging pieces with a grin and giggle.

The Lowly Knight Pawn - A chess game/poem from Lyle Engle. Since the end to this video was cut short I posted it in the next video found below.

Conclusion of The Lowly Knight Pawn

Cheparinov vs Kadric European Ch 2011 [71:38]
This game illustrates the complexities of the Poisoned Pawn variation of the Sicilian Defense. It is a very tactical line and represents a good study of tactics in general

Tucson Open '11-Martinez vs Mayer [18:27]  There are many opportunities that are missed in our simple game of chess, even I am prone to them, but rather than give you an embarrassing example of my play, here we have a game between Isaac Martinez vs Steven Mayer in which there were some big missed opportunities.

2011 Tucson Open Missed Opportunities [36:52] Even more missed opportunites in this collection of game fragments.

Chess Tempo - Tactic Workout [23:53] What is Speed Solving? Chess requires a vast knowledge of many thing, from opening lines to endgame motifs and everything in-between. If we had all the time in the world to thoroughly examine each position that arises on the board we may be able to deduce the correct line of play most of the time. But the Gods of chess demand that we use a chess clock these days and that severely hinders our freedom to think at leisure. We get around this in several ways; in the opening we study our favorite lines thoroughly so that we can whip out 20-25 moves without much effort or thought, or we study endgames so that we can easily spot a winning endgame position a few moves away, knowing what pieces need to be traded to reach this favorable ending. Another way is to develop your Pattern Recognition Skills to a razor's edge. Pattern Recognition generally lends itself to tactics. In this, and the following video, we will see how I train before tournaments to make sure I am keeping a keen eye in my game. With a lot of experience under my belt I cannot think of a pattern that I am not familiar with, yet, in these videos you will see that I sometimes miss things. This is not a bad thing, as the videos will explain, I want to be aware of where my problem areas are before I play in a tournament. Paying attention to games that you watch or review, you will begin to take stock of why one attack works and another does not. Why one player has all his forces amassed on the enemy king but cannot go forward, but in other less positions, with less material available for the attack, there is enough there to break on through to victory. This is almost always Pattern based. For example, there are different techniques to attacking the enemy castled position  if he has a fianchetto set-up (P's on h2, g3 and f2) or, if his pawns are all at home (P's on h2, g2 and f2). Sometimes the latter is harder to bust open, so you make an innocent looking move that will force his RP (h-pawn) up one square, sometimes this makes all the difference in the world. Of course, in these videos of Speed Solving, we are well beyond this simple concept, but the simple concepts are the preamble to what you will see in these videos. If you can see that a weakening of a square in the opponent's position will about a Pattern you are familiar with, then you have made a major step towards improving your play!

Chess Tactics Speed Solving Technique [25:08] In this video I continue to show how to use Speed Solving to help develop your chess intuition. There are some very good comments in the forum attached to this video that discuss what a 'Critical Position' is and how to approach them.

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