Open Chess Study Group

When I was playing poker for a living, I noticed that players who made big strides very quickly always seemed to be part of a study group. It makes sense: a dynamic group can cover more ground and push each other to new heights. I’ve always wanted to be part of a study group like this for chess, but I’ve never quite found one that fits the bill. So I was thinking, why not try to make one?

I’ve been inspired by ML Collective, a free and open platform for machine learning research collaboration. They host a weekly Zoom paper reading group where cutting edge researchers present their work and anyone can join. I always admired this philosophy of radical accessibility and thought it could work well for chess.

With this in mind, I’m launching an open chess study group on April 17. The format will combine a presentation/discussion on a chess topic (in this case the Catalan opening) with play/practice focused on that topic. In chess, you haven’t really learned something until you’ve put it into practice, and the group format guarantees you have a training partner who’s working on the same thing as you.

For the first session, I’ll be the presenter, because I’m organizing it and, well, I knew I’d be available. But this won’t exactly be a chess class. Rather, I want to build a truly collaborative group where everyone feels comfortable contributing on equal footing. In the future, I’d like to do more events with different presenters.

The event is, of course, open to everyone, but especially followers of this newsletter. Hope to see you there!

https://lu.ma/o124iufk