15+10 Is All You Need

I’ve been on a mission to find a chess study plan that works for adults. This challenge is to figure out something that 1) actually works and 2) people will do. Combining both of these factors turns out to be harder than it seems, but I think Elizabeth Spiegel has cracked the code.

Spiegel is the longtime coach of IS 318 in New York City. You might have seen them in the documentary Brooklyn Castle. On the Dojo Podcast, Spiegel shared her standard homework assignment for all of her students:

• 3 rapid games

• 20 correct puzzles

It seems almost too simple, yet Spiegel’s program has won 58 (!!!) national championships. As soon as I heard it, I realized the same plan could be adapted for adults.

What I like about the plan

The first thing I like about it is that it’s on a weekly (not daily) schedule. When I’ve tried to create specific daily schedules, similar to a workout plan, I find that most adults struggle to follow them. Their schedules are too chaotic and chess is not a high enough priority. Using a weekly schedule allows for more wiggle room while still providing some structure.

I also like that the plan simplifies it down to the two most critical activities, playing and solving. In a study plan workshop I ran at the beginning of this year, I broke it down into four pillars: play, review, solve, learn. But as long as you’re clear that you need to review every game, reviewing can be rolled into the play category.

And, this is heresy to many adults, but you don’t actually need to learn that much new information to get better at chess. Mostly, you need a lot of practice. If you review your games thoughtfully and take the lessons to heart, that’s probably enough new information right there.

Additionally, for most of my adult students, learning new stuff is their favorite part of chess, so I figure they’ll do books and courses whether or not it’s part of the study plan. It’s the playing and solving where I need to hold their feet to the fire to make sure they get the minimum practice to keep improving.

Adapting it to Adults

Adults do experience chess differently than kids, so there’s a few things I would tweak.

First, while kids often like to play faster, for most adults I would suggest the 15+10 time control. Adults players tend to be more deliberative, whereas kids are more intuitive, so they appreciate the extra time. No time control is a silver bullet, but I’ve found 15+10 is in a sweet spot where it’s slow enough to get a really good game in, but fast enough to fit into most schedules.

Second, for most people, I think it’s easier to set a time goal, rather than a correct answer goal, for puzzles. This makes it more predictable for scheduling, and in my opinion, emphasizes the right thing: it doesn’t really matter how many puzzles you get right in a given week, the important thing is to do the work consistently.

By the way, given a fixed amount of time, it is better to spread out your practice over multiple days than cramming it all in one day; i.e., ten minutes of puzzles six days a week is better than one hour once a week.

The puzzle trainers on Chess.com or Lichess are the easiest way to get started, but if you want to get a little more advanced, you could consider tailoring the puzzle source to your goals. For example, if you ultimately want to improve at OTB chess, you could focus on puzzles from a book, set up on a physical board, to train your board vision for what you’ll experience at a tournament.

Finally, if you want to include learning as part of the plan, my suggestion is to get obsessed with one topic (for example, rook endgames). A good way to choose this is either your biggest weakness, or what you enjoy most. Focus on this one area for six weeks to three months, then move on to something else.

Wrapping Up

I recently heard a commercial for a financial advisor that emphasized how individualized the service was. This sounds great, but the truth is, most people do not really need a lot of individualization. If you make automated contributions to a low cost index fund, you’ll probably get better results than the vast majority of advisors, with no cost and very little effort.

Likewise in chess, an individualized solution sounds good in a coaching bio (ironically, every coach’s bio says the same thing). But the truth is, most players would benefit from doing most of the same things: play focused games, review them, solve puzzles, and pick up some new ideas along the way.

If this plan was good enough for Spiegel’s students to win 58 national championships, it’s probably good enough for you to improve.