Late 2 Chess – Details, episodes & analysis

L2C-04:  Top Ten Things That Helped Me - The ChessDojo

Vicki rejoins the podcast to bring everyone up to speed with my chess history prior to 2025.  It isn't much, but helps us to establish the starting point for my current chess journey.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess04 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-03:  Rediscovering Chess

Sorry for the delay, we had some technical difficulties getting the podcast feed setup, but we should be good to go now.  

On this episode, I go into the trials and tribulations that I went through as I began my chess journey.  What went well, what went poorly, and some of the challenges of learning this game on my own.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess03 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-02:  Bill's Chess History - Pre-2025

Vicki rejoins the podcast to bring everyone up to speed with my chess history prior to 2025.  It isn't much, but helps us to establish the starting point for my current chess journey.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess02 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-01:  Why Does This Podcast Exist

Welcome to the Late 2 Chess Podcast.  On this first episode, we go into why this podcast exists and what the goals are going forward.  

One of the frustrations that I see is the near constant r=refrain that if you did not start playing chess at "X years old" you can never be good at the game.  While it is true that is you start "late", you may never be a Grand Master or the World Champion.   I do not believe that with the modern chess training resources available that this is the case.  What is the limit?  I don't know. But what i do know is that there is no better time to start playing chess than today and until there is a time machine invented, that will always be true.  Also, the game can be great fun and getting better is a blast all by itself.  So lets see where we can go and how best to improve.  

Many of these episodes will be summaries of my own chess progress, what i find to work and what didn't work quite as well (yet).  I hope to be able to also have guests of all skill levels to discuss their journey and their experiences in learning the game of chess.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess01 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-06:  Top Ten Things That Helped Me - Game Annotations, Books, and Long Games

On this episode, I cover three more related areas that have helped me to progress up to around 1,000 Elo.  The first topic we cover is annotating your game and also reading annotated games by other players and masters.  I have found this to be very helpful in improving my understanding and thinking during a game and also has helped reduce my error frequency.  This then transitioned into annotated game books and other chess books, including a precaution for your book purchasing and reading.  Finally, I went into the effect that longer time control games have had on my games and thinking process.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess06

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-05:  Top Ten Things That Helped Me - YouTube and Podcasts

On this episode, we go through two more things that have helped me most to this point in getting better at chess, YouTube and Podcasts.  I recommend the YouTube channels that I have found to be most helpful to me on my journey to 1000 Elo, as well as several podcasts that I subscribe.  One important thing to know is that listening to a podcast or watching a YouTube video may not be the most highly impactful thing to your learning and growing as a chess player.  I often look at these resources as a soft learning time.  However, there are a few that I have found to be what i would term as opportunities for hard learning that will directly affect your game and help you to improve, if you pay full attention and likely take notes.  Chess improvement was never promised to be easy and some of the greatest gains can be made by doing the "hard" work.  

Also, I cannot say that I have found/watched/listened to all the YouTube channels and podcasts that are out.  Did i miss any?  Please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com.

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess05  

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C 019:  GM Jesse Kraai - Our First Ever Guest

We are humbled to have GM Jesse Kraai on the podcast.  Many of you will probably know him as a Grand Master in Chess, or as an excellent instructor on chess improvement, or as one of the three sensei's that started the ChessDojo.  We have been working in the Dojo for the past year and working directly with Jesse for the past 4 or 5 months.  We asked all your chess questions that we received on our Instagram, facebook, and email.  Plus we added a few of our own.

We barely scratched the surface and hope this is the first of many podcasts with Jesse.

Did you have any questions after the episode?  Let us know at Late2Chess@gmail.com.  Also, if you have any thoughts, topics and/or guest ideas, or solutions, please let us know.  

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/GMJesseKraai 

#chess #chesstournament #chesstournaments #TaoofChess  #mostExcellentRoadTo1500 #OurBumpyRoad #roadto1500Elo #roadtoDecentChess #DCP #decentChessPlayer #chessInstruction #adultimprover #adultimprovers #chessClub #clubChess #tournamentChess 

L2C 016: Book Review: The Tao of Chess - part 1

We started a new book review series with a Chess 101 book called The Tao of Chess. While it is a book centered on many of the most common chess principles that you may or may not have heard. What we did find though was that while this can be thought of as a fairly simplistic study into chess, it has as surprising amount of depth, and at this point it is very, very likely that we aren't even comprehending the full depth within this book, yet. In this part 1, we cover the first chapter that deals with the chess board itself. We hope you enjoy and this helps your game. What did we miss?  Did we get something wrong?  Let us know at Late2Chess@gmail.com If you have any thoughts, topics and/or guest ideas, or solutions, please let us know.   Welcome to the board. We hope you enjoy the show! For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess14 Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com

If you have any thoughts, ideas, or solutions, please let us know.  Please.

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess016

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-09:  Tournament Recap Part 2 with Dr Pop Pop

On this episode, our guest and I review his first live OTB chess tournament in several decades.  We played together at the West Virginia Senior Open a few weeks back and I thought it might be a good idea to get a second perspective on the tournament and how it was to play in his first live event this century.  We also talk about the group game reviews that we are part of within the Chess Dojo and how they have helped our games in so many ways.

I was incredibly happy to have him on as the first guest on the podcast.  He goes by Dr Pop Pop in the Chess Dojo, and we have been playing and learning together for the past several months.  He has grown as a player vastly in that short amount of time and is now really pushing his Elo up and I expect his rating to continue to climb. 

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess09 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com 

L2C-08:  Tournament - First and Latest

Work and then flu impacted the release of this weeks episode.  I had several in the queue but held them off for this one and then got hit with some nasty bug and couldn't talk (bad for podcasting, lol).  This episode started out with an earlier version where i went through a recap of my first ever OTB tournament, but then i thought that it would be better to cover my last OTB tournament as well.  So i did. 

Sorry for a bit of a hiccup in the release schedule.   

PS the episode queue is still a few deep, so if you have any questions, they are not being ignored.  Coming soon!

PS2 let me know if you like these, i have several recorded in the queue and can release them or ditch them.  Your call.

Welcome to the board.

We hope you enjoy the show!

For a link to the podcast, please use:  https://tinyurl.com/Late2Chess08 

Also, if you'd like any topics, guests, or have any questions, please let me know at Late2Chess@gmail.com