The most ambitious approach to studying a master game requires looking it over more than once. Masters often say the ideal is three times. Each of the three play-throughs has its own tempo, goals and priorities.
The first play-through
…you should play the moves fairly quickly the first time. Try to make the moves on a board or computer screen at a uniform pace. It should feel comfortable – five, ten, 20 seconds per move or more. Whatever speed isn't too fast for you.
The aim here is to appreciate the flow of the game:
* When did it become sharp?
* When did someone seize the initiative?
* When did a serious advantage appear?
* When was the outcome clear?
Don't read the annotations during your first look at the game.
There will be time for that in the two follow-up looks.
…many students find it easiest to input the game score into a computer and then click through them. If, instead, you play over the game manually, from a book, you may get hung up on individual moves. |
Pausing before the second play-through
David Bronstein recommended pausing before taking the second look.
Put the game aside, he said, "get a cup of tea or coffee, relax and try your best to recall the spectacle of what you have just seen." Don't try to remember specific moves unless they were truly stunning.
The second play-through
Now it's time for the second look. Let's assume you are working with a well-annotated account of the game.
This is the time when you want to get a taste of the notes.
But focus mainly on the words. You don't want to get bogged down on something like "if 76…Bxc2 then 77.Rc1." Instead, you want to benefit from the teaching points that a good annotator will be making.
By the end of the second play-through, you should have a much clearer idea of what [one player] was trying to do and what [the other player] succeeded in doing.
The third play-through
What you won't be concerned with in the second play-through are the finer points of move-by-move-analysis.
You may not even have a clue as to what the mistakes were. But you will during the third play-through.
In addition, you should try to appreciate more of the mysteries of the game, such as why moves that seemed obviously good to you weren't played. The answer usually lies in tactics.
The third play-through will reveal many subtle points that you never suspected existed in the first two looks you had of the game.
When you're done looking at a game, there is one final step: Try to sum it up in words. Too often a student finishes a master game and believes the outcome depended entirely on tactics, the way his own games are decided.
Try to explain the game in your own words. Imagine you are the teacher one more time and you are trying to make sense of the game to another student.
One last bit of advice. Whether you are going over a game in this ambitious way or in a less rigorous manner, make sure you take another look at that game some time later. Not the following week and certainly not the next day. Perhaps a few months later is best. This has the effect of reinforcing what you've learned – before you've completely forgotten it.
