What is your chess rating? Fav opening? Wanna play?

[DanF]

It is an equal opportunity hater, lol

 

[David Mary]

Fell back down from that peak rating in 10 minute rapid all the way down to 900 and back up to 1144 (at the moment). But I decided in the last few days to play 3 minute blitz again, which is the time control that I lived in for most of 2021 and 2022. It's a lot of fun, but not generally recommended for players really trying to get better. I resign myself to improving only so much (no pun intended), but keeping it fun. The graphic below is misleading.




When I signed up for chess.com I erroneously said something like "intermediate" when I was asked my skill level, and it assigned me a provisional rating, but then I also played others with new accounts too, who had provisional ratings, so my rating didn't stabilize to reflect my actual ability until I had played a larger subset of other established players.





So even though my three minute blitz stats page on my profile says my highest rating in that time control was 1077, it's actually currently the highest it has ever been, as a reflection of my actual performance against other established players.



Anyway, all this being said, I do believe that I will continue a long term trend of improvement with a continual cycling of blitz, rapid, and daily time controls, along with periodically taking in video lessons, and doing tactics puzzles.






Also, I have told a few friends this privately, but not made it public yet. I'll share it here first. I'm doing a knife give away soon where playing two games of chess with me, one as black, and one as white is the entry requirement. I have not yet determined the time control or other details yet.

 

[David Mary]

Okay.

Giveaway Thread 'ENDED: Checkmate/Leap of Faith GIVE AWAY!'

May 23, 2025

THIS CONTEST IS OPEN TO EVERYONE, even if you only signed up for Bladeforums five minutes ago!

I made a knife, based on the votes in the giveaway polls I started in my sub forum. I am not showing you the knife publicly, though a few of my friends have seen pics of it privately. If I see even one pic of this knife published anywhere, the give away is off, so don't ruin it. I put a lot of work and love into this knife. You can learn a bit about it by finding the polls in my subforum where the details of the knife were voted on. Rest assured this is a "pull out all the stops" knife and...

• David Mary
• Replies: 64
• Forum: David Mary Custom

• 
• 

 

[David Mary]

My tactical awareness suffered again for a while. Despite hitting my all time high in rapid of 1205 on February 12 2025, by the end of March I had hit 958. Nevertheless, I love chess, even though she hates me, and I persevered, and in the last month or so I have waffled between low 1100s and mid 900s. It seems like my lows came in tandem with tariff developments so I think my performance is tied in large part to stress.

I am still a little stressed over the border situation, but today after a month long climb back up from ~970, I climbed over 1100 again, just now, in a game as white against the Englund Gambit. I love when people play this opening against me. People at or around my level seem to think it is a good weapon because they are probably used to people falling for the trap. My theory is that their reliance on this unsound gambit is a symptom of poor tactical awareness, and if I can get the "out of book", they will blunder and give me the game. I think it usually works out in my favor (except when I blunder!), and this is one such example, which pushed me to 1107 today (10 min rapid time control).



BigBadManz (1081)

David Mary (1107)




And yet there is a terrifying video of Eric Rosen playing the Englund Gambit, sacrificing his queen, and crushing white.

 

[David Mary]

I find myself a hair over 1200 in rapid again, and yet the games I have been having prompted me to perform the following query:

Is it common for people, when they start increasing in rating on chess.com, to feel less like they are improving, and more like everyone else is just playing badly?

Here is the answer I got:

Yes, that feeling is very common, and it’s mostly a psychology + rating-system thing rather than reality.

Why it feels that way​

• As your rating climbs, you’re mostly paired with opponents who blunder a bit less but in different ways, so their mistakes can look “obvious” to you even though they weren’t obvious to you a few months ago.
• Improvement in chess is gradual and mostly shows up as “making fewer bad mistakes” and “punishing simple errors,” which feels like they are worse rather than you being better.
• Rating systems are relative: your number goes up if you’re doing better than your peer group, but from the inside it just feels like “these games are still messy, people still hang pieces, this can’t be real improvement.”

What is actually happening​

• You are noticing and exploiting more opponent mistakes than before, which is improvement; your pattern recognition and basic calculation are better, so blunders jump out at you.
• At the same time, you’re also much more aware of your own mistakes now, so subjectively you may feel just as “bad” as before, or even worse, because your standards went up faster than your skills.
• The pool around your rating is always a mix of under‑ and over‑rated players, people on tilt, people playing tired or casually, etc., so there will always be some games where your opponent looks inexplicably weak.

How to sanity‑check your progress​

• Compare your games from 3–6 months ago: do you still hang the same kinds of pieces, miss the same tactics, or misplay the same endgames? If not, you are improving, regardless of how “bad” others look now.
• Look at how you win: more wins from clean development, safe kings and basic tactics (forks, pins, mate nets) usually means real strength gain, not just rating inflation.
• Track accuracy or blunder counts over time (using game analysis tools); if your average mistakes per game are going down, that’s objective evidence of improvement.

How to keep a healthy mindset​

• Treat “everyone is playing badly” as a red flag: instead reframe it as “I’m getting good at spotting and punishing common mistakes.”
• Focus on process goals (good time management, blunder checks, applying studied ideas) rather than rating feelings after each session.
• Regularly review both wins and losses; if your victories still reveal clear things you could improve, there is more than enough room for growth—and that’s normal at every level.

So yes, your reaction is very normal, and it’s actually a subtle sign that your chess understanding and standards are rising faster than the raw rating can convey.

 

[David Mary]

Of all times for my internet to cut out.

 

[David Mary]

Just realized on post #124 I could have done Bxb5 like four moves earlier lol